ClimateLaunchpad Global Grand Final Launches In 2 Weeks (and we’re going to be there)!

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In two weeks, ClimateLaunchpad will host its Grand Final 2017, and CleanTechnica will be there! I will be headed to Limassol, Cyprus, with Kyle Field, our VP and Senior Editor here at CT, to cover this exciting event and share it with our readers.

ClimateLaunchpad is the world’s largest green business idea competition, creating a space where innovation and invention can lead the way to a clean future.

The Grand Final is the culmination of six months of hard work as companies pitch, refine, and compete for their ideas. The first part of the competition took place from April until June. Once companies are accepted into the program, there are national-level 2-day boot camps to help perfect ideas, then a national level competition. Each country will be sending the top-3 to the Grand Final to pitch their idea in front of the jury.

Each year Launchpad has grown, and this year roughly 1,000 green business ideas were submitted from 35 countries across the globe. The 2017 ClimateLaunchpad features finalists from the following countries: Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kenya, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Moldova, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UK (Birmingham), UK (Scotland), and Ukraine.

What makes ClimateLaunchpad different is that they really vet their winners and include a significant amount of training. This ensures that these are new ideas, that there is a team behind the brand, and that they are ready to succeed. Launchpad Founder Frans Nauta explains:

“There is a lot of training involved that is not about what do on stage (the pitching) but focused on customer discovery. We present ClimateLaunchpad to partners as the ‘Green Business Ideas Accelerator camouflaged as an international competition’. [There] is no prize money involved at national level, and a relatively small first prize (€10,000) at global level. That’s how we keep the professional award seekers out. And that’s how 85% of our 2015 alumni are still in business today.” 

The 10 winners of the Grand Final will also gain access to the Climate-KIC Accelerator, an 18-month program to help participants access the knowledge, resources, tools and the coaching a cleantech start-up needs for success to help you ‘achieve global domination in your chosen market niche.’

The Climate-KIC Accelerator is the world’s first business school for promising cleantech entrepreneurs. It offers entrepreneurship education, top-notch tools and techniques, and intensive coaching.

Climate-KIC is Europe’s largest public-private innovation partnership focused on climate change, consisting of dynamic companies, the best academic institutions, and the public sector.

Everyone is welcome at the event: they are hoping to reach ‘cleantech watchers, corporate green leaders, planet saving visionaries and Trump-defying bright thinkers.’ If that sounds like you, get your ClimateLaunchpad Grand Final ticket here.

 


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Andrea Bertoli

I'm a marketing and sales professional focused on mission-driven businesses. I'm a journalist, green investor, wellness educator, surfer, and yogi. Find delicious food and wellness stuff on my Instagram @VibrantWellness.

Andrea Bertoli has 119 posts and counting. See all posts by Andrea Bertoli