At the same time, a second call for entrepreneurs wishing to participate in this European innovation project focusing on the Internet of the Future has been launched
The IMPACT Growth accelerator programme began recently in Madrid, with the 14 winning startups working in the Internet of the Future sector meeting venture capital managers and corporations with the aim of establishing professional links for the future. These will be the only face-to-face meetings of the acceleration process, since all other steps of the process are implemented remotely.
The programme includes 100 000 Euros in equity-free funding, training with experts and international entrepreneurs in Madrid, Copenhagen and Barcelona, and mentoring from well-regarded mentors, founders and investors who will help the companies to grow and become the best in the field.
What is an accelerator programme?
The process of “acceleration” starts 11 months after the best startups in the Internet of the Future sector have been identified and provided with funding. Programme beneficiaries are the 14 winning startups from the first call for entries of the IMPACT Growth programme, which were selected in the month of June. During this phase, the 14 startups can access an enabling environment providing the most favourable conditions for achieving exponential growth in a short space of time.
Cooperation between large companies and accelerators continues to grow
Ferrovial Services leads the “Smart Infrastructure and Cities” sector through its Centre of Excellence for Energy Facility Management and the support of the Ferrovial Services Innovation and Processes Department and the Centre for Innovation of Smart Infrastructures (CI3).
The winning startups in this sector were OS Vehicle, Stratio Automotive, Watcher and XapiX Smart. Ferrovial provides SMEs with information regarding the main challenges in the Smart Infrastructures sector, while at the same time identifying cutting-edge technologies for its business. This climate of growing cooperation between large companies and accelerators is highlighted in the Global Accelerator Report prepared by the Gust startups platform. The report also ranks Impact Growth as one of the top 10 accelerators in the world.
Second call for IMPACT Growth
Entrepreneurs who didn’t quite make it to the previous call or who want to try again now have another chance through a second call, launched on 5 September and open until 12 December. Those wishing to participate in the programme will need to register on the IMPACT Growth website. This year’s edition hopes to beat the more than 1,900 applications from 60 countries of the first call.
The 14 participating startups will have access to a maximum of 250,000 Euros in equity-free funding, with 100,000 Euros for all the selected projects and a further 150,000 Euros for the two best startups. These two winning projects will additionally have the chance to access private financing of up to 1.5 million Euros from venture capital firms.
This is a similar project to IMPACT Connected Car which aims to find the best European startups working in the connected cars sector.
