🌍 Climatetech, Cloud Summit, Fitness, Leaving to start a company
This week there's lots of climate tech news, a Cloud Summit, news of a new fund, funding rounds, partnerships, we countdown to Turing Fest, multiple awards openings, and we hear from Dan Hespe from Onya.
But before that, exited founder Tadas Labudis shares about his early journey.
I couldn't leave my job to start a company
Work is a big part of my identity. I often conflate it with self-worth, which I know is unhealthy. It’s a bad habit that’s hard to shake, even after years of enduring mood swings directly linked to how well I do at work on any given day.
So when I meet new people and the question of “what do you do” comes up, I secretly like it. I like it because it allows me to share a mini-version of my founding story and its core to who I am.
“I couldn’t leave my job to start a company.”
This is the most common response I hear. It’s a knee-jerk reaction to something people perceive as a large, uncertain, and unpleasant undertaking. I usually take it as a compliment, but in this post, I wanted to explore some of the considerations that made me take the plunge.
For context, in 2017, I left my job as a Product Manager to pursue a startup called Prodsight as a solo founder. In 2022 I successfully sold it, which now, six years later, validates that decision, but obviously, at the time, I had no clue how it was going to pan out.
This post is not meant to convince anyone to do what I did but instead offer a perspective of the factors that might lead one down the path of entrepreneurship....
To continue reading the full post, go here to Tadas's blog.
This post snippet has been re-shared from Tadas's new newsletter, which you can subscribe to here.
Tadas Labudis is the founder of Prodsight which exited to Playvox in 2022.
🌊 Updates
🔒 Edinburgh-based Pasabi (digital fraud detection platform) raised £2.4m in a round led by VeUP. Congrats! PS UKTN
🐠 Dundee-based Ace Aquatec (sustainable aquaculture technology) raised £2.5m in a round led by Earth Capital Limited TS DGT SFN
🚜 Building in climatetech or agritech? The Climate Innovation Hub has just been announced. Based in Glensaugh in Aberdeen, it's a 1,000 hectare research farm, offices, and conference facilities and is available for tech companies to access. DGT
🌎 10 Climatetech firms from Scotland are showcasing in London next week. They include Reath, Krucial, Intelligent Growth Solutions, Trojan Energy, arbnco, CCU International, Global Surface Intelligence, iOPt , Topolytics, and Trade in Space FS
🤝 Scotland-based Good-Loop announced a new partnership with Captify to help them measure the carbon emissions generated by their digital ads in real time. Congrats! DGT
💰 New fund: N4 Partners (PE/advisory firm) has announced SEIS/EIS N4 Ventures. Expecting to invest £100-750k with a fund size of £3-5m. Sector agnostic but focusing on underrepresented female founders and those working in NetZero, SaaS, Healthtech, Life Sciences, Cyber, Spacetech, and Fintech. TS IN
🐝 Scottish Regional VC Par Equity has obtained B Corp certification. SFN
🔻 UK Tech investments fell 57% according to Atomico. That compares to a 55% and 44% decrease in France and Germany respectively. Report Link DGT
👜 Scotland-based GP Dr Catherine Fernando launched IYASU, a line of luxury medical bags specifically designed for women. SFN
⛓️ Edinburgh-based Zumo (crypto digital assets infrastructure) launched Oxygen, a tool to help verify that blockchain activities are offest by renewable sources. DGT
♻️ The TechX Clean Energy Accelerator graduated 12 companies as part of its 2023 co-hort. Demo day winners included Fluxart (decarbonising aviation), and Wastewater Fuels (green hydrogen from wastewater). SS IN
✈️ New Air Routes announced
🇦🇱 Edinburgh -> Tirana, Albania (Ryanair, Wizz Air) YH BTN
🇮🇹 Edinburgh -> Catania, Italy (Easyjet) TH
🇹🇷 Edinburgh -> Antalya, Türkiye (Easyjet) TH
🇩🇪 Glasgow -> Munich, Germany (Lufthansa) TH
🤖 Countdown to Turning Fest
Turing Fest is just around the corner. In the lead up we're highlighting different speakers we're looking forward to:
🎨 April Dunford, Positioning Expert, Ambient Strategy
🤖 Fergal Reid, Director of Machine Learning, Intercom
🏄♀️ Leah Tharin, Head of Product, Jua
🙏 Asks & Offers
📖 Have a book recommendation? We'll be starting to share founder-to-founder recommendations next week.
