Blog « Founders Fit

Feb 13 2013

Female Entrepreneurs Wanted – Mastermind Group

The City of London Corporation and Bright Ideas Trust are looking for Female Entrepreneurs to join a Mastermind Group, meeting monthly with specialist facilitators and mentors.

To be considered for this exciting opportunity to you will need to be a woman running your own business that you have identified as growing. This can be in terms of staff, customers, turnover, profit or any other viable reason. The business must be no older than 24 months and you must be resident in, or run your business in neighbouring boroughs to the City of London (Lambeth, Southwark, Tower Hamlets, Islington, Hackney, Westminister, Camden or the City of London) . These are the only criteria.

It will cost nothing, but your time. A series of monthly Mastermind meetings will be held , run by specialists in their field, subjects defined by your wants and needs and you will be assigned an individual mentor to help you reach your goals during the year that the project will run for.

For further information and to apply contact: Zoe Brown, Business Manager, Bright Ideas Trust (zoe AT brightideastrust dot com)

Feb 2 2013

Fashion and Entrepreneurship

Founders Fit were fortunate to have the University of the Arts London (UAL) provide the venue for the Fashion Founders Supper event that we ran on the 23rd of January 2013. Continuing on our mission to help build some great collaborative partnerships and see the development of new business, the Fashion Founders Supper was organised to bring together people interested in Fashion and the Arts, and to facilitate Entrepreneurial partnerships.

We were joined by Jan Miller, Business Development Consultant and part of the Centre For Fashion Enterprise (CFE), and also Jonas Altman, the Enterprise Business Director at UAL who runs the Fashion Innovation Centre. Both of whom share the desire to see new businesses being built out of the fashion industry in the UK, which has enormous talent and skill. The event run by Founders Fit was organised to tackle issues that occur in the development of fashion based companies.

The evening started with a quick introduction from everybody who had attended. I have put a list at the bottom of this page. There were a whole range of people in attendance; students, investors, business consultants, legal consultants and a large majority of people starting their own companies. It is incredibly invigorating to hear all the innovation that is happening in the fashion industry and the Fashion Founders Supper was the perfect opportunity to hear about the businesses in more detail than a traditional networking event. People looking to tackle niches such as a bespoke online wedding clothing company, a company looking to develop clothing for the disabled, formal occasion wear for children, and a bespoke clothing company that has studied the true pain points of shopping for men, called Spoke.

Once the introductions were over, there was a speed networking event. Where we all got a more intimate understanding of what each other’s businesses were and what we were looking to take away from the Fashion Founders Supper. After the speed networking was finished, we had a big brainstorming session where someone would present an issue that they are having with their business, and the group would come together to try and solve their issues.

One of the common themes that people were raising as an issue, is the lack of people. People to be co-founders, people to be designers and people who are willing to take the risk of not having a secure income for the possibility of long term success. Which is exactly the issue that Founders Fit was established to tackle, Founders Fit aims to increase the chances of startup success by helping entrepreneurs find potential co-founders with complementary skills. We are looking forward to hearing about any future partnerships that have grown out of this event.

Just some of the people and companies that attended…

Jonas Altman – an experienced strategist and marketer and has a natural ability to accelerate projects and lead multidisciplinary teams. He works across sectors to provide business and design strategy, develop new ventures, and facilitate organisational change. Jonas is long standing entrepreneur and acts as Enterprise Business Director at the London College of Fashion.

Jan Miller - Business Development Consultant at the Centre for Fashion Enterprise (CFE), www.fashion-enterprise.com will be joining part of the evening. Jan has over 20 years business development experience of the fashion and textiles sectors. Working at the CFE since 2006, Jan works with many of the CFE supported designers, providing support on legal and contractual issues, and assistance with business development and planning.

Ben Farren (www.gospoke.com) - Spoke unbundles fashion for men, offering luxury-grade wardrobe staples that really fit, at a sane price. Instead of investing in a big range and the endless race to stay on trend, we focus narrowly on a handful of essentials, and we proliferate sizes rather than styles so we can get the one thing that really matters absolutely right – the perfect fit. Instead of using traditional, expensive retail channels, we exist exclusively online, selling direct to our customers: a luxury product, delivered to your door, without the crazy retail markup. And not a fitting room in sight. www.gospoke.com

Annabelle Gauberti - Founding partner of Crefovi, a law firm which specialises in the law of fashion & luxury goods, will present a free webinar on fashion business partnerships & investment: IP as a business asset on 13 February in London.

