Mentoring startups in the Innovation Hub Sofia
MediaMotorEurope (MME), a project co-funded by the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 programme, was aimed to nurture high-potential European deeptech innovators solving today’s most prominent media industry challenges (including misinformation and fake news, protection of personal data) and support them in building scalable media solutions.
After 3 open calls, 3 support cycles and 61 selected and supported startups, MME ended in April 2022. For the entire term of this project, a total of 15 startups from different European countries passed the mentoring program ensured by the Innovation Hub Sofia.
Here in the table below are presented all startups included in the MME Project Mentoring Program which the Innovation Hub Sofia has been engaged with and the role of the mentors of this Hub for their successful participation in this project.
|
Startup Name |
Solutions |
Mentoring |
Specific Benefits |
|
BunchID, Croatia (www.bunchid.com) |
A platform for linguistic (NLP) analysis of comments. By analysing conversation & language it can determine current interest and detect hate speech. |
Mentor Magdalena Ivanova - the work was on the product and technology development, market entry strategy, testing and feedback, advising on EU funded programmes. |
Contacts with the Business angels’ network in Canada & CEO angels club in Bulgaria. |
|
EnVsion, UK (https://envsion.io/) |
It helps media organisations save time and produce more engaging content at scale by automating their entire video production workflows with multimodal AI |
Mentor Dimo Dimov - the focus was on testing and feedback, discussing and co-identification of the most relevant and responsive target group, access to some universities ensured and a matchmaking provided. |
Effective contacts with EON, UK: London Business School, UK; Reykjavik University, Iceland; University of Bath. |
|
Visualyst, Norway (www.visualyst.co) |
AI tool based on which the video content can be automatically scrutinized for things like nudity, violence, religious symbolism, alcohol and drugs, or sentiments such as hateful speech |
Mentor Nigel Tobin - the key focus was on preparing for its first external party fund raising, and on the preparation of Due Diligence and ‘pitching’ materials, calculation of a ‘valuation’ and accounting treatment of some costs. |
Introduced to the media companies: Hart Media & Danesh Varma |
|
DeepVA, Germany (www.deepva.com) |
It can automatically categorize and tag visual content while providing innovative tools to create additional value from media! |
Mentor Vesselin Stoyanov - the mentoring activities covered the peer work on the product-market fit and product management support. |
Selected for the STADIEM's 3 phases |
|
Mimirium, Bulgaria (https://mimirium.io/) |
It allows users to be compensated for the data mining and analysis of their personal data and behavior, without their identifying personal data leaving their control. |
Mentor Deyan Doykov - the accent of peer work was on the business model canvas tuning; analysis of the marketing model and strategy; finetuning of the market; definition of new markets and industries. |
Entry to the telemedicine market ensured, business model development - introduction to Telemed Ltd. |
|
Kelp.Digital, Estonia (www.kelp.digital) |
Advancing Content Protection and IP Rights management. The solution can make the market of creative content more transparent and fairer for all parties. Join us to make it happen! |
Mentor Dimo Dimov - the focus was on identifying the priorities and understanding the user experience. The investment pitching deck and the financial model were reviewed and significantly improved. |
The best pitch award at the showcase MTOS#3 event. New initiative for preparation of talent for Creative Digital industries. Featured in Tech.eu with an article. |
|
Saulx, Netherlands |
It is proposed real time audience interaction platform that is built on unique real time graph database, that can scale to millions of concurrently connected users. |
Mentor Louis Lapidaire - helping to find customers, investors and stakeholders in value chain. Improving the value proposition, product & market strategies and entry barriers build-up proposal. A support in action plan development. |
Application to the EIC Accelerator programme; Euronews introduction and meeting |
|
Wanted Media, UK |
Improved accessibility to media outlets. The solution helps video streaming consumers to find the most relevant content to watch by providing them with personalized recommendations based on their watching habits and social interactions with their friends. |
Mentor Nigel Tobin - efforts in addressing product feedback and adapting the technology solution to achieve consumer retention and product re-use; attempting on fund raising and sharing ideas and learning from fellow business owners/founders and media-based corporates. |
Introduction to universities: Bath university, London Business school, etc. |
|
Wantent, Ukraine |
It is AI-based solution for evaluating content effectiveness. It tracks audience reactions and emotional states, estimates their attitude and engagement level into the content, and recommends improvements. |
Mentor Vesselin Stoyanov - business developing, testing and validating the product; new clients, contacts and markets discussed. |
Product development and management. |
|
AdHash, Bulgaria |
It makes transparency the default state of digital advertising. By reducing the commissions in digital advertising, it allows media companies to monetise their publications much more effectively and thus to create higher-quality free content. |
Mentor Ruslan Papazyan - the accent was on the business and team development, including hiring new talent; support with fund raising of Swiss investing programme. |
Hiring new people to the team; introduction to two big media groups: Nyteknik and Dagens Industri (Bonnier Group) |
|
Macrorec Cinema Technologies, Turkey |
Multi-axis motion control systems, specially designed for the filmmaking, photography, and broadcast industries. Includes mobile app-controlled modules and remote-controlled solutions for every module of the motion control ecosystem. |
Mentor Petko Ruskov - supporting the marketing & exist strategy development, introduction to new client. Helping in the improvement of the website, blue ocean strategy, pitching and investment deck. |
Meetings with Nu Boyana Film Studios. |
|
Mavin.org, Netherlands |
Crowd-sourced, reputation-based, rating and commenting solutions to enable internet users to instantly recognise the trustworthiness of content they read, share or engage in. |
Mentor Louis Lapidaire - he concentrated on the business development process, testing and validation of the prototype and introduction to new lead clients. |
New contacts made with Roularta.be, Mediafin.be, VPRO.nl |
|
StoryTracks, Ireland |
An engaging and immersive mobile application that allows clients to create and distribute audio and video content through multiple channels connecting them with their target customers in-destination. |
Mentor Dimo Dimov - review and improvement of the business model. Redefining and improving the business development process and services. |
Entrepreneurship program at University of Bath. Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN) introduction (attending networking event on using geospatial insights. |
|
Vixtape, Portugal |
A media platform that delivers ambient video content and brand integrations in a respectful, less intrusive way. It pursues creating new media and ad formats that allow content owners and advertisers to discover new audiences and revenue streams. |
Mentor Pedro Roseiro - focus on business model and development of a prototype and MVP. An early-stage company action plan was developed including the definition of MVP, value proposition, preparation of a Pitch and matchmaking. |
Introduced to: MOG - Digital Media, GEMA (Audio-visual, Creativity & Design), Present Technologies, LOAD. |