3 Estonian Teams Make International Business Idea Competition Finals
Three Estonian startup enterprise teams were among the 10 finalists of the annual business idea contest, hosted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Seoul from March 24 to 26.
The competition, titled the Elevator Pitch Contest, is a part of the MIT Global Startup Workshop conference held for the 14th time. Each team has a total of 60 seconds to introduce their business conception in front of a panel of judges.
Estonia was represented by five teams, the finalists of the local startup competition for young entrepreneurs Ajujaht (Brainhunt) which aims to bring together Enterprise Estonia funding and innovative business ideas. The best ideas take a cut in the national prize fund of 64,000 euros and the possibility to enter a one-year support program for executing their business plan.
The three Estonian startup conceptions which reached the international finals were: a novel and efficient heat exchanger designed by the company Priienergia; Quotista.com, an online environment for collecting and sharing citations; and Virtual Garden, which gives people an opportunity to grow real organic vegetables and horticultural products through a website.
Estonia's success "definitely may have sparked an interest among the audience of venture capitalists and other operators in the startup field," said Ilmar Pralla, head of the Innovation Division at Enterprise Estonia.
"It also proves that the winners of the Brainhunt contest are very well prepared to compete on an international level," said Pralla.
Ingrid Teesalu