Hanna Magdalena Krön - From Shift Swap, which is a web and mobile platform that helps retail chains better manage their flexible workforce. Find out more on http://shiftswap.me or follow them on twitter @shiftswapme

Dilpreet Mecser (http://www.katalinmerksz.com/) - A banker and an MBA graduate from London Business School working with Katalin Merksz on Katalin Merkz Millinery, who helps you to find that hair accessory that transcends beyond the typical definition of a hat that could pair up with day to day professional, chic and casual wear, they decided to come up with their own style of hats- hats that women would love to wear knowing that no one else would be seen wearing the same hat.

Jan 15 2013

First foray with Founders Fit (and a bit of alliteration)

After spending the majority of 2012 dabbling on the fringes of the London entreprenurial community (brainstorming ideas from the comfort of my own home, etc), over the holidays, I resolved that 2013 will be the year that I focus on engaging and maturing some of my nascent concepts. In case you’re wondering, I am currentlythe proud holder of a corporate job, actively looking to cut the chord and do something meaningful in any of the following spaces: education, healthcare, or space exploration. (The last of which requires a substantial amount of explanation, which I will not get into here).

Anyway, landing back in London after the break, I decided that the first stop on my self-proclaimed “Year of Ideation” would be the Founders Fit Women Entrepreneurs in Education lunch on January 10th. Suffice to say, I was impressed and inspired, both with the format of the event, and with the attendees, many of whose ideas may prove powerfully transformative.

The event brought together a dynamic group, comprised of (male & female) entreprenuers, financiers, students, and corporate innovators. Structured in three parts, the session first required each participant to introduce her/himself and her objectives. The introduction was followed by “speed networking”, which forced me to refine my elevator pitch. This session was great as I met a number of people that I could conceptually work with. The event ended with an hour long lunch, providing a good opportunity to share one-on-one.

I met several folks at the session whom I have subsequently been in contact with. I found a couple of ideas that I would like to help mature, found a class that I would like to take, and best of all found a new friend.

Regardless of whether your ideas have materialized into a new business or whether you are just starting out, I would recommend attending a Founders Fit event to explore the London Entreprenurial community…

Jan 11 2013

Women Entrepreneurs in Education Lunch event

“I have never let my schooling interfere with my education” – Mark Twain

Forbes featured Khan Academy as how one man, Salman Khan, is reinventing education and disrupting a trillion dollar industry. During the Founders Fit Women Entrepreneurs in Education lunch event, we had 25 entrepreneurs who are passionate about education and working on startups that will change the world. This event was sponsored by the City of London Corporation and hosted by Pictet London on 10 Jan 2013.

Not only did we enjoy fantastic views of London but met with some amazing entrepreneurs from 3 House Club, LanguageRoom, Stealth Education, Skillab, Education Index, Simbell, Cribbd, pyoupil, Fire Tech Camp, Inspire My Growth, among others. 25 entrepreneurs were selected to attend this event and Founders Fit organized a Speed Matching event.

During Speed Matching, entrepreneurs had 2 minutes to talk about why someone would want to work with them and what they are passionate about. It was a great opportunity to meet some really interesting and inspiring people from diverse backgrounds. Some of the high profile mentors were Diana Stepner, Head of Future Technologies at Pearson, Gerald Walker, Managing Director at Bloomberg Ventures and Frances Doherty, Partner at Dorsey & Whitney.

The startups were at various stages – idea, prelaunch, launched & growth. Here’s a summary of the startups represented at the event. Entrepreneurs shared their stories, talked about the challenges they face and how they can support each other. Many of them found ways to collaborate. For e.g. Jill Hodges from Fire Tech Camp found potential partners with 3 House Club, SkillLab and City of London Corporation. Fire Tech Camp will be running week-long holiday camps to teach kids & teens to develop apps, design video games & build robots launching this summer.

Growth Stage:
Anya Abdulakh, 3 House Club – private family club created & run by parents for parents and children up to five years old

Jane Langely, Cool It Schools – The creative environmental programme for young people, schools and families

Julie Dagonet, Simbell – Makes learning fun and meaningful through its Brilliant Educational Videos featuring graphic animations, its Educations Apps and its 95% participation online courses

Will Leader, LanguageRoom – Marketing Software for the Education Sector

Launched:

Henry Playfoot, Stealth Education – Developing curiosity and a love of learning in children aged 2-12

Kit Harman, Musiquity – New online/offline music learning platform. Aims to be the largest provider of quality music tuition and musical experiences to all ages throughout the UK

Maria O’Conor, The Unlocked Learner – Expert tuition to inspire and enable learners unlock their creative brains and let their inner brilliance shine!

