Showing posts with label the young entrepreneurs festival. Show all posts

TAX WELL SPENT - The Young Entrepreneurs Festival, Digital LIfe Design and more...



Well what a week it's been; Cybergirl had the unutterable joy of accompanying the GWG's editor Alice Kahrmann to the first day of Tech City's Young Entrepreneur's Festival - the three day event was a joyous example of what can be achieved when our tax pennies are well invested; in this case by The Department of Trade and Industry. The sheer elation of seeing over forty of the UK's brightest young minds pitch their way to success (and significant investment) gave Cybergirl a real glow of pride… Log onto The GWG next week for a full report, complete with interviews with both mentors and young entrepreneurs, both full of earth shattering business acumen.




With regards to Cybergirl's activities this week - I'm more than a little excited to be attending the Digital Life Design Cities Conference. Today's event will bring together some of the greatest entrepreneurs and digital minds from across the globe to discuss the issue of 'sustainable urbanisation'  and how to build 'smarter cities for a better future.' Esteemed speakers include: 

Jürgen Mayer, Founder of J. Mayer Architects, Kostas Mallios, Vice President, Intellectual Ventures, Pedro Miranda, Head of Global City Centre of Competence, Siemens, Felix Petersen, Founder & CEO, Amen, Carlo Ratti, Director Senseable City Lab, Juliana Rotich, Co-Founder, Ushahidi, Saskia Sassen, Sociologist, Colombia Universtity, Ole Scheeren, Architect, Ludwig Siegele, Editor, Economist, Rohan Silva, Digital Advisor to the Prime Minister UK, Yossi Vardi, Serial Entrepreneur, DLD Co-Chairman,Clemens Weisshaar, Co-Founder, Kram Weisshaar, amongst many others...

It will be nothing if not a fascinating insight into the evolution of our digital landscape...

On another note this week offered the casual cyberstalker a hilarious example of social networking gone wrong; earlier this year oil giant Shell felt the wrath of a social media campaign gone topsy turvy when it fell pray to a fake website masterminded by Greenpeace; the site offered photographs of nature affected by the detrimental effects of oil spillages (birds covered in oil, melancholic looking polar bears etc) and offered a forum on which visitors to the site could post comments on each photo. Fast forward a few months and supermarket giant Waitrose wades into similar territory with a Twitter stunt that backfires spectacularly - this week the company asked customers to tweet the answer to the following question; 'I shop at Waitrose because…' Here are two of the answers; 'because I don't like being surrounded by poor people' and 'because darling Harrods is just too much of a trek mid week.' Hilarious and another brilliant sign of the subversive freedom given to the public via the juggernaut that is social media. Needless to say the offending question were swiftly deleted.

Now no Cybergirl blog would be complete without a weekly comment on, yes - you guessed it Apple. And I'd hate to let you down on that front so for this week I'm going to divert from previous diatribes and instead offer you a a little anecdote that's fallen straight from the Apple tree; let's call it 'Freebies in Store' - consider it my gift to celebrate the launch of the IPhone 5, which has in one short week accrued two million pre-orders. I'll hold back from commenting on that little statistic - of you want my opinion on the IPhone 5 debacle just read last week's post.

So here goes 'FREEBIES IN STORE'; a very dear friend of mine goes into the Regents Street store with her IPhone 4s complete with a shattered back. She looks a little dishevelled having pulled a work all nighter and neglects to do her make up, or brush her hair. She asks how much it costs to fix? '£150' replies the well trained Apple attendant. My friend  (let's call her Milly) gasps in shock; she's a successful young professional but even this seems a bit steep (well it would do - check out the cost of a new back on EBay - ok, ok I know they might not be real but they're identical!!!). On the verge of tears, Milly accepts the fee - gets her handset fixed and goes to the till to pay, at which point the attendant looks her squarely in the eye and says "that's all taken care of now" Milly stands there flummoxed. She opens her mouth to speak and the attendant looks her squarely in the eye and again says "that's all taken care of now." 

Milly is baffled; no cards have been exchanged, no cash handed over, but with people all around and the assistant's beady eye staring blankly at her, Milly backs away. The assistant keeps smiling and turns her attention to another customer. Milly walks out happy as Larry recounting the story to all and sundry. So what to make of this anecdote; a cynical marketing ploy or the kindness of a rogue Apple employee? Hmmmm - well as I'm pretty sure every single item of stock is tagged, logged and scanned to within an inch of its life - it would seem to me a very clever case of silent marketing. Give away a few freebies and see those altruistic rumours start spreading. Ok I know I'm the cynic in this equation, but it's clever ploys like this that detract consumers from the bigger issues at stake - the ethics of a company with a monopoly over the tablet, computer and smartphone market and two million pre orders of the IPhone 5. But I have to say the handset I keep seeing over and over on the street, on buses and most of all on the tube isn't an IPhone - guess what, it's a Samsung Galaxy S III.

