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- May
2016
Kiwigrid, Mobisol, Kebony, Lumenaza, BEN Energy and Electrochaea win Ecosummit Award 2016 in Berlin
Ecosummit TV: Ecosummit’s mission is to accelerate smart green startups, investors and corporates with our events and Ecosummit TV. In fact, we accelerated our video production, too, and already uploaded 20 videos mixed live at ECO16 Berlin to YouTube. Last week, 250 happy participants temporarily populated the Radialsystem and enjoyed an amazing conference that was packed with lots of business and investment opportunities. In the evening of the first conference day, 26 April 2016, we announced the 6 new winners of the Ecosummit Award 2016. 58 nominees from 13 countries created public startup profiles on Ecosummit Market and were judged by 43 judges during the online voting before the conference. The 3 ECO16 Award winners in the late stage startup category (> €2M revenues 2015) are: Kiwigrid winning Gold and €1.5K prize money, Mobisol receiving Silver and €1K and Kebony scoring Bronze and €500. The 3 ECO16 Award winners in the early stage startup category (< €2M revenues 2015) are: Lumenaza winning Gold and €1.5K prize money, BEN Energy earning Silver and €1K and Electrochaea collecting Bronze and €500. Congrats to all the winners for convincing our judges that your smart green startup rocks.
Read more- 26
- March
2015
Jan Marckhoff pitches BEN Energy
Ecosummit TV: Jan Marckhoff pitches BEN Energy at ECO14 Berlin. The smart green startup enables customer intelligence and engagement for utilities and competes with Opower and Tendril. Being the market leader in Switzerland, BEN Energy recently entered the German market and already won a large customer and a powerful distribution partner. The founders successfully bootstrapped their spin-off from ETH Zurich to €1M annual revenues and are currently raising their first financing round. Jan will pitch again at ECO15 Berlin to change the way people experience energy.
Read more- 9
- August
2013
Smart green lean startup panel with Cleantech Invest, Savosolar, Wellington Partners, Icos Capital and Ben Energy
Ecosummit TV: Tarja Teppo (Cleantech Invest) moderates the smart green lean startup panel at ECO13 Berlin featuring Jari Varjotie (Savosolar), Bart Markus (Wellington Partners), Peter van Gelderen (Icos Capital) and Jan Marckhoff (Ben Energy). Given that most cleantech startups are capital- and time-intensive, we believe that the lean startup philosophy is the right medicine. Lean startup is all about resource efficient product development with fast iterations to achieve product market fit without wasting too much time and money. While lean startup works well for software startups, the question is whether it can also be applied to hardware startups. For the strategy discussion between the startup management and their VCs, lean startup also means to take smart make or buy decisions to maintain focus and, for example, outsource manufacturing or distribution to reduce CAPEX and OPEX. During an inspiring discussion, our panelists share their experience with being lean while being clean.
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- June
2013
Jan Marckhoff pitches Ben Energy from Switzerland
Ecosummit TV: Jan Marckhoff pitches Ben Energy at ECO13 Berlin. The Swiss startup is a spin-off from ETH Zurich and already provides their customer engagement solution to 17 utilities in Switzerland, covering 25% of the Swiss market. Being financed by the founders and customers so far, Ben Energy now looks for €1.2M Series A to increase their sales team in Germany and other new territories. Ben Energy competes with Opower that raised $65M and has got 400 employees. Comparing the two startups, it’s fair to say that the really lean startup comes from Switzerland. In my personal opinion, Ben Energy is a great investment opportunity for any cleantech VC who likes fast scalable business models that are capital-light and proven in the market. Opower may be their exit channel.
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