Spirit of Silicon Valley in Belgrade - StartLabs continues to help young entrepreneurs through various projects

Menthors from San Francisco and Munich were guests at GrowthRules workshop for startup companies that was organized by the investment fund StartLabs from May 18th to 21st. They gave lectures to 11 teams on marketing, Facebook and Adwords campaigns, rules of presentation of products to investors, content placement, tactics for rapid growth and attracting buyers.

Soso Sasez and Tristan Polok shared with local teams their experience from Silicon Valley, where they founded several startups that still operate successfully. Yann Girad from Munich, also a "serial" entrepreneur, shared his experience in content placement and popular Growth Hacking. Yann, who's been a menthor for startups worldwide, has been living and working in China, New York and Berlin over the past few years.

Startups had one night to prepare their presentations for menthors and partners of StartLabs and then got harsh feedback from the viewpoint of investors. As menthors stressed, it was incredible to see the teams progress in just three days and the enthusiasm of young entrepreneurs who passionately and committedly work on their products. GrowthRules menthors brought the spirit of Silicon Valley to Belgrade and, as they said, they will continue to work with all participants for the next six months.

Three teams that attended the workshop obtained an investment of USD 3,000 from StartLabs and joined the official Go-To-Market program. They will continue to work with StartLabs menthors, while the best teams will have an opportunity to work from the headquarters in San Francisco, the cradle of technological entrepreneurship.

All workshop participants have excellent impressions. One of them is Matija Sosic from Zagreb-based startup Mobicon who is working on a solution to improve the interaction between lecturers and audience during the lecture (www.mobicon.io).

- It is a web/mobile solution that enables each member of the audience to use their smartphone as a microphone that can be connected to the audio system of the venue. In that way, everyone can speak without waiting for the microphone to be passed to them. Also, lecturers can communicate with the audience through polls and watch the comments they post - explains the interlocutor of eKapija.

- GrowthRules workshop was extremely important for us, considering that this is our first startup. We've acquired knowledge that is necessary for the functioning of a startup and met menthors who advised us and answered all questions we're facing in the company development process – Marija Janjusevic from the startup Kidster says in a talk with eKapija.

Kidster is a mobile application for parents that makes it easy for them to sell things their kids have outgrown and don't need any more as well as to save money by buying stuff as good as new from other parents.

- Kidster was launched by two moms in February 2015. We're currently testing beta version of Android app and are focused on the strategy for developing new markets. We hope that StartLabs and methors will continue to help us overcome the challenges we will be facing in our further development and after the launch of application in the United States – says our interlocutor.

(Rade Joksimovic)

Loyalis in San Francisco

Shortly before the GrowthRules workshop, Rade Joksimovic, the founder of one of the startups from StartLabs' portfolio - Loyalis, spent six weeks in San Francisco, thanks to the official Go-To-Market program, where he had a chance to work with menthors from San Francisco and a broad network of experts on loyalty platforms and e-commerce, which is the core activity of his startup.

As Joksimovic points out, he was honored to present Loyalis at so-called pitching contest organized by PitchForce in San Francisco, where the representatives of innovative ICT companies have only four minutes to present their companies on the stage in front of an audience of few hundred people and a panel of about ten influential investors. The aim is to get an advice or an interview for investment.

- We were lucky to win the second place, scoring only three points less than the company that raised USD 2.5 million in investments, which we see as a great confirmation of the quality of our work and the vision we share. Aside from this opportunity, we had a number of meetings with some of the world's most influential investors in the ICT industry - Joksimovic explains.

First-hand experience

- We're glad to be able to back young technological entrepreneurs from the region and startups as a whole. StartLabs is very active at regional and international startup events. In that way, we are doing our best to provide educational in addition to financial support – says Nebojsa Lazic, one of the partners in StartLabs who spoke about prospects and expectations of investors at one of the largest startup conferences in the region - Sparke.me.

Lazic is also a regular member of various juries at startup competitions organized by foreign investors.

Applications for the StartLabs program can be submitted all year long, and all entrepreneurs engaged in technological entrepreneurship can apply on the official website www.startlabs.co and present their business.

Irina Milosevic