Four times a year we host our flagship Seedcamp Week event; twice in London and twice in Berlin. It’s an opportunity for startups to meet experienced entrepreneurs, investors and product experts from across Europe and participate in an intense week of mentoring, masterclasses and presentations.
We’ve welcomed many hundreds of startups to Seedcamp Week since 2007 and have invested in over 130 of them to-date. But Seedcamp Week isn’t just an opportunity to raise investment – in fact, we believe its long-term value can far surpass any cheque we could sign.
With more startups applying every year, we wanted to find out which aspects of Seedcamp Week were most attractive to applicants. So we asked them! Here’s what they said…
A strong network is one vital ingredient in the makeup of any successful startup, and it looks like Seedcamp Week applicants agree. Let’s drill down into the top three reasons startups are so eager to attend Seedcamp Week…
With our launch in London approaching, Seedcamp’s network is a huge opportunity to tell the world we’re coming! – A Seedcamp Week startup
Access to our network can give you several advantages over your competition:
We’re incredibly proud to have developed one of the world’s strongest networks of investors, mentors and startup entrepreneurs; and we’re glad our applicants see the benefits of being part of it.
Fortunately, for those startups who haven’t participated in Seedcamp Week or aren’t otherwise part of the Seedcamp family (yet?) we interview our network of mentors and investors regularly to capture and share their advice over on our YouTube channel.
We’re at Seedcamp to hear feedback from both mentors and peers on our search engine & other product plans to tackle this space – A Seedcamp Week startup
Early and regular feedback is particularly important when trying to reach product/market fit; having early testers helps identify weaknesses in your product and can help validate your market.
At Seedcamp Week we invite a select group of mentors to look at your business and stress-test your product from every angle. The feedback can often be blunt, but it’s sure to be valuable. Sometimes it’s not the product that’s at fault though; for one startup, their product’s purpose wasn’t clear and it wasn’t until one of the mentors said, “Your messaging is wrong” that feedback on the product began to change.
We are particularly looking for mentors and advisors to guide us through these early stages of our company – A Seedcamp Week startup
It’s good to seek advice, but more important is to seek advice from the right people. Our mentors have a wealth of experience working for and with many successful startups at Board and C-level; Barry Smith (founder of Skyscanner), Mat Braddy (CMO of Just Eat) and Renaud Visage (CTO of Eventbrite) to name just a few.
Seedcamp Week presents a rare opportunity for startups to sit down with such experienced individuals and focus on key aspects of their business, from product/market-fit to marketing to finance. For the startups who do ultimately join the Seedcamp family, the learning doesn’t stop. As part of our Academy, our mentors regularly come in to lead masterclasses in their field of expertise.
And while you may think all this is great for early-stage startups and their founders, even experienced teams such as Teleport, eMoov and Mailcloud have said the experience was invaluable . When you have access to some of the world’s best mentors, there’s no limit on who can benefit.
Fortunately, there are several Seedcamp Weeks throughout the year, so if you’re an ambitious startup and want to make the most of the above opportunities make sure you view our Events page and apply to the next one! We’d love to see you there!
Twice a year we jump on a plane with a dozen of our startups and head to the US to introduce them to some of the world’s most prestigious companies and investors. During the 2 weeks that we’re there we travel to New York, Boston, San Francisco and the Valley. 
But as with all things, there’s a bit more to it than meets the eye – it’s not a sight-seeing tour! So lets take a look at what really goes on during Seedcamp’s US Trip and why so many of our startups find the experience invaluable.
Simply put, the US market is huge and presents an attractive next step for many European startups. In addition to its 300 million consumers the US is home to many of the world’s largest companies and investors. Within our network we’re proud to name companies such as Dropbox, Google, Square and Stripe in addition to tier-1 investors such as Index Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Andreessen Horowitz and Greylock Partners. Our US Trip is an opportunity for our startups to visit all of these companies (and many more) to hear from experts and pitch their startups. Because all the stops are with people at the top of their game, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime chance to learn from the best. 
Some of our startups may be raising rounds and for them it’s a great opportunity to pitch and extend their investor network. But for others its about networking and learning from the best in the industry.
Breakfast meetings, networking events and dinners are all part of the experience. We give our startups maximum exposure to our network, so it’s a great time to connect, discuss and form relationships outside of an office environment. It’s a pretty intense week so there isn’t a lot of room for sight-seeing, but we try to grab the occasional visit to a famous landmark! 
We invite Seedcamp startups who are at the right stage to consider expanding into the US or who are looking to raise a new round of funding. These startups will most likely have joined us through one of our quarterly Seedcamp Week events in London or Berlin. 
It’s time to follow up those leads! We encourage startups to follow up with companies and investors as soon as possible, preferably immediately after a meeting; but in any case, once the trip has ended the dialogue continues and we do our best to facilitate those discussions when appropriate. We cover the US Trip live on Twitter so follow the action. You can also view photos from previous US Trips on our Flickr page.
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