Octavia Hirst, Skillab – Mentor-based affordable coding education

Polina Hristova, Academy at the HUB- Provides essential entrepreneurship classes & events for entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs and other experts

Yana Drapkina, Education Index – Online platform for Russian students to search degree courses and universities

Pre-Launch/ Idea stage:

Blue Wilson, Inspire My Growth – Inspiring young people to reach their full potential

Jelte de Jongh, pyoupil – Working on business plan for a tool to tackle learning difficulties

Jill Hodges, Fire Tech Camp – Launching week-long holiday camps to teach kids & teens to develop apps, design video games & build robots

Do let us know if you would like to work with any of these startups. We will be publishing more success stories of collaborations and partnerships that came about through our Women Entrepreneur Lunch series.

For those looking to pitch their edtech startups and win £15,000 please check out BETT Pitch Fest (Submission Deadline: 28th Jan 2013 – 9pm). Hope to see some of you pitch at BETT pitching competition (4pm – 6pm, 1st Feb ‘13).

Dec 20 2012

My Experience of Founders Fit events

When I heard about the Founders Fit WorkIT event at Google Campus I knew I wanted to be there, either as a participant or representing my company. The event paired entrepreneurial, tech and business people with non-profits to solve real-world challenges in a marathon five hour work session, resulting in a tangible action plan for next steps.

My non-profit SixVibe.com is an online community for young people with haemophilia and other bleeding disorders. I came to the event thinking our main challenge was developing a digital tool to help patients manage their conditions, but our team of six quickly pinpointed that we should first focus on growing engagement on the site. My colleagues and I had been working on engagement strategies in parallel, and our Founders Fit team hit on almost every idea we had and came up with at least half a dozen more! They also pushed me to really think through some of our broader aspirations and helped me get through some fundamental blocks about potential structures for our long-term growth.

After presenting to the ‘Dragon’s Den’ of experienced entrepreneurs and having SixVibe honoured against stiff competition as the days best project, I was already looking forward to my next Founders Fit meetup. A few weeks later, they hosted a lunch event for women entrepreneurs supported by the City of London Corporation. As soon as I walked into the room I could feel the atmosphere of people wanting to help. There was no fear of competition or distrust, no insecurity or apologies. This was a room full of women with ideas, skills and experience ready to listen, support, advise, challenge and appreciate the accomplishments and goals of others like them.
Through the women’s lunch, I’ve met several people who have offered to help with our plans as we continue to grow as SixVibe and as I continue to grow personally as a doctor-turned-entrepreneur. One of my resolutions for 2013 is to make it to more Founders Fit events, so if you see me there say hi!

About the guest blogger: Kristin Shine is the cofounder for SixVibe. Combining her background in R&D, clinical medicine and corporate digital communication consulting, Kristin leads strategic development at SixVibe.com. Kristin is a Columbia MD and ex-Account Director at Brunswick Group. Follow her on Twitter at @kristinshine.

Great bunch of women in fashion at December Women Entrepreneur Lunch

Dec 18 2012

Great bunch of women in fashion at December Women Entrepreneur Lunch

Founders Fit Women Entrepreneurs in Fashion lunch event, kindly sponsored by the City of London was held on 13 Dec 2012 at the City Marketing Suite, Guildhall.

Some of the companies that were represented at the event were Abingdon Road, Fashionista Outlet, Funlayo Deri, Style Nibble, XENI, Wish Want Wear, Fashion ComPassion, Labante, Trylista. 25 entrepreneurs were selected to attend this event and Founders Fit organized a Speed Matching event followed by a talk by Suruchi Saxena, founder of Wish Want Wear, on how she found her cofounders and raised money from investors. During Speed Matching, entrepreneurs had 2 minutes to talk about why someone would want to work with them and what they are passionate about. It was a great opportunity to meet some really interesting and inspiring people from diverse backgrounds.

Founder Fit will be running another Fashion focused event in Jan 2013. If you are looking for cofounders for your fashion idea or looking to solve challenges faced by early stage startups in Fashion then register here.

Growth Stage:

Vanita Badlani Bagri, Labante

offers beautiful unique jewellery that glam up your attire, delight your senses and wow your admirers.

Suruchi Saxena, Wish Want Wear

helps you hire a designer dress without the designer price tag. The only UK site that deals directly with designers bringing you the hottest styles to hire straight from the catwalk.

