Slick presentations and high quality ideas, presented in the Martini Church. Three student entrepreneurs from the Hanze University pitched their startup during the finals of the Anner Award last week. After a final selection, a qualifying round and a series of workshops in April, the three finalists competed for a €2,500 prize, a marketing consult and participation in the Venturelab program.
The Anner Award is named after the very entrepreneurial Hanze student Anner van der Mheen, who passed away in 2011. The award celebrates what he represented: endless curiosity and connecting and inspiring people.
The shortest route to the coolest parties
Wonder when your favorite artist will perform or where the best parties are this weekend in Groningen? What do you do? Google it of course. Right? But you’ll get lost in all the not so relevant search results.
Until now, because Wouter Bijen, student Software Engineering at the Hanzehogeschool, will bring an end to this chaos with his startup Festimap. With the easy search functions you’ll find the best parties, concerts and festivals in your area within a few seconds. “But what about the competition?”, the judges ask. “And who would you partner with?”
“There’s one competitor doing something similar in the US, but they’re using data provided by venues and ticket sellers”, says Wouter. “That works just fine in the US, but in other countries, you’ll need local contacts. We use an algorithm, so it will be pretty easy for us to roll out Festimap in other countries, once we’re ready. As for partnering up, there’s the Spotify API we can use and I think it will also make for a good partner.”
Satisfaction
Fimme Marra is studying Industrial Engineering and Management at Hanze University. During this study he established his own company Satys-Fact. Fimme thought, based on his own experience, that surveys in education could improve greatly. It could be done much better and in a more appealing way. He has developed a tool that can be used to collect feedback fast and easy.
Fimme soon realized that there was also a great need in the commercial market and the health care sector for collecting customer, employee or patient feedback. Meanwhile Satys-Fact helps supermarkets, schools and hospitals with various feedback tools. Besides further growing his company, he’s writing his bachelor thesis at his own company.
“But what about people trying to mess with the system?” the jury asks. “Are there any safeguards?” “We’ve made sure the panel and screen are not easy to reach for kids”, Fimme says. “But the system also registers the frequency and timing of the survey answers. So if the response time is a lot faster than you would normally expect, we won’t register it as a valid response. And there’s also a 60 second wait between being able to fill out the surveys.”
Modular gaming controller
Ba The Nguyen is studying Business Administration at NHL Stenden in Leeuwarden. Tech enthusiast, entrepreneur and gamer, trying to realize a dream by building the first controller that brings you total freedom. The Po!nt controller is world's first modular, universal and ergonomic controller.
Adjustable to every personal need, you can customize and personalize everything you wish for. From PC to Xbox and Playstation, it is the world's first universal controller and it has been designed to fit perfectly in the palm of your hands. Ba was selected to show his first prototype during the CES Convention in Las Vegas, but unfortunately, he couldn’t bring the latest prototype with him this evening.
“How will you produce these controllers on a large scale if it turns out to be a hit?” the jury asks. “Well, we’re already working together with a factory in Emmen. We’re starting out with a limited number of consoles, but it’s fairly easy to scale up the production if needed”, Ba says.
Double victory, double the money
After careful deliberation, both the Public Choice Award and the main prize went to Fimme Marra. The jury praised his sincere and open way of pitching Satys-Fact and in a suprise turn of events, one of the judges, who happens to be one of the founders of YoungCapital, decided to double the prize money.
