Behind the Scenes at Scottish Edge Round 7
The Scottish Edge has, over the past few years, become a cornerstone of Scotland's entrepreneurial initiative, with more than 130 businesses receiving funding which has resulted in the creation of 479 additional jobs and an additional £21.6m in turnover generated within the Scottish economy. I've been invited to attend the final of the competition's seventh round, to interview the finalists (see links) and go behind the scenes to offer a new and unique perspective. Here's how the day unfolded.
8:00 am: An Ecosystem which Attracts Attention It's still dark as I step off the tram at RBS Gogarburn and make my way to the conference centre a mile or so down the road. This is the first time I've attended a Scottish Edge final so it is difficult to know what to expect. Sure, I've met plenty of Edge funding recipients before through the likes of the Startup Interviews, some of whom are pitching for additional funding today, but the beauty of the Scottish Edge is that it brings together entrepreneurs from far and wide. From an audience member's perspective, the Scottish Edge is a showcase of the most innovative entrepreneurial talent, not only in Edinburgh and Glasgow but also in the northern-most reaches of the country.
I'm early so enjoy a quiet look around the exhibitor's hall as the businesses and entrepreneurship support groups set up. Naturally, RBS are present as our hosts for the day, but Scottish startups are also lucky to receive the support of other organisations like Harper Macleod, Microsoft, and Johnston Carmichael. There is, without a doubt, a growing interest from established organisations in grabbing a piece of the startup market. Between the accountancy and legal firms are a series of well-known support agencies, including Entrepreneurial Scotland and Bright Red Triangle, both of whom will offer support to today's winners.
9:00 am: Pitching Begins As one might expect with any event that takes place on a working Monday, the auditorium is less than half full as we take our seats for the first round of pitches. With twenty-three finalists in the main Scottish Edge competition, their five-minute pitches and ten minutes for Q&A will be split into four blocks of pitches, the first starting at 9 am and the last finishing just before 5 pm.
Billy Mitchell and Scott Wallace of Smart Compliance are up first, pitching their award-winning carbon monoxide detectors to the panel. It's an unenviable task, being first, not least because you'll have to wait another ten hours to find out whether you're bid for funding has been successful or not. Following them are Cognitive Geology, FINDRA, AllDay Designs and snap40, ensuring that the morning session covers every industry from oil and gas to clothing, and pushchairs to real-time monitoring medical devices. These startups also demonstrate that Scotland's entrepreneurs come in all shapes and sizes, some experienced, other's recent graduates.
Last up in the first session are Intelligent Point of Sale. I hardly need to tell you what their product is. With their entire team on stage, their pitch appears to go off without a hitch, until the judges begin their questioning. "Your statistics about market size; does every one of these businesses use a cash register?" asks one of the panel. The answer, inevitably, is 'no'. The questioning continues and I'm left feeling uncertain as to whether or not their pitch will be a success. Only time will tell.
11:00 am: Pitching, Take Two We reach the first networking break and, with the help of Judith, the Scottish Edge's recently hired social media fanatic, I interrogate a few more finalists in front of a camera for the day's video blog. Despite the move by more and more employers and entrepreneurship groups to use video applications, everybody seems a little hesitant. I can't imagine why.
Thirty minutes later and we're back in the auditorium for the second set of pitches. Again, the businesses taking part represent every industry imaginable. Up first are Space Budgie, a BAFTA-nominated games studio. Behind them are CarGo seat, Pick Protection, and Photon Force. Rounding off the set are Rotomotor Ltd, and Highland Hustle who are pioneering an international series of ceilidh-based workouts.
Within the second set are two businesses which catch my attention as they represent some of the excellent work which Scottish Universities are doing to encourage and enable entrepreneurship. The first is Pick Protection; founded by Rebecca Pick while a student at the University of Strathclyde, this startup is, some might argue, the best-known student startup to come out of Scotland in recent years. Although not launching until 2016, her innovative new rape and lone working alarm has already featured in most national newspapers and in a number of high-profile magazines including Cosmopolitan. The second is Photon Force, a University of Edinburgh-based startup run by Richard Walker, which recently won the top prize at the Converge Challenge 2015.
1:00 pm: High Scorers and Low Scorers Lunchtime arrives, and, perhaps not surprisingly, so do plenty of people. As such, when we head back into the third pitching session, the auditorium is reaching near capacity. Before I discuss the next batch of pitches, however, I feel it is important to discuss how the Scottish Edge funding criteria work as, after all, the judging panel haven't been taking notes all morning for nothing. As such, I sat down with Evelyn McDonald, CEO of the Scottish Edge to talk about the judging process.
"The judges are scoring [each business] against six assessment criteria," Evelyn tells me. These include business growth potential, entrepreneurial spirit, innovation, customer focus, utilisation of the Edge funding and awareness of risk and cost. Scored out of ten, the panel then review the total scores when allocating the funding. "At the end of the day, there will be some clear high scorers, and sadly, there will be some clear low scorers. But generally, in my experience, there's a large group in the middle and there will be a lot of conversation that goes on around that," says Evelyn.
Plenty to think about then when reviewing the third and fourth sets of pitches. Up first this afternoon are Nomadix Media who, much to the entertainment of the audience, appear on stage with what looks like iPad's strapped to their backs. They're looking to grow their wearable digital technologies business which is used for marketing and advertising in five countries. Behind them are Digital Connextions, and Coast & Glen, who's Fishbox allows customers to subscribe for deliveries of fresh fish. Yep, you did read that right. Newlyweds Magnus and Fiona Houston have found, like so many others recently, that the subscription model is the way to go in business and, although I don't want to imagine fresh fish appearing through my letter box, their pitch certainly got the attention of the assembled crowd. The pitching session continues with GM Flow Measurement Services, Pinstripe Inventories and Optomize all taking to the stage.
