In all the places we visit, the entrepreneurial community has a different vibe – Tel Aviv with its high-tech founders, Paris with a passion for beautiful design, London with a hyper-connected local scene, Eastern Europe with its scrappy and hungry entrepreneurs – we can’t get enough of this diversity, which is why we are travelling all over the world to find the best businesses and most tenacious teams.

Seedcamp-2010Image by Seedcamp Photos via Flickr

It’s time for us to return to Berlin – where we had an impressive line up of international teams last year. Berlin with its huge and ever growing number of startups, where companies like our darlings at Soundcloud, the incredible machine of Citydeal/GroupOn Europe, the gaming champs at Gameduell and Wooga reside, is one of the most vibrant startup hubs of the continent that continues to draw more and more attention from investors and entrepreneurs alike.

 

We are opening the applications for Seedcamp Berlin today, and we are excited to see teams from all over Germany, the neighbouring countries, and the rest of Europe. If last year’s Seedcamp Berlin is an indication, we’ll have teams coming from Denmark to Poland, from Munich to Hamburg, and great mentors to pair them with. Also, two of last year’s teams are now Seedcamp companies – Nuji and Wordy convinced us at Seedcamp Week and have received an investment.

 

Seedcamp Berlin will take place on 14th of April at the supercool betahaus in Kreuzberg, where we were lucky enough to hold our post-Seedcamp event last year. We are partnering, amongst others, with the High-Tech Gruenderfonds, DuMont Ventures, Microsoft, and our year long Seedcamp Sponsors at Google and Paypal.

 

There will also be some pretty exciting news very soon, both for participants and mentors – so watch out for announcements in our blog and Twitter stream (and make sure to be a fan of Seedcamp on Facebook, too!).

 

Entrepreneurs – see how our process works, read the FAQs if you still have questions, and see what our companies are up to on the 2011 road trip to the USA. 

Then, go and write a kick ass application for Seedcamp Berlin!

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Seedcamp Week is over and the Seedcamp 6 have been announced. The teams are now in London working 24-7 on building great products. Everyone involved can’t wait to see how they develop over the next 3 months.

What’s really inspiring is to see how active the start-up community in Europe is right now. There are so many great events coming up and Seedcamp is actively involved. Yesterday, Seedcamp was invited to Microsoft’s half-day conference focused specifically around supporting UK software start-ups. It was a good, small event that helps continue the discussion on how large corporates like Microsoft can support start-ups. The Startup Accelerator Programme is the kind of initiative that enables start-ups to work closely with and leverage what Microsoft can offer. We have been happy about the strong support Microsoft has shown from the early days of setting up Seedcamp, through the Seedcamp Week, and on an on-going basis.

We are also thrilled to be working with Ryan Carson and his FOWA. Ryan was a great mentor at Seedcamp Week and we’re looking forward to checking out the great content he and his team have put together. It should be another intense few days. Seedcamp and some of the Seedcamp 6 will be exhibiting at the Expo. Please do stop by our stand, say hello, and discuss more effective ways of supporting the entrepreneur community. It will be great to see many of the mentors that came to Seedcamp Week as well.

On October 19th, many of the Seedcampers will be in attendance again at Minibar in London. This is a great event targeted towards start-ups and developers. It gives a unique opportunity for folks to build a strong network with each other. I have already received great feedback from Seedcampers who attended the last one. So, if you fall in the target audience, you should make every effort to take part.

We have always said Seedcamp is about Europe at large. So from November, we’re taking Seedcamp on the road. This year, we’ll be in Berlin in November and Paris in December so we can start to reach out to the many teams that applied to Seedcamp this year and in general to talk about how Europe’s next generation of entrepreneurs can continue to build a strong community in each country but across Europe as well. Seedcamp is working closely with O’Reilly and CMP to organize a start-up focused session at the Web 2.0 Expo in Berlin in November. I’ll blog more about this in time. Finally, we’ll also work closely with Loic Le Mur’s Le Web 3 to organize another start-up and Seedcamp focused session to talk more with the local French community and see the best ways of building strong Seedcamp and entrepreneurship foundations there.

