Join me at Constructor University as we launch migrant entrepreneurs with world-changing ideas. Deep tech, UNSDGs, Diversity – that is what “Synthesis” is about.
Here’s why to apply:
Become a future-proof entrepreneur: Learn from the best and thrive in a rapidly changing world.
Make a real difference: Tackle global challenges and contribute to a better tomorrow while getting a potential investment of up to €100K!
Join a vibrant community: Network with passionate individuals from around the globe.
Turn your idea into reality: Get expert support and mentorship to launch your startup and get mentorship from people like myself!
Applications close March 25th, here’s how to apply.
P.S. Know someone this program would be perfect for? Spread the word!
I’m back also this year mentoring startups at the (rebranded) Young Entrepreneurship Summit run entirely by students at Constructor University in Bremen, DE.
About YES
“The Young Entrepreneur Summit is the ideal springboard for you to project that unique idea!
Contest your idea, benefit from the expertise of successful entrepreneurs through our one-to-one mentorship process, and win thousands of euros to kick-start your venture!
Here at Young Entrepreneur Summit, we guide you from your first business idea towards your very own company—from vision to venture.
From the first application round, you will be provided with valuable advice from experienced founders and entrepreneurship professionals and get a chance to participate in webinars that introduce you to the most important aspects of founding your own business.
The best ten teams will be paired with a personal mentor to guide them through the last application round and prepare them for their pitch during the final event on the Constructor University campus.”
As you may or may not already know, as the co-founder of the Rheinland Pitch, Germany’s largest startup pitching event founded back in 2013, I’ve been preparing and training the applying startups how to pitch investors.
And with training how to pitch, I don’t mean how to put on a song and dance in front of investors – I mean how to actually find investors, how to contact investors, what investors are looking for, how the funding game works, and the contents of what and how to actually pitch investors successfully – with my in-person Pitching Masterclass.
So far I’ve trained over 3.000 startups how to successfully pitch in person.
Over the years I’ve also been booked by companies, events, organisations, startup programs (like incubators and accelerators), and universities and colleges, to help their employees, members, startups, and students improve their pitching skills.
Happy customers include KIT ( Karlsruher Institut für Technologie), Cologne Business School, Heinrich Heine Universität Düsseldorf, RTL Journalistenschule, Bertelsmann, Budapest Enterprise Agency, USAID, DMEXCO, Web Summit, Pirate Summit, Medien Gruppe RTL, ottobock, Zentis, Founders Foundation, 0-1 Booster (Japan), Startup Nano (Portugal), Startup Braga (Portugal), IHK, DigitalHUB Aachen, DigitalHUB Düsseldorf, DigitalHUB Bonn, DigitalHUB Cologne, Reifenhäuser, etc.
But until now, you’d have to be able to attend an in-person Pitching Masterclass to enjoy the benefits.
As the Pitching Masterclass has been evolving and updating – and the aggregated collective wisdom of the thousands of startups I’ve been working with for over the last 11 years – I thought it was a damned shame that you could only access the knowledge if you were somehow able to attend an in-person Masterclass.
So to be able to help as many people as possible to pitch investors for raising funds, I’ve now created and released a 100% digital version of the Pitching Masterclass open for anyone, anywhere, anytime!
So, got startup? Get smart, get funded: Enroll today.
Also available: Corporate Edition
And that’s not all; I’ve also created a different version for employees wanting to secure buy-in from stakeholders for their innovation ideas and for companies wanting to train their employees to be better at pitching new innovations internally. Spoiler alert: corporate innovation ventures are not startups and they need a different approach to securing funding and support. This version includes a framework for getting to yes, for securing buy-in from stakeholders and an additional very useful alternative pitch format to the classic pitch deck just for corporates. Here’s how to learn more about this corporate edition.
Also available: Unlimited Edition
Both versions of my Pitching Masterclass are available either as a single user for startups and employees AND as an subscription edition with unlimited users for companies, organisations, startup support programs, and educational institutions who want to make it available to all of their employees, members, startups, or students on-demand. Here’s how to learn more about the unlimited users options.
Contents
What you can expect is +2 hours of video and +370 slides with these topics and contents in a user friendly web-based learning interface:
INTRO
Intro
Welcome
About your instructor
BEFORE YOU START PITCHING
First thing first
The Basics
Your competition today
Capital available today
HOW TO RAISE MONEY
Funding sources available to you
What investors are looking for
How the funding game works
When should you raise money
How to find investors
How to contact investors
PITCHING
Pitching TL;DR
The three pitch types
The High-Concept Pitch
The Elevator Pitch
The Pitch Deck (The Funding Pitch)
Final words
ADDENDUM 20.1 Startup metrics 20.2 Pitching Tricks 20.3 Further Resources 20.4 AirBnB’s first (successful) pitch deck 20.5 Acknowledgements
And what a spectacular Rheinland Pitch Winter Finals 2024 it was in KOMED, Cologne!
This year, based on the experience and feedback gathered from doing this for over 10 years now, we mixed it up a little to make it even more interesting for the audience – and to give even more startups the exposure: We decided to try three different categories with three startups pitching in each.
The categories were Sustainability, Generative AI, and Female Entrepreneurship. The finalists were:
Sustainability:
Beaverdesk
Innovative Robot Delivery
Fainin GmbH
Generative AI:
Panos AI
Cityscaper
LABNODE
Female Entrepreneurship:
KOHO Smart
Campus Cruiser
Qizify Learning
And then the startups pitched…
The jury considered each pitches, asked questions… With the Rheinland Pitch finals format we have a panel of expert judges that count for 50% of the weight of the votes together with 50% of the audience.
The audience asked questions…
The audience also voted…
And then it was time for the classic networking break with Currywurst.
Networking is at least half the value of the event.
And it wouldn’t been possible to put on a flawless event without a lot of great helpers!
Guess who’s back, guess who’s back, guess who’s back… at the digitalHUB Aachen e.V. for the seventh year in a row now, again supporting the 2023 batch of 12 incubated startups with a custom version of the Lean Launchpad (LLP) program.
Together over the years we have been able to achieve an incredible 87% survival rate of their incubated startups.
So what is the Lean Launchpad (LLP)? It’s the world’s premier early-start support program that originated at Stanford and Berkeley over 10 years ago and has since spread to top universities, GOs, NGOs, startup support programs, and corporate innovation programs world wide. It applies an evidence-based process, going from beliefs to facts. It lets the idea evolve by exposing it to unbiased feedback from the market at incredible speed instead of applying a top-down linear creationism approach (that rarely – if ever – works out) at a snail’s pace. It’s 20% theory, 80% hands on experience, and 100% peer dynamics, 100% reality-based, 100% engaging.
The LLP has been tested by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) – a 7 BILLION USD public fund that finances commercialisation of publicly funded research in the US – and found so radically effective for increasing the fundability of early-stage ventures that the LLP has been mandated into US law: If you want funding from the NSF, you first have to attend an LLP program – it’s the law.
The good thing about the Lean Launchpad is that it has no lock-in, no licensing model, or other such nonsense. And you can send your own faculty, staff, and employees to be trained and certified as an LLP Educator at great universities around the world once you’re comfortable with the program and would decide to move it in-house.
Let me know if you want to know more about the Lean Launchpad (LLP) and how it can help radically improve the outcomes of your students, startup support program, or corporate innovation program – Phone: +4915140133149 Mail: [email protected] Zoom: https://ohours.youcanbook.me/
