And the winner is…
Recently I had the honor and pleasure to moderate the 4th Pitch Party organized by the Wirtschaftsjunioren Düsseldorf.
That guy again…
More images can be found here.
Author Archives: Vidar Andersen
Pitching the state of NRW for Startups in Moscow, Russia
So that’s what my name looks like in Russian
Recently I was invited by the city of Düsseldorf (the capital of NRW) and NRW.INVEST to be a part of a delegation with the Lord Mayor of Düsseldorf, Thomas Geisel and others, to spread the gospel about why the German state of North-Rhine Westphalia (NRW – where I have now been living for the 12 last years) is a great place for startups in Moscow, Russia (sister city of Düsseldorf).
Talked a little bit about why NRW is a good place for startups, the biggest exits we’ve seen and which startups who could be having the next big exits here
As you might know, this has been a pet peeve of mine for years and I was delighted to be able to help shed some light on why this region has a lot to offer and why I have been staying on here as a foreign startup founder all these years.
Some impressions:
Yup. That guy again…
Fun fact; Turned out Sigmar Gabriel was also staying at Ritz Carlton Moscow – so we photobombed his press conference
Here are the slides I used:
Why Corporates Engage with Startups @ Henkel
Henkel HQ, Düsseldorf
Recently I was invited by Henkel to keynote at “Henkel Startup-Day”, an internal innovation event at their HQ with +300 participants about why and how corporations engage with startups (and sometimes vice versa).
A participant describing my Keynote:
[…] Vidar Andersen, asked us to talk to a person we don’t know at all. A fairly easy task: I turned to the left and talked to a guy that was doing a dual course of studies with Henkel. At that moment he was writing about collaboration between companies and startups. Stunning, his enthusiasm and concentration paying attention to every single detail that was said. Andersen made one point clear that big companies have to be faster and adapt flexibly to startups’ pace in order to be successful. He also mentioned a splendid quote from Claus Schwab: “In the new world, it’s not the big fish that eats the small fish. It’s the fast fish that eats the slow fish”. With his funny sayings he made the audience laugh their ass off. – Amina Mrad on Medium
These these were the slides I used:
Corporate Innovation – On Onassis’ Yacht
On a boat…
Who says corporate innovation has to be boring?
The office today… A yacht previously owned by Onassis.
I don’t often post about what we do with +ANDERSEN & ASSOCIATES for corporations and their innovation programs, because they don’t hire us for me to have yet another stage to talk about myself.
But from time to time I make an exception. This is one of those times.
Today, the office for the regular support and feedback session with the innovation teams of a Dutch corporate customer was a bit different.
It was on a yacht. And not any old yacht. A yacht previously owned by Onassis.
You might know I’m a huge opponent of running a corporate innovation theatre, so why a yacht as an office?
First of all, it’s important to get the innovation teams off-site, as far away from the long arm of daily operations for these kinds of sessions. (And as an added bonus, if you chose somewhere nice, it doesn’t hurt the inspiration of the teams.)
Secondly, we’re darn frugal. It was cheaper to rent the yacht than renting a off-site conference facility for the same day. Incredible!
The captain explaining the technology capabilities of the conference room…
Pitch Please! with MTP Köln
Pitch Please! with MTP Köln @ STARTPLATZ Cologne 17.06.2017
Recently I was invited to coach and prepare the startups participating in the “Pitch Please!” event and we had a lot of fun.
Pitch Please! is a startup pitching event during the CAMPUS Startup-Days organized by MTP Cologne in cooperation with Hgnc – hochschulgründernetz cologne, Entrepreneurs Club Cologne – ECC, Gateway – Gründungsservice der Universität zu Köln and STARTPLATZ.
You can find more pictures from the event here.