Digital Salutem
24 April 2017

My Experience at UP Rise Festival Europe 5 – Amsterdam

By João Bocas

Hi guys,

I’ve been away at the UpRise Festival Europe 5 – 2017 in Amsterdam, the conference promised to deliver on Tech and Innovation and certainly fulfil my expectations.

The event proclaimed people first ( 1st ) and Tech ( 2nd ) as a motto for the festival. 142 Speakers were involved from start ups , corporates , VC’s and industry experts. The festival had 6 Tracks with something for everyone :

uprise-festival

Innovate Stage – Hackathon for democracy, Sextech to propaganda and Product.

Designed Experience Stage – Banking design, Adobe workshops, Talkshops to EightInc.

Fintech and Intrapreneurship – Payment solutions, Emotional Intelligence to Fintech panels.

Funding Stage – Angel 101 workshops, burn sessions, post VC guidance to firesides.

Sales Stage – Pipedrive workshops, Marketing, Sales acquisition to strategies.

Culture & New Recruitment Stage –  Growth Hacking recruitment, Holacracy, co-working space panels to pitch your job sessions.

I was invited to take part in a take part in the Sales Stage, moderated by Jon Woodroof and with other experts, Daniel Douglass – Director Business Development , DragonsSearch & Co-Founder The Scale-Up Group; Markus Lühmann Founder & CEO of Galaxonic and Jean-Richard Witteveen Founder & CEO of Eccentrade

My experience

I had a fantastic time at the conference, the lead up to it was a beautiful located dinner at Restaurant Hotel De Goudfazant the night before. The dinner was invite only for investors and speakers. I met some incredible people, including a Brighton resident neighbour – Jon  , we just realised that when we started talking and realised that we both lived in Brighton but having dinner in Amsterdam. I’ve had really interesting tin conversations with VC investors and get more knowledgeable about how they think, operate and approach start ups from an investment point of view. I’d like to mention Anna Bofill Bert from SendGrid ( the Dinner Sponsor’s ), as she promptly offered to connected with the Lisbon ( The New Silicon Valey ) start up ecosystem.

At the conference, I realise straightaway that was different, very casual, cool, funky and even witty at times. The music was pumping most of the day, with plenty sessions to get involved to and many happy people to talk to in an atmosphere of collaboration , goodwill and

I strongly believe that to innovate, you must be open minded and that why probably many organisations really struggle to innovate. As it goes against the grain, culture, methodologies, processes and hierarchies.  

Highlights

As highlights of the day, I would like to mentioned a few cool start ups that I’ve meet and spoke too as they are doing really cool stuff. My first mention goes to Troffee – Your Way Coffee. As a coffee lover, I really liked the idea of personalised coffee choosing it exactly the way I liked it, supported with an app and a intelligent ( IoT ) coffee machine.

Troffee

Troffee

Troffee

Troffee

Ovao

Ovao

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My second mentioned goes to Ovao, they are developing a Wearable for Swimmers, so they can improve and analyse performance with the use of a device attached to their googles. The device offers real time coaching and many more other capabilities, advanced training programmes and post workout analysis.

 My third and last mention goes to LifeSense Group, they build beautiful wearable technology to solve meaningful life problems. They have developed a special product to improve Women’s Health, created a wearable solution for Urine loss.

Carin

Carin

Carin recognizes that women are not the only ones impacted by urinary incontinence and its effects. Strengthening pelvic floor muscles and inhibiting unwanted urine loss impacts every aspect of life, from sex and marriage to health and happiness. Carin produces innovation that matters, not only to women but to everyone around them.

To round up the article, I could not forget to mention my friend Marc Wullings – from Skipred. We catch up, talked, walked and as usually try to innovate and exchange ideas about business and markets. He is a true go to market expert expert helping companies to enter the Netherlands market, some clients even call him his “ Dutch Cousin “.

I hope that you enjoyed the article as much I enjoyed the UpRise Festival.

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