September 2012.

A Love Affair With Tech City and the Bête Noire that is Apple...


 
So ladies and gentlemen you’ll be happy to hear I’m going to take an (albeit brief) respite from talking from Apple. Yes on a lighter and happier note, yesterday was the day when Cybergirl took a little trip east (hello Shoreditch!) and stumbled (accidentally on purpose) across technophile heaven, yes if you're living in London and have any connection to the weird and wonderful word of the web, then there's no excuse not to pay a visit to Hoxton House; the location of Tech City…
Oh how I wept with unadulterated glee on wandering into the uber hip venue complete with works of art by a number of esteemed artists. The space has been curated as a meeting point, come networking haven, come work hub for all the bright young start ups dotted across the capital. It really is the most ingenious investment of resources in the evolution of our digital identity… The intention to make East London the ‘Silicon Valley’ of the UK.
Coming up (next Tuesday – Thursday) is the Tech City Investment Organisation’s Young Entrepreneurs Festival, a business boot camp for Britain’s brightest young minds intent on ‘starting up’. The very best of these will be offered access to the three-day event and will be given intense coaching and the chance to raise investment to ‘kick start their entrepreneurial journey.’

Now that’s what I call ‘inspiring a generation.’
Candidates fall into two age groups, 16-24 and 25+ can apply online, with the best applicants invited to present their business plans to a ‘rockstar panel’ of industry experts.

After being taught a number of essential skills such as sales & marketing, understanding equity and valuation, marketing overseas and investor pitching, the young tekkies will be mentored by industry luminaries including serial entrepreneur and former LinkedIn business leader of the Year, David Murray-Hundley, CEO and author of “Student to CEO” and “Bank To The Future” Simon Dixon, and CEO of Global Natives and International Media Technology Mentor, Daniel Teweles.

David Murray-Hundley, former LinkedIn business leader of the Year said: “The Young Entrepreneurs Festival is a perfect opportunity to uncover inspirational entrepreneurial talent, and I’m really excited to take part and do my part to inspire a new generation of aspiring business leaders.”

Watch out though, only the finest young minds will make it through to Day two. Winners of The Young Entrepreneurs Festival will receive valuable business support including free workspace and technology, and the top 25 young entrepreneurs will also gain ongoing mentoring support into 2013 to help them navigate potential business challenges. 

If you have a great business idea, visit the website and apply now. There’s still time!
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Right now to my bête noire – I’m sorry folks but with all the 'who ha' surrounding the IPhone 5 I just had to wade into Apple territory again. Yes the much lauded (and much leaked) handset  - it’s here ladies and gentlemen. Cybergirl was slap bang right in their flagship store the day of the press conference and funnily enough no one batted an eyelid, consumers kept browsing, genius bar technicians kept troubleshooting and the security guards looked on with their usual blank eyed stare.

But just wait till September 21st; this is one retail space that won't be nearly as calm. So what are the benefits of shelling out (at the least) £529 for the IPhone 5? Are the differences so radical that they warrant purchasing a new handset, one that in a few months close to 70% of Apple users will own? Will it really change your life significantly to have a slightly bigger screen, a slightly faster data speed and access to the 4G network? Yes the camera is better - it will give you 8 mega pixels - heightened colours, but colours you could easily achieve using Camera Plus or IPhoto. Or are you one of the die hard Applephiles, who see the handset as 'essential'; cue the voice of reason Ricky Gervais whose tweet on Thursday pretty much summed up my sentiments on the matter, “Can’t wait for the iPhone 5, I’ve had this mint condition, perfectly good IPhone 4 for a year now – embarrassing,” trust Ricky to be subversive.

So does it really mean that much to consumers? It must do if people are willing to ignore the provenance of that shiny little handset. The handset that whispers on the tube – “I'm worth something, I'm in the know, I'm up to date and most of all I'm cool” - because that’s what the IPhone sells, it's not really about the technology is it? It's about the way a well manicured hand looks roaming over the shimmering shatter prone screen. If it were about the handset – millions of Apple users would have defected to Android.

So you’ve decided you ‘need’ the toy - but what’s it worth? Is it worth the life of another human being? Did you know that 80% of the minerals used in the manufacture of our mobile handsets are mined in the Congo - where civil war has decimated the country and (to date) five million people have died?
If I urge you to do one thing this week, it’s check out the 2011 documentary ‘Blood on the Mobile’ by director Franck Pialsecki Poulsen and then ask yourselves, do I need a phone that works or do I need a phone to be ‘seen with’, a phone that plugs some depleted sense of self worth that only another trinket can assuage. Since the film was made Nokia have amended their policy on conflict minerals. But the 'supply chain' is still very much an issue across the board. At the end of the day it's up to you the consumer to decide which side of the fence you want to stand on - personally I'm sticking to my 4S, until it literally packs up and dies, and if and when I do buy another handset - believe you me it won't be the IPhone 5.
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