Together with Berlin Partner, Hamburg Invest, and Köln Business, Munich Startup organized a booth at Slush this year. In addition to the ecosystems themselves, various startups from the respective cities presented themselves there for two days. For Munich, these were Farminsect, Fernride, Justt, and Mily Technologies. Each of the startups was able to decorate the booth with its content for half a day and meet with investors, partners, and other interested parties there.
Felix Braune, co-founder of Justt, says about the booth:
“That’s really cool. With the booth, it’s easy to arrive at the fair and you don’t just wing it here. You have people right away that you can work with.”
The rest of the startup festival also made an impression on the founder:
“The exchange with other startups was really fantastic, I learned a lot from them. I also had a whole series of valuable investor conversations. In terms of content, Slush’s focus is somewhat different from what’s relevant for us, but in the end, the two days were absolutely worth it.”
For other startups, the presence at the booth was less important. Fernride, for example, with CEO Hendrik Kramer and CCO & CFO Martin Isik on site, could barely keep up with meeting requests, according to their own account: both representatives of the startup were in conversations every half hour for both days.
Aleksander Buha and Miloš Zlatković, the founders of Mily Technologies, were particularly impressed by two things at Slush:
“On the one hand, it’s really amazing that at Slush you meet so many high-caliber decision-makers who normally seem completely out of reach. You rarely get into conversations with them so easily otherwise. In conversations with other startups and at the presentations on the stages, on the other hand, you realize how much work it can be to lead a startup to success. It’s simply confirmed over and over again: success only comes through hard work.”
Farminsect wins pitch competition
An important part of Slush is the side events distributed throughout Helsinki. These are not only venues for in-depth networking; startups often have the opportunity to present themselves to a selected audience. This was also the case at the evening event hosted by Munich Startup and its partners. There, the startups from the respective ecosystems competed against each other in 90-second pitches. In the race for first place in Munich, Farminsect prevailed in an incredibly close race. The subsequent networking didn’t wrap up until late into the night.
Farminsect co-founder Thomas Kuehn concludes:
“Slush was a great event for us with very good contacts, and we’re very grateful to Munich Startup for the excellent organization and support. It was great to be able to participate in the pitch competition, and we’re thrilled that we won. The competition was well organized and the conversations on site were very fruitful.”
Many Munich startups at Slush
Of course, the Munich Startup delegation was not the only representative of the Munich ecosystem. Numerous other startups from the state capital filled the halls of Slush. Nathan Evans, co-founder of Fulfin, draws the following conclusion from Slush:
“This is the best or second-best startup event I’ve attended so far. It’s something very special and much better than the South Summit in Madrid or Sifted in London. At Slush with its legendary after-events, you meet numerous movers, shakers, and players, not just spectators; the number of startups and investors complements each other well. Our visit here helped us tremendously; we were approached by many investors we had been trying to reach for a long time.”
