Madrid & Barcelona Unite at the Tetuan Valley Summit

Posted by lauraspencer on 17/05/2011 Leave a comment (0) Go to comments

May 2011- Friday the 13th will go down as the day in Startup School history when, for the first time, Spain´s two greatest startup communities joined together for the Zaragoza Tetuan Valley Summit. The Madrid and Barcelona graduates of the Spring 2011 Startup School completed their 6 week journey by demonstrating their transformation from mere mortals of the unemployed/working class into jedi masters in the entrepreneurial forces. It was a great day for not only the teams, but for all who believe in the TV manifesto.

And this is how it went:

9am, To Zaragoza we go!

The teams embarked on their journey to the Digital Water Pavillion and el Centro de Incubación Empresarial de Zaragoza via sponsored ALSA autobuses, free wifi included. We say journey because here at Tetuan Valley we don´t just travel on a bus, we compete in a Hackathon while enduring a wild environment of head banging to Bohemian Rhapsody, a ton of angry birds, an appearance from Johnny Walker, and a run-in with the police! These guys just can´t be stopped.

12pm, Elevator Pitches

Per usual we were running just a little late…maybe an hour or so, but we made it! The first item on the agenda was elevator pitching. Each team displayed their cool confidence and WOWed us all by giving their less-than-30-seconds elevator pitch in perfect English. Were they concise? Definitely. Were they investable? Absolutely. Did they stop the Squeal from blowing his horn? Without Question.

1pm, Top Teams Present

These guys are pretty good, but do they have what it takes to succeed? After the elevator pitches, the top teams from Barcelona (Cirkana, Shopsial and Connaxion) and Madrid (Mobitto, Mental+ and Timpik) formally presented their startup initiatives with developed business and marketing plans, financial projections, break-even analyses, product/service demos and investment needs. After only 6 weeks these presentations left most of us speechless, while the rest just couldn´t shut up about wanting to invest.

2pm, Food + Drink = Networking

Tetuan Valley boasts a community of like-minded individuals. But while we share a common purpose, we are extremely diverse. The summit lunch table was an exciting place to be surrounded by ex-developers from big companies, talented university students, fearless and unemployed 20-somethings, boys, girls, young, younger, Spaniards, Americans, Mexicans, Portuguese, and Singaporeans. We´ve got it all.

4pm, Hackathon Results

What can you code in 3 hours? After lunch, the crew headed over to the Centro de Incubación Empresarial to present the hackathon results. Unexpectedly, many of the super hackers focused their initiatives on the Tetuan Valley team. One project was a fun and challenging puzzle solver with some of the latest and greatest photos from Tetuan Valley. Another hacker found a way for Alex to find his dream girl (if he didn´t already have his dream girl) in less than 10 seconds. We had a different project to address the team pressure from this session, in a healthy way. Who wouldn´t love to blow up the Tetuan Valley site once in a while? Lastly, one of our hackers gave us an app to track stats on the top phrases of the TV team. We can´t share any of them here.

6pm, Battledecks

To finish off the Summit, we held the ultimate Battledecks competition where our graduates improvised the most ridiculous 10-slide presentations compiled by the Tetuan Valley team. They served it right back to us by pitching some hilarious and creative material that kept the whole crowd laughing for the duration of the event. The participants were Fran from Timpik, Javier from Mental+, Jose from Mobitto, and Wilson from Connaxion.

7pm, To the Sky and Beyond

The first Tetuan Valley Summit was a great success. It was a day for the entire world to see the progress and achievements the teams made in 6 short weeks. It was a day to forget about the pressure and stress from fighting against a society to defend our visions and ideas. It was a day for making new friends. It was a day for change and new ideas. It was a day for the entrepreneurs.

To the Tetuan Valley Class of Spring 2011, we wish you all the best! Keep fighting! GO GO GO