👵 Have a parent or grandparent who you’d love to preserve a memoir from? Get 20% off Storii’s AI Biography Rewrite Tool by using using code CAMPFIRE here. Also available on Amazon in the UK and it's prime-available.
👩🏫 A group of founders who aren’t satisfied with the current offering in Scotland for power-venture investor readiness are thinking about running a week-long sprint, specifically targeting companies who want to understand how to run international power-venture investment rounds, without the bs. 👉 I’m interested
🤝 Looking for a co-founder? Let us know and we'll post a blurb!
👋 A few questions with Daniel Hespe, founder at OnYa
What's OnYa?
Onya is a gamified marketplace for the health and fitness industry, with a goal of helping people to create the habit of exercise.
How did you get involved?
I have worked in the fitness industry for the last 10 years as a coach, PT and operations manager, both here in the UK and my home country of Australia. I’ve always been fascinated by the ability of technology to have a positive influence on people’s lives at scale. In a gym or studio you can only reach and help a limited number of people, with technology there is no limit. That’s what inspired me to start Onya.
What's the problem you're solving?
Onya solves a number of problems for our 3 stakeholders. These stakeholders are users, facilities and brands. Users - struggle to form exercise habits.Facilties - are looking for more ways of engaging and retaining their members.Brands - are looking for new ways to connect with consumers, we are giving them a platform to reward people for living their brand values. Our overall goal is to use the power of technology and gamification to provide our users with an extrinsic reward for showing commitment to their health and fitness. This method will help users to create strong healthy habits.
What's your solution?
Onya is a super simple system.
• Users download the app.
• Set themselves a goal for how many times they aim to attend the gym per week.
• They then select their facility, gym or studio.
• Every time they turn up to the gym they check-in using the app. This is verified via-geolocation (so you can’t be on the couch with your feet up 😂).
• Users are helped along with the assistance of gamification. We show users where they are currently and how close they are to achieving their goal. This is completed over a 4 week period.
• Once users have completed their goal for the month they unlock exclusive offers and rewards from our brand partners.
• The rewards they unlock are all health and fitness related, the idea being that users will want to reinvest in their health and fitness journey.
What current alternatives exist?
Currently there are a few consumer facing apps in the space, like Sweatcoin that rewards users for taking steps.However, we believe that by focussing on attendance at physical locations, we can support the cultivation of a long lasting habit for our users by helping them become part of a community. Getting our users to set goals is crucial in the process of habit formation and in the end, steps aren’t training.
What does good look like in this space?
Good for us, is playing a role in our users overall wellbeing and happiness. Exercise is a corner stone for so many parts of our lives and we want to help as many people as possible to create healthy exercise habits.
What do you need help with?
Right now we are in a closed Beta stage, if you’re a potential user, brand or facility operator we’d love to chat to you about joining our beta. We are also beginning to build out a bigger team, if your interested in what we are trying to achieve here at Onya I’d love to chat!
How should folks get in touch?
You can email me or connect on LinkedIn
You can learn more about OnYa here.