So, I encourage the Seedcamp community and Europe’s entrepreneurs to take every advantage of the various events organized for the rest of 2007 and beyond. We want to keep the conversation going so please contributing to our Facebook group , Forum , and if you have something you’d like to say to the Seedcamp world, we’re always looking for guest posts on our Blog . We love to talk, so let us know what more we can do and where you’d like to see Seedcamp on the road next year.

With 2010 officially in full swing, we are happy to announce that this years Seedcamp search for the brightest startups is on with applications now open for Mini Seedcamp Zagreb being held on the 11th February, 2010 at the prestigious Croatian Chamber of Economy.

In the past few years we’ve had some very strong teams from the region get through the program to become Seedcamp Week finalists and winners such as Zemanta from Slovenia, Brainient and UberVU from Romania, and of course Croatia’s own Shoutem. While we strongly encourage talented webtech, software and mobile startups from Croatia and its neighbouring countries from Slovenia and Turkey to Greece, Bulgaria and Hungary and Romania to apply, our open door policy means that any startup from across the EMEA and beyond can apply.

As you may know from our blog post back in December, we’re building on the lessons of the past few years and solidifying the Seedcamp process to better benefit startups. The Mini Seedcamps provide the best way to have a chance at winning a spot as one of our top teams that receive investment in July 2010 and to leverage the value the programme brings. As such we encourage startups to apply to any of the Mini Seedcamps that best match the timing and progress of your business.

As always, we are looking for strong, quality startups that have the talent, drive and capacity to fully embrace the opportunities that participating in a Mini Seedcamp brings, which is receiving quality advice from top industry leaders and start building those key relationships to help drive your business. Relationships that normally take years to build, you’ll have access to in one day. Mini Seedcamps are not a conference, but an entrepreneurial ecosystem of support and a programme designed to strengthen and catapult your ideas into a viable business.

Check out our newly revamped resources page full of advice and videos, our blog posts, and follow us on Twitter and Facebook to see what we’re looking for, what teams get out of it and what you can do to improve your chances in winning a spot on one of the most prestigious and rewarding web tech programs that is helping to drive and shape the European startup scene today.

Mini Seedcamp Zagreb will connect 20 top quality, early stage web tech startups with over 50 regional and European esteemed, sought after and highly experienced entrepreneurs, investors and developers.

Through an interactive panel discussion and informal 1:1 sessions, teams benefit from engaging with and listening to a variety of distinguished mentors and industry leaders from PR, HR, product development, business development, marketing to name but a few. All at the top of their game – all there to help you.

You will gain invaluable insight and a solid foundation to help kick-start a viable business in Europe today. Not to mention being inspired by fellow entrepreneurs and a chance to broaden your scope within the European startup ecosystem.

Applications are now open and close at midnight on 27th January 2010. For full details, updates and how to apply go to the mini site.

We look forward to poring over your disruptive and world-changing ideas and being blown away with what the talent will bring.

As we gear up for the final stretch in our Mini Seedcamp tour, we are happy to announce the final 20 teams for Mini Seedcamp Ljubljana taking place on May 14th at Tehnoloski Park Ljubljana. The region produced some of the most early stage ideas we’ve come across yet, with a show of promise that Seedcamp can’t wait to support and nurture. The teams have promising technical talent and we are looking to challenge them to develop innovative and globally addressable solutions. We look forward to encouraging the emerging entrepreneurs, many who applied from Croatia, Romania, Serbia, Vienna, Austria, Bosnia Herzegovina, Zagreb, Italy and even the UK.

And here are the lucky 20:

Activis d.o.o. BENS – Buinac & Co., k.d. Brihten ComfortClick Elaphe FM Virtual LiveNetLife Longnet Mala radionica interneta d.o.o. Nexus d.o.o. Ocean 4D seekda GmbH ShoutEm Symbolya Viidea d.o.o. Vilango Wondeer www.mojmag.com Xohana Yasmo Live

The 20 teams will be engaging with distinguished mentors and have the opportunity to learn and network with 50 local and European industry movers and shakers including VC’s, Investors and product specialists in HR, PR, Product and Marketing.