Ayesha Mustafa, Fashion ComPassion

a socially responsible fashion initiative that provides a platform to brands created by skilled women artisans from the developing world.

Launched:

Jennifer Wirth, Abingdon Road Limited

a personal styling service that helps people find their own style by working with a personal stylist.

Myriam Duran, Fashionista Outlet

provides affordable online boutique for up to 70% off exclusive designer labels and offers style tips & advice for style hunters.

Funmi Deri, Funlayo Deri

a designer label for savvy fashionistas who value quality and craftsmanship, and are seeking timeless investment pieces that will see them through several occasions and seasons.

Heather Bird, Style Nibble

Take the fun style quiz, discover your style profile and get personalised fashion recommendations from your own personal stylist

Ann Olivier, XENI Ltd

Xeni is a young fashion label designing, manufacturing and retailing online couture quality clothing specifically designed for women who use wheelchairs

Pre-Launch/ Idea stage:

Amit Rai, Trylista - launching a new way of buying clothes, shoes and accessories that combines online convenience with offline ability to touch and try before you buy.

Alison Baker, Ally Bee - clothes and accessories retail business offering high-quality, ethically sourced fashion ranges sold via social-selling and, ultimately, home-business franchising.

Emilia Bairamova, EMILIA B Ltd - knitwear designer and consultant

Aleksandra Karpowicz, Aleksandra Karpowicz Photography – freelance fashion photographer

Jenny Lu, JennyFashion - fashion supplier and sourcing agent with manufacturers in China specializes in womenswear produced at own or subcontracted factories

Namrata Bostrom - founding a new fashion ecommerce startup, bringing Indian design to the UK.

Helena McKeown, Multemyr Ltd - setting up a fashion label introducing a value for money, stylish, classic, comfortable and high-quality clothing range made from only 100% natural fibres sustainably and responsibly farmed.

Nov 9 2012

Feedback from WorkIT for Charities and Social Enterprises It was great to see the energy and creativity of diverse teams working together to brainstorm and solve challenges presented by social enterprises and charities. Entrepreneurs & participants enjoyed the event and got valuable ideas, contacts and advice. Thank you to the challenge presenters – Kristin Shine, Micheal Holland (Six [...]

Feedback from WorkIT for Charities and Social Enterprises
It was great to see the energy and creativity of diverse teams working together to brainstorm and solve challenges presented by social enterprises and charities. Entrepreneurs & participants enjoyed the event and got valuable ideas, contacts and advice.

Thank you to the challenge presenters – Kristin Shine, Micheal Holland (Six Vibe), Rajal Pitroda (Gametastic), Charlotte Neary-Bremer (Street Doctors), Jake Evans (Just For Kids Law) and Baillie Aaron (Spark Inside). Participants from technology, business and design shared their skills and ideas with the organisations and helped them solve real life challenges that they face. Judges and mentors from Social Innovation Camp, 85Broads, Royal College of Arts, UCL Business gave their advice and feedback to the teams.

See feedback from Rajal Pitroda, founder of Gamestatic on the people she worked with and preview of her game prototype.

“FounderFit was an amazing event for Street Doctors to attend. We had the opportunity to work with a team with varied expertise and buckets of enthusiasm. We achieved a massive amount in only an afternoon and I now have practical and simple steps to use to improve Street Doctor’s strategy for communicating with our 120 volunteers and other stakeholders. The team generously offered to meet up again in month to see how it’s going and to offer more support and advice. It’s inspiring to meet such a generous community who understand our vision. I didn’t know what to expect from the FoundersFit event but I couldn’t have asked for more! Thank you!” - Charlotte Neary-Bremer, CEO of Street Doctors

Here’s Emma Carter, founder of Beyond Creative Thinking talk about her experience of what went on at Google Campus during the WorkIT with social enterprises.

“The team that supported Spark Inside through Founders Fit helped us think practically about solutions to high-level IT challenges. By bringing diverse sets of skills and experiences, as well as enthusiasm for our cause, they enabled us to come up with a practical plan for addressing three of our most pressing technological needs. Moreover, they offered to lend their continued support for the future.” Baillie Aaron, Founder of Spark Inside

Thank you to Google Campus for hosting the event and a special thanks to our prize sponsors – Eze Vidra, Head of Google Campus, for sponsoring the books and Courtney Boyd Myers, Director at General Assembly, for giving a 50% discount on the courses during Internet Week Europe .

It is great to see that so many new connections were formed and you discovered new opportunities for collaboration. Many of the participants wanted to continue to keep in touch with the organisations and help them grow.

