Cameras capture start-ups pitching to influential investors

The partnership with the thriving BritAsia TV saw businesses battle it out for vital cash in front of the cameras in The Innovation Centre, on the Colchester campus.

Firms supported by the University’s flagship Angels@Essex platform were seeking over £10m of funding from selected funds and investors.

Amongst the founders fighting for investment were ARMA Karma – an ethical insurance company, Kestrl – a sharia-compliant Muslim Money App, and WYSPR – an influencer-focused marketing company.

They faced a panel of Jat Kara from Beauchamp Capital and Howdy Singh from Kuflink, Sarah Livingstone from OKR Financial and Nitin Patel, Private Investor.

A team from BritAsia TV oversaw the production with University students given hands-on-experience on real-life TV production.

The station is the largest TV Multimedia Broadcasting Channel for the South Asian Audience around the world, covering Punjabi and Bollywood entertainment, film, and lifestyle.

The University’s Business Support Manager John Stenhouse praised the event and emerging partnership with the broadcaster.

He said : “We welcome the assistance of BritAsia TV in televising our live pitch events at our Innovation Centre now that it is possible to hold face to face meetings again.

“The 10 brave founders who live pitched in front of a panel comprised of experienced high net worth and fund investors, have already engaged in follow up conversations and we watch this space with great interest.

“Already we are planning our next televised live pitch event and the selection process has already started but it is not too late to apply to Angels@Essex to join the next cohort of innovative founders.”

This is the first of three events the University will host and is closely linked to the Angels@Essex programme.

It has helped disruptive bleeding-edge tech companies secure a staggering £21m of funding in just 18 months.

The platform facilitated fundraising by linking international backers with East of England entrepreneurs at the vanguard of business.

Businesses listed on the Angels@Essex platform have raised over £13m through nearly 90 separate investments.

It is an invitation-only equity investment platform which links angel investors with innovative entrepreneurs with a focus on cutting-edge tech.

A further £8.9m has been secured by businesses working with the Space to Grow scheme, which offer businessowners 1-to-1 mentoring support, webinars and further opportunities to pitch to funders.

In total more than 151 jobs have been created or saved, 18 new products have been launched and 30 R&D projects have been initiated in collaboration with UKRI.

Any founders looking for support are urged email the Angels team 

The firms seeking investment at the event were -

• Arma Karma: For the generation who don’t buy insurance simply protecting what matters most the ethical way.
• Green Running t/a Verv: AI-Based Predictive Maintenance and Low carbon Energy Saving solution for the simple upgrade to smart, sustainable A/C and heat pumps.
• HealthMXSolutions: The future of ubiquitous smart patches and their integration into health operating models.
• Kestrl: An ethical Sharia fintech banking solution, the Muslim Money App that allows Muslims achieve their goals without compromising their beliefs.
• Kubos Semiconductors: Addressing the lighting and displays market and could save an estimated 600M tons of CO2 emissions over 5 years.  Our business model is to license this technology to LED manufacturers.
• Kwoter: The faster solution for quoting insurance products. Enables brokers to give instant online prices to their customers for all non-standard products.
• LimboTech: Investment for a brand new, low cost, Motion Capture Metaverse system; has been listed as one of (CiC) CreatTech ‘Ones to watch’ programme, recognised as one of the top 100 up and coming creative tech companies this year.
• Evenlina: Medical compression garments supporting quality of life.
• Post Op: SaaS App - an advanced bias free AI algorithm to improve patient-clinician post-operative communication plus early detection of wounds.
• WYSPR: WYSPR turns consumers into influencers. It uses the power of the regular Social Media user as a means of promotion and data collection; they call this Friendvertising™.