📅 Events & deadlines
🇬🇧 Upcoming Innovate UK deadlines:
Innovate UK Smart Grant: Jan 2023 Applications close 14 June
SBRI: Quantum Catalyst Fund Phase 1 and phase 2 Applications close 27 June
ARMD2 - Late Stage R&D towards net zero automotive futures Applications close 28 June
💻 12/06, 18:30 🗺️ Inverness: Inverness Tech Meetup: Civtech 7, 8, and 9 with Jiveen MacGillivray and TBC, plus networking. MORE INFO
🧑🎨 13/06, 12:00 🗺️ Stirling: Marketing Meetup Stirling: A quick and insightful in-person meetup, open to all marketers, to share your experience and learn from others! MORE INFO
🤹♀️ 13/06, 18:30 🗺️ Online: How to be a changemaker with Katy Murray: Please join us if you’re juggling multiple priorities, teetering into overwhelm and you don’t want to burnout (again). MORE INFO
📜 14/06, 16:15 🗺️ Edinburgh: [Founders] Series A and beyond – insights for investors & founders into the new BVCA Model Documents: in-person session reviewing the key changes to the British Venture Capital Association (BVCA) model form documents for early-stage investments, and discussion points that are likely to arise in deals papered with the new model forms. MORE INFO
☁️ 15/06 🗺️ Edinburgh: Cloud First 2023 Summit: Bringing together speakers, experts, and delegates to contextualise the transition to Cloud-based services, explore key trends, advancements, and use-cases, and discuss how to optimise the business impact of Cloud technology. MORE INFO
❓ 15/06, 09:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: How To Create An Effective Value Proposition: Marketing workshop to understand the importance of a solid value proposition and how to build it. MORE INFO
👋 15/06, 12:40 🗺️ Online: Hello! :) [Online]: A friendly virtual hangout for all startups based in Scotland: come say hello and meet people! If you're a founder, or working for a startup, this is the place to come connect with your peers across Scotland. MORE INFO
🤝 15/06, 13:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Neurodiversity Meetup: A space for Neurodivergent people and allies working in the Scottish Tech Ecosystem to meet and discuss how we can make our spaces more inclusive to neurodivergent individuals. MORE INFO
📯 19/06, 18:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Pitch it to me: Casual evening of pitching to peers within Tech startups - practice your pitching and receive valuable feedback in a welcoming environment. MORE INFO
🤖 20/06, 11:30 🗺️ Edinburgh: Unleash the power of ChatGPT and AI for business growth: This masterclass, led by Stephen Whitelaw, will delve into how you can utilise AI tools to help your business become more efficient and productive. MORE INFO
🥇 20/06, 17:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Appin Entrepreneurship Award: shining a spotlight on the entrepreneurial students and recent graduates from Edinburgh Napier University who have demonstrated exceptional potential and ambition. MORE INFO
🇨🇳 21/06, 10:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Selling to Chinese consumers through cross-border eCommerce: Workshop to help understand accessing the China opportunity through cross-border eCommerce. MORE INFO
🤝 21/06, 17:30 🗺️ Glasgow: Bridging Communities: Cross-community networking event. We’re bridging communities to help you spark new connections and collaborations. Speakers include Martin Avila, CEIS, Alison Savill, Codebase, and George Tah, Jambo! Radio Scotland. MORE INFO
🤝 21/06, 18:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Good Time Station 3.0: A quarterly purpose-driven, stress-free business meet-up featuring good ideas, good discussion, good local food and drinks for GOOD. MORE INFO
🏳️🌈 22/06, 13:00 🗺️ Online: What can organisations do to protect the LGBTQ+ rights of their employees?: Join CodeClan for a panel discussion around LGBTQ+ rights in the workplace. The panel is represented fully by the LGBTQ+ community. MORE INFO
💸 22/06, 18:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Unlocking Compliance: Fintech Mixer: An evening of drinks for those in the fintech industry to meet and connect, along with a panel discussion on a relevant topic. MORE INFO
🤝 28/06, 19:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Entrepreneurs Social Club (ESC): The social club for entrepreneurs - skip the talks, presentations and lectures - in favour of going straight to the bar to connect! MORE INFO
Deadlines
🎯 Open 💡 Applications are open for the RBS Accelerator programme MORE INFO
🎯 15/06 ♻️ MSIP Accelerator for companies building in mobility and decarbonisation. 12-week programme, based in Dundee. Applications close 15 June. LNC MORE INFO
🎯15/06 🧱 Product Builder programme from Barclays Eagles Labs: online programme to teach how to develop a digital product and then test, validate and evolve it using customer feedback. MORE INFO
🎯 20/06 📱 KPMG has opened submissions for Tech Innovator in the UK 2023. Initial heat will take place on 20 June to find a shortlist of innovators representing Scotland. Finalists UK-wide will be announced at Web Summit 2023 in Lisbon. MORE INFO
🎯 30/06 🚀 Barclay's Entrepreneurship Awards 2023 are open for nominations across 8 categories: Startup, Sustainability, International Expansion, Scale-up, Social, Eagle Labs Innovation, Barclaycard Payments, Games MORE INFO
🎯 01/09 🤓 Applications are now open for the Scottish Cyber Awards. MORE INFO
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That’s all for this week - have a great one!
Team 🔥Campfire