The Mini Seedcamp programme is aimed at recognizing fresh web-tech, software and mobile talent from across the EMEA and to help immerse these teams within the European entrepreneurial ecosystem that will help them build a viable and sustainable business in future.

We look forward to meeting all of the teams face to face and to help them lay the foundations to launch a kick-ass startup. Remember teams, preparation is key and will help you get the most out of Mini Seedcamp. We urge you to once again watch our videos and read blog posts from past winners to gain advice on how you can squeeze every drop of knowledge and learning from the awesome set of mentors you’ll be engaged with on the day.

It has been an amazing couple of years starting up Seedcamp. We are excited by what lies ahead and want to announce some key Seedcamp dates in 2010 for start-ups, mentors and investors across Europe.


A Little Bit of Background
When we started Seedcamp 2007 we planned to address the growing need for micro-seed funding in early stage start-ups across Europe by holding a Seedcamp Week every year in London for 3 years and investing in a total of 15 companies in that period.


But what we discovered was that to do justice to the opportunity in our region we needed to create more of a network and go deeply into local markets. We will never recreate Silicon Valley – and nor should we try – instead we need to make a strength of our region’s cultural diversity and geographical distribution.


Mini Seedcamp’s role in our distributed model
We found that to tap into the talent in the time zones from London to Tel Aviv, we needed to have a different, more distributed model which aimed to bring start ups together in a sustainable distributed network with all the key elements of a healthy different strands of ecosystem: entrepreneurs, investors, great product, marketing and technology advisors, academia and corporates.


Core to this model are Mini Seedcamps, which we started as an experiment in 2008 in Paris, London, Berlin and Kiev and then expanded to a fully fledged program in 2009 with 7 Mini Seedcamps in Tel Aviv, Paris, Warsaw, London, Helsinborg, Ljubljana and Berlin.


Going to the next-level

We like to practice what we preach and like any lean start-up, we keep trying to evolve Seedcamp by incorporating feedback from teams, advisors and investors along the way and we hope to make the next generation of Seedcamp, starting in 2010 even better and give Mini Seedcamps an even more important role.


We are planning to hold 8 Mini Seedcamps in 2010 and expanding our geographical coverage (Spain is new) and doubling-down on the traditionally under-served regions of the Balkans and Eastern Europe, where we have seen such great start-ups like Erply, Codility, Zemanta, Ubervu and Brainient emerge since Seedcamp started.

We will potentially have other partners organizing events jointly. More news to come on that front!


Dates for 2010

So without further ado – here are next years’ Mini Seecamp dates:


>> Zagreb – 11th February

>> Prague – 2nd March

>> Barcelona – 23rd March

>> Paris – 15th April

>> Tel Aviv – 6th May

>> Copenhagen – 27th May

>> Berlin – 16th June

>> London – 20th July


Can only local teams apply to a Mini Seedcamp?

No, each Mini Seedcamp is open to anyone. In fact we encourage teams to apply from across the region. Last year we saw a Romanian team in Paris, an Israeli team in Sweden and an Estonian company in London. We are blessed with short flights and great low cost airlines in Europe, so take advantage and come along to which every event you want – in fact some teams successfully applied to more than one last year and learnt a lot along the way.


What happens if you are a top team at Mini Seedcamp?

The top teams from each Mini Seedcamp in 2010 will go directly into a final selection process in July of up to 40 teams for investment – in some rare cases we may invest in teams directly after a Mini Seedcamp.


At the end of the final selection process in July we will choose the top teams to invest in. Historically we have invested in 5-8 companies per year but from 2010 we will aim to invest in more.


What happens if you’re selected for an investment?

Following selection in July, the teams Seedcamp invests in will be able to benefit from an intensive three month support program, where we work closely with teams to develop their business and ideas. At the end of this period the teams take part in our annual Seedcamp Week.


Why are Mini Seedcamps valuable to teams and us?

