BizSpark European Summit in London Answers Questions about Building Startups in the Cloud

  • Article

Startups and cloud developers face challenging opportunities while building a business in the cloud. Monetization of apps and how to manage talent in a wireless world are among the most important.To bring us through this, Wired UK editor David Rowan will moderate the BizSpark European Summit on June 7 in London. 

By Ruud de Jonge, Audience Marketing Manager, Microsoft Netherlands  

I’m delighted to announce that this year’s BizSpark European Summit takes place on June 7th, in London.  Now into its 8th year, this event will once again bring together the great and the good in the European entrepreneurial community.  As well as top investors, visionaries and guest speakers, the line-up includes 15 of our top BizSpark startups from across the region. You may remember that at last year's European Summit, the winners aligned along a fantastic spectrum of entrepreneurial talent.

Picking the finalists for the event was a tough call, as we have literally thousands to choose from in Europe, but here are the 15 who will present on stage to a panel of judges, as well as the audience:

6wunderkinder (Germany), Autitouch (The Netherlands), Commerce Guys (France), Entertrainer (Finland), Fitting Reality (Russia), Foresight (Israel), Jampot (Ireland), miMedication (Belgium), MobileBits (Germany), Paperlit (Italy), Parking Defenders (Greece), PlaceChallenge (Poland), Red Badger (the UK), The Oblong (UK), and xBrainSoft (France).

Among the people they will be trying to influence are Reshma Sohoni, Partner, Seedcamp, Phil Cox, Head of UK, Europe and Israel, Silicon Valley Bank, Saul Klein, Partner, Index Ventures, and Curtis MacDonald, Investment Manager, High-Tech Gründerfonds .  

Speakers and panel sessions

The day is being MC’d by David Rowan, editor of Wired UK, who will oversee a range of keynotes and panel discussions, covering a wide range of topics, including the  monetisation of apps, the cloud economy and how to manage talent.  Presenters and participants include Bob Dorff (co-author of the Startup Owner’s Manual), world-renowned Professor Jerome S. Engel, last  year’s Summit pitch contest winner Alessandro Rizzoli (CEO of Mobapp), plus our very own Dan’l Lewin, Corporate Vice President, Strategic and Emerging Business Development, Microsoft.

The venue is Ravensbourne, next to the 02, close to TechCity and the Old Street area (fast becoming a major hub for startups in the UK)  and not far from the Olympic stadium – London is definitely an exciting place to be this summer.  In fact,  some of you may have spotted that the date is the same week as the British Queen’s Golden Jubilee celebrations (50 years in the same job is an impressive track record) so we can safely expect London to be buzzing with lots to see and do.

We look forward to finding out who will be crowned our own BizSpark ‘royalty’ on June 7th. 

Related content:  Here are some case studies of some of Microsoft's work in Europe: