4th Annual Santa Cruz Accelerator Pitch Contest Videos
On April 6th, Santa Cruz Works concluded the fourth cohort of the Santa Cruz Accelerates program with a 4th Annual Santa Cruz Startup Pitch Contest at The Inn at Pasatiempo.
Six local Santa Cruz startups were selected to present their pitches in-person to a panel of judges and live audience: Airset, Belay, Climatize, Fonda Technologies, Immergo Labs, and Purcell. Each of the startups has worked throughout the program to develop their MVP, obtain customers and funding, and prepare their pitch deck for investors. The startups showcased their business ideas to the judges in hopes of not only fame and respect but also to take home cash prizes and the opportunity to receive an investment from one or more of the judges.
Cruz Control got the evening rolling with their great tunes and X Academy ROV Team, a crew of high school engineers and entrepreneurs kicked off the event by sharing their secret project, an underwater robot. Photos at: 4th Annual Startup Pitch Contest.
The judges Craig Vachon, Hillary Talbot, Ian McHenry, and Marilyn Calciano were faced with the challenge of selecting the first, second, and third places. Here’s who they chose:
First Place: Fonda Technologies
Fonda, previously known as the Apptopus, helps restaurants compete with the big chains by empowering them with all the tools and services to grow their business online. Fonda brings online orders, delivery platform management, menu building and optimization, online business listing configuration, and online revenue monitoring under one solution to increase your visibility and your sales.
Second Place: Belay
Belay recognizes that millions of gig workers face uncertain income without the guarantees associated with employment. Belay eliminates this issue by using state-of-the-art in-house forecasting tech to cover drivers on their bad days in exchange for a share of their good days.
Third Place: Climatize
Climatize is an investment platform connecting individual investors with renewable energy projects. Climatize operates on a crowdlending business model basis– debt crowdfunding – a community of investors collectively lending money to projects. As an investor you can lend money to project promoters in order to finance their projects, starting with as little as $5, and get a fixed return on your investment throughout the duration of the loan. Climatize’s innovative model gives you a return on investment all while protecting our planet!