Phew! In a mere 36 Hours we had the opportunity to see demos, pitches and Seattle! Launch Academy held their inaugural DemoDay with over 200 attendees! Check out all the details from TechCocktail! A total of 27 startups pitched to our panel of judges including Mike Edwards, Len Brody and Boris Wertz in hopes of securing their spot on the bus with the Growlab cohorts. Netlek, Thinkific and Battlefy were victorious and a short 10 hours after the winners were announced all 11 companies were on the bus headed to Seattle.
Seattle Tennis Club
First stop was a formal pitch session to Alliance of Angels. The companies pitching skills were put to the test as the tough questions were asked by the leaders from Vulcan Capital, Madrona Ventures, Summit Partners, Silicon Valley Bank as well as others. Despite some sweating in their suites, our companies all held their own and were all well prepared and left with a taste of the real world of pitching to investors! The feedback was overwhelming positive from the investor groups and GrowLab is looking forward to making the visit a regular occurrence.
Grow Conference Pre-Party
Loosening their ties and ditching blazers for their company branded t-shirts we all headed over to the Tech Stars basement, known to the locals as “The Easy,” where Dealmaker Media helped us host a GrowConf pre-party to further connect with the local community.
The companies demoed and made connections with industry professionals including Rand from SEOMoz, reporters from Forbes, Investors from The Founders Co-op, Amazon, Invest BC, and of course other local entrepreneurs.
Special thanks to our sponsor Western Economic Diversification Canada for financing the trip as well as DealMaker Media and GrowLab for making it all possible.
The first 36 Hours to Launch and Grow was a huge success and we look forward to making the trip a regular occurrence!
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