EIT Digital has launched the 4th edition of the EIT Digital Challenge. Late stage startups can apply with their successful digital technology products in five different categories: Digital Industry, Digital Cities, Digital Wellbeing, Digital Infrastructure and Digital Finance. The winner in each category will receive an international growth package worth € 100,000. The package includes a full year of dedicated support from the EIT Digital Accelerator and a cash price of € 50,000. Applications can be submitted until 8 October 2017.
Since 2014, the EIT Digital Challenge has drawn more than 1,400 entries from 27 EU countries. Most awarded startups grew to become internationally successful companies.
Konux, winner in 2014, offers a technology that reduces industrial maintenance costs, optimizes asset lifecycles and increases production capacity with sensor systems and analytics based on artificial intelligence. In the spring of 2016, EIT Digital assisted Konux with a successful roadshow in Silicon Valley that brought in substantial investment. Their client portfolio now includes major business names such as Deutsche Bahn. Konux raised US$ 16 million in Series A funding in 2017.
The focus of the contest is to support the international growth of deep-tech innovations in Europe. Deep-tech innovations are technologies that are built around unique, often protected or hard to reproduce technological or scientific advances. They have a strong research base and develop disruptive solutions that fuel the digital transformation. “Deep tech digital ventures require high quality specialized support when it comes to finding customers and raising capital,” explains Willem Jonker, CEO of EIT Digital. “Through our excellent pan-European business and technology ecosystem, and guided by our experience and our proven track record in deal-making, we as EIT Digital are in a unique position to drive the international scaling of these deep-tech digital ventures.”
The EIT Digital Accelerator supports European digital tech ventures to scale-up by helping secure target customers and raise capital. A team of 40 experienced business developers and finance experts operate from 13 cities across Europe, along with a hub in Silicon Valley. Since 2012, the EIT Digital Accelerator has supported more than 250 companies to access new markets, and helped them raise more than € 80 million in investment to date. Recently, the program was ranked 8th among the Top 20 Accelerators in the Global Accelerator Report 2016 by Gust.
The best five applicants in each category will be invited to pitch their product in front on an expert jury at one of five final events:
- Digital Cities – Trento – 28 November 2017
- Digital Industry – Eindhoven – 29 November 2017
- Digital Wellbeing – Madrid – 30 November 2017
- Digital Finance – Budapest – 4 December 2017
- Digital Infrastructure – Berlin – 11 December 2017
The deadline for applications is 8 October 2017. Visit the website of EIT Digital Challenge, learn more, and apply now!
About EIT Digital: EIT Digital is a leading European innovation and entrepreneurial education organisation driving Europe’s digital transformation. It does this by mobilising a pan-European ecosystem of over 130 top European corporations, SMEs, startups, universities and research institutes. EIT Digital invests in strategic areas to accelerate the market uptake of research-based digital technologies focusing on Europe’s strategic, societal challenges: Digital Industry, Digital Cities, Digital Wellbeing, Digital Finance and Digital Infrastructure.