Jul 7 2012

On Friday, 6th July 2012, we had a great Founders Work-IT session with the entrepreneurs from the Entrepreneur First cohort. 26 smart and tenacious entrepreneurs worked during the whole day to to solve the specific challenges faced proposed by the partner corporations. The four corporates were interviewed by the entrepreneurs in the morning. After understanding the challenges and problems proposed by the Company Champions entrepreneurs focused on building the products that could solve the problem. Among the corporates we had: Regus, McKinsey, BNP Paribas and Civil Service.

Joysy and I grouped the 26 participants into four different teams. The grouping was done based on their skills and personality, and using their eTeamups and LinkedIn profiles. Most of them wanted to test how well they could work with some specific entrepreneurs in the cohort. We teamed them up to work on real-life challenges faced so they could test their potential cofounders. A general feedback was that they really enjoyed working with new colleagues.

The day resulted in some very interesting solutions for the challenges. Teams also built MVPs that they pitched during the presentations at the end of the day. As in any other competition, the Work-IT also had a winner. The winning team presented AirDesk, a on-line solution for Regus to maximise the use of the co-working space by facilitating the short term use. We celebrated with a well deserved beer at the pub.

We had an intense and very enjoyable Founders Work-IT day. The question now is, how many of the entrepreneurs will continue to work with at least one or two people from the Work-IT teams, in their real startups that they will launch later this year?

We want to emphasise the importance of selecting the right cofounder and end on wise words from Paul Graham. “Cofounders are for a startup what location is for real estate. You can change anything about a house except where it is. In a startup you can change your idea easily, but changing your cofounders is hard.”

May 24 2012

We held our first Founders Fit pilot at Google Campus, 6-9pm on 25 April. Thank you for your support and interest in this new initiative! We had over 120 applicants for our pilot event and we selected a group of 20 people from business, tech and design backgrounds. Everyone got the opportunity to pitch for 2 mins and state who they are, why someone would want to work with them and what they are passionate about. This was a great opportunity to meet some really interesting people from diverse backgrounds.

Some of the companies that pitched are:

Monica Martini - Artbeez is a fun, safe and free online platform that provides a unique opportunity for young people to showcase their artistic talent and become part of a global community of young artists who employ their creativity for social change.

Ricky Cooper - Wishbomb is a free goal setting site that helps people help themselves by writing down their goals, setting milestones, recruiting supporters and tracking progress.

Dejan Mitrovic - Kide is a unique teaching tool for schools which allows children to design and make 3D printed toys through playing a creative game.

Ali Meruani - MenuSpring is a revolutionary restaurant guide serving the restaurant and consumers of London. MenuSpring is all about the celebration, exploration, sharing and discovery of new cuisines and restaurants.

David Plans - Nad.am is a EEG hardware and App that provides neurofeedback and delivers serious tracking of mental focus over time

The attendees at Founders Fit event were happy with the peer-to-peer feedback and connections with a select group of screened people. We ensured that we had quality people who could help each other. The main requirement from the group seemed to be for technical people. We are now working on building partnerships to add more technical people to the community. Watch this space for new partnerships.

We are aware of atleast 5 follow-on conversations and discussions with people who attended the pilot event. If you found some interesting people or connections then please let us know. We are interested in your feedback or questions. One of our pitching companies, Artbeez, will be pitching at the London Business School Pitching for Entrepreneurial Talent event. They are looking for a CFO and a tech person to join their team.

Many thanks to Google Campus and Central Working for hosting us.

See all the pictures here!

Apr 16 2012

Founders Fit is about to launch the first event. The first Founder Meetup will be happening at Google Campus in Shoreditch on April 25th. In the Founder Meetups entrepreneurs with ideas are able to meet other entrepreneurs with strong background and professional experience who are willing to contribute to the creation and growth of an startup.

Founders Meetups are designed for a maximum of 15 people who are very carefully selected. The entrepreneurs involved in these Founders Meetups have similar interests and complementary skills. These are not events in which you network with random entrepreneurs. The entrepreneurs attending Founder Meetups have a goal: they are willing to find potential cofounders for their startups or they are willing to join entrepreneurs with ideas to build companies from scratch. Very soon, participants of the Founders Meetups will be able to attend the Founder Workit challenges in order to get to know the potential cofounders that they have met in the Founders Meetups.

You have the opportunity now to build your team! Fill in this questionnaire and we will invite you to meet attend the events in which you will be able to find cofounders for your startup.