Last night, at a packed event in London’s TechHub, A&N Media awarded five yearlong 1M/1M scholarships. The judges for the contest were Kevin Beatty, CEO of A&N Media, Dominique Trempont, Board Member of DMGT (parent company of A&N Media), Bill Raduchel, Strategic Advisor to DMGT, Alberto Torres, former EVP and GM of Nokia’s MeeGo division, and me.
Let’s review the businesses we saw.
goCarShare
Drummond Gilbert, pitched goCarShare to connect drivers with paying passengers who wish to travel the same way, allowing them to share the journey costs. It uses Facebook to connect users with friends of friends and a rating system to help create a trusted community. goCarShare will take a commission of 15 % of the paid transaction between the passenger and driver.
Platter
Will Hodson pitched Platter, a cross between Instagram and Pinterest for food, along with other features such as micro blogging, vertical search, and so forth. Will proposes to use affiliate marketing as a way of monetization similar to what Pinterest is attempting.
Fitness Freak
Shara Tochia pitched Fitness Freak, a bookable Web platform that allows users to search for and book fitness classes and activities. It also integrates with booking partners to offer an easy-to-use service and a review platform for journalists and users.
Insane Logic
Next, Zoe Peden pitched Insane Logic and an educational iPad app called MyChoicePad. It uses symbols and sign language with speech to enable choice and communication for children and adults with learning or communication difficulties.
PopUpShopUp
Then Steven Lucero pitched PopUpShopUp, a social media for popup shops, restaurants, cinema, entertainment, charities or any and all temporary retail events, utilizing a curated member-based website, www.popupshopup.com, weekly email newsletter, mobile application and check-in technology. PopUpShopUp aims to become the marketplace for consumers to visit to learn about all popup events first in London, then throughout the UK and finally, in the top 100 urban areas of the world.
Hire Space
The next business pitched was Hire Space, a website that allows you to find, book and pay for publicly available space online. Hire Space works with a diverse range of venues, from schools to private function venues and provides a platform for the sale of associated services such as catering and entertainment.
TimeMaps
Jonny Britton pitched TimeMaps, a company that makes digital history maps to illustrate events over time. The company sells to schools, homeschoolers, parents and other educators all over the world.
Simplytics
Jason Cooper pitched Simplytics, a mobile advertising engagement analytics model to help better measure user engagement with ads.
Enjoy! Karaoke
Neill Watson pitched Enjoy! Karoke, a Facebook game that taps into the vast pool of singing fun that dominates prime time TV.
Thestudentjob
Jack Tang pitched Thestudentjob.com, a social-network-based job portal connecting students with local employers looking for casual staff on a one-off or part-time basis.
The winners of the contest were: Enjoy! Karaoke, Thestudentjob, InsaneLogic, Platter, and goCarShare.
As always, I would very much like to hear about your business, so let me invite you to come and pitch at one of our free 1M/1M public roundtables. We will be holding future roundtables at 8:00 a.m. PDT on:
-Tuesday, May 29, Contest With Imperial College Entrepreneurs To Win 1M/1M Scholarships From A&N Media & Elance: Register Here.
-Thursday, May 31, 1M/1M Roundtable: Register Here.
-Monday, June 4, Ten Finalists of BlueSnap Elance Entrepreneur Development Contest Awarding 1M/1M Scholarships: Register Here.
-Thursday, June 7, Ten Finalists of BlueSnap Elance Entrepreneur Development Contest Awarding 1M/1M Scholarships Register Here.
-Thursday, June 14, 1M/1M Roundtable: Register Here.
-Tuesday, June 19, Contest With London School of Economics Entrepreneurs to Win 1M/1M Scholarships From A&N Media & Elance: Register Here.
-Thursday, June 21, 1M/1M Roundtable With Innovation Pavilion: Register Here.
-Tuesday, June 26, Contest With University College London Entrepreneurs to Win 1M/1M Scholarships From A&N Media & Elance Register Here.
-Thursday, June 28, 1M/1M Roundtable With Boulder, Colorado Entrepreneurs: Register Here.
If you want a deeper relationship with me, you are very welcome to join the 1M/1M premium program. If you have any questions about the program, please, first study the website, especially What to expect from the 1M/1M premium program and the FAQs. If you have additional questions, please email me, and I would be very happy to respond. Please note that I work exclusively with 1M/1M entrepreneurs.
I also invite you to join the 1M/1M mailing list for the ease and convenience of getting updates. This way we can stay in touch, and it will help you to decide if 1M/1M is a program for you.
Sramana Mitra is the founder of the One Million by One Million (1M/1M) initiative, an educational, business development and incubation program that aims to help one million entrepreneurs globally to reach $1 million in revenue and beyond. She is a Silicon Valley entrepreneur and strategy consultant, she writes the blog Sramana Mitra On Strategy, and is author of the Entrepreneur Journeys book series and Vision India 2020. From 2008 to 2010, Mitra was a columnist for Forbes. As an entrepreneur CEO, she ran three companies: DAIS, Intarka, and Uuma. Sramana has a master’s degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.