A pitch competition highlighting companies with female founders is crossing the pond for the first time: the next Women Startup Challenge will be held in London on May 3 and open to companies anywhere in Europe. The prize: a cool €50,000. Plus other, unspecified “startup friendly services.”
Basically it’s a standard pitch-off situation. You get on stage, you present to a bunch of judges, they judge, the winner takes the cash and everyone goes out afterwards and has a good time. It’s a partnership with craigslist’s Craig Newmark, who points out:
“Only 10 percent of global investor money goes to women-led startups, yet women-led companies yield a 35 percent higher return than those led by men. What gives?”
Previous winners include regrettable message rescinder On Second Thought, smart wearable tech SoftSpot (now Supa.ai) and medicine redistribution service SIRUM.
If your company has a female founder and meets the other criteria (English language, scalable tech, under €2 million funding), you can apply right here.
Then, if yours is among the 10 startups selected to come to London’s City Hall, you’ll be facing an accomplished collection of judges: Doteveryone founder (and Baroness) Martha Lane Fox, Wikimedia/Wikipedia’s Jimmy Wales and former TechCrunch editor Robin Wauters, who’s been doing his own coverage of the European startup scene with Tech.eu.
It’s held by Women Who Tech, a nonprofit dedicated to elevating the work of women in the tech sector — more details here.