Other than the awesome mentoring and validation teams get at the Mini Seedcamps, we’ve seen that 60% of teams who come through to Seedcamp Week came from a Mini Seedcamp and 50% of teams we invest in we met at a Mini Seedcamp. We’ve found that the feedback teams receive and the milestones that are established help to drive real team progression plus it really helps to get to know people better – the results speak for themselves.


Looking forward to next year

Each year the strength of the Seedcamp teams and their ideas continue to impress us and we look forward to seeing what next years’ talent will bring. We have increased the number of hubs across the region with a view to attracting great teams not only from Europe, but also Africa, the Middle East and Asia and the US to give them the opportunity to apply. Applications for each region will go live 4-6 weeks before each Mini Seedcamp.


More Seedcamp resources available

We’ve recently revamped our Resources page with our daily video blogs from previous Seedcamp Weeks, along with insightful and often entertaining panel sessions and masterclasses from some of the most prestigious entrepreneurs, VC’s, investors and developers in the community. We strongly encourage you to view and share these, as they provide good content as you’re thinking through your startup growth and also help you understand what being a part of Seedcamp means.


So, if you’re a web-tech start-up with a strong team, a great idea and the passion and drive needed to take it to the next level, then please join our Twitter, Facebook and blog to keep updated on when it’s all happening near you! And be sure to apply to the Mini Seedcamp timing that best fits you.


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We’ve been thrilled at the interest Seedcamp has generated in such a short time since we announced it a few weeks ago. In the spirit of the new web, we’ve had some great guest blogs , our forums are slowly getting more active and even our Facebook group is growing like crazy – we’re just crossed 600 members 🙂

We want Seedcamp to really help stimulate a community and conversation around European startups – so please join in, online or physically at your local Opencoffee Club. So if you’re an entrepreneur with an idea, a developer with a killer app – there’s no excuse to feel alone anymore.

You have until midnight August 12th to submit your completed application, we’ve already had nearly 100 from all over Europe including France, Germany, Sweden, Holland, Portugal, Spain, Italy and the UK. We’ve also had applications from India, Israel, Russia, South Africa and Latin America – keep them coming.

Seedcamp is completely focussed on supporting the entrepreneur. So we’re thrilled that we seemed to have tapped into something that seems relevant and valuable to you. In fact, one of the things which has excited me the most is that people are recognizing that although capital is key, Seedcamp is more about the contacts, coverage and connections successful applicants will receive both in the week of September 3-7 in London and in the 3 months afterwards.

With this in mind, I’m really excited today to announce the first wave of Seedcamp supporters, who are really stepping up to play a major role not just in Seedcamp 2007 but for the years ahead. These are all people and organizations who have played a critical role in putting European entrepreneurship on the map and I’m thrilled to have them on board.

The cast in order of appearance so far are: Index Ventures, Niklas Zennstrom and Mattias Ljungman’s Atomico Investments , Atlas Venture, Balderton Capital (formerly Benchmark Europe), TAG, Forsyth Group and Brown Rudnick. We are also thrilled to have FT.com and Techcrunch as media partners and the NextWeb Conference as an event partner.

We look forward to act two and announcing our new cast of characters in the coming weeks.

Seedcamp Week is starting next Monday and we can’t believe how this year has really flown by! After the most active season so far (more locations, applications, teams, mentors and even continents than ever) we are coming down to what is the highlight of the Seedcamp year: our week long Seedcamp taking place in London from the 13th until the 17th of September.

 

We have made a great selection from the more than 600 teams that have applied over the year and went through the 9 Mini Seedcamps (and some gruelling interviews). We are now proud to finally present the Seedcamp finalists 2010 – a wide selection of teams from 16 different countries, active in more than 19 cities:
All these great entrepreneurs will spend the next week with us and our top notch mentors in London to improve their business, find new customers, investors and supporters, and finally convince us to invest in their companies. Among the mentors this year are some real international startup stars, reflecting the quality and reach of the companies themselves. To mention just a few, this year we will have on board:
Keep an eye out for the blog and Twitter over the coming days to see what we are up to at Seedcamp week – we will post some videos and reviews and link to others writing about the event. Tim Bradshaw at the Financial Times has his own view on Seedcamp this year, looking at some broader trends in the group.

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