3:30 pm: Behind Closed Doors As darkness falls outside, I'm lead into a hidden conference room on the first floor. Lord Willie Haughey and Bob Keiller are sat at the end of the other end of the room, sharing a joke as they wait for the other members of the judging panel to arrive following the third set of pitches. I'm introduced as the Scottish Edge's official blogger and vlogger - a term I am still not entirely comfortable with - and offered tea or coffee, before being invited to take a seat between the pair.
As the other judges return from the auditorium, I ask whether the pair would be happy to be interviewed as part of the video blog. "Sure," says Bob Keiller, before adding "just interview Willie first and we'll all pile on afterwards to say 'I agree.'" It reminds Lord Haughey of a time when he pitched for a business, only to have a competitor pitch that he would "take whatever I said and add ten thousand pounds on top of it." Nevertheless, he gets up, stands near one of the windows and my camera comes out.
"How has the day been so far?" I ask. "I think the standard of the pitches has been great," Lord Haughey responds. "I was here two years ago and I think the standard is even better today than it was then." Knowing that all of the finalists will receive individual feedback on their applications, regardless of whether they are successful or not, I ask Lord Haughey if he has any advice for future finalists. "Don't be too optimistic about your three-year forecasts," he says with a chuckle.
Up next is Bob Keiller, the current CEO of the Wood Group and future chairman at Scottish Enterprise. "The sheer variety of the businesses we've seen today, and the quality of the people pitching those businesses, has been fantastic," he tells me. He emphasises the need for entrepreneurs to communicate their passion for their business idea when pitching, something we've seen plenty of so far today.
With that, I leave the judges in peace and head back downstairs to interview one or two more finalists before the final pitching session, featuring Ocelot Chocolate, Float, the Isle of Skye Candle Company, AppointMentor and Vistem.
5:00 pm: Networking, Networking, Networking If there's one thing which is crucial to the success of entrepreneurs, it's networking. Just as well then that, like every other group in Scotland, Scottish Edge provide ample time to meet fellow attendees and finalists. My blogging now over (although not my tweeting, as many pointed out), I made use of the two-hour dinner break to find out more about some of the finalists in the main Scottish Edge competition and to meet some of this year's Young Edge, Wild Card Edge and Higgs Edge winners. More recent spinoffs of the Scottish Edge, these competitions offer funding opportunities to startups and entrepreneurs who might otherwise be ineligible or unable to obtain funding.
The Young Edge competition offers up to £10,000 in funding to companies who's directors are all under the age of thirty, and many previous winners have gone on to participate and win funding in the main Scottish Edge competition. This year's winners - the winners are announced in advance of finals day - include Kitsch Drinks and Turtle Pack - both of whom I have interviewed recently, - as well as Spark and Rocket, EuroBiotix, Synchronise IO, Edinburgh Room Rentals, Orrin Equestrian Products, Reinvent Life Sciences, MindMate and Dronely.
In the Wild Card Edge category, winners include Amiqus, Barking Rad, Bellfield Brewery, Curious Chip, Cutitronics, Fairsquared, GNUHOW.com, Prickly Thistle, Phoenix Instinct, Soltropy, Sunstore Technologies and We Data. In order to be considered for this category, companies must be pre-trading but, as with the main competition, be able to demonstrate innovation, either in their product or service offering, or in their business model or operations. Unlike the Young Edge winners, however, these winners are unaware of exactly how much funding they'll be taking home and so must wait until this evening to find out.
Finally, there's the Higgs Edge category, a new award which acknowledges the most promising early stage science, technology and engineering businesses, which the judging panel believe have the greatest chance of scaling and globalisation. Krotos, the first of three Higgs Edge winners, are demonstrating their software, known as 'Dehumaniser' which is used by the world's top film and game studios including Sony, Sega, 20th Century Fox and Disney to create monster noises through vocal processing. More recently, they've made the software available to consumers through an iPhone application. Another winner are Epipole, a company who are seeking to eradicate preventable blindness by building a mass market monitoring and screening platform to monitor eye diseases. Their new product, launched this month, is far too technical for me to understand, however, I am told that they have received plaudits from clinicians and distributors around the world so they're obviously doing something right. The last Higgs Edge winner are Soluis Labs who, throughout the day, have been building anticipation among the audience through their sealed-off construction of a large, black dome in the corner of the exhibitors hall. Now open, Judith and I are given a tour; they're building fascinating virtual reality products and, inside the dome, we find ourselves surrounded by a near 360-degree tour of the moon and planets. Needless to say, it's pretty cool.
7:00 pm: The Moment of Truth Back in the auditorium, I find myself sat at the back as the finalists, their teams and a full audience fill up every seat for the evening awards ceremony. The question is who will win the funding they need, and who will be left disappointed? David Shearer, Chairman of the Scottish Edge introduces the evening with a message for all the finalists; "a no is not a 'no', it is a 'not yet'." In fact, as Evelyn reminded us earlier, there are many startups who have failed to secure funding during previous rounds, only to return and triumph. Up first are Krotos, the first Higgs Edge winners. As the category is new, we have, until now, been uncertain as to how much the company might receive in funding. They take home £100,000.
We move on to announce the first batch of main Scottish Edge winners. Float are first to win, taking home £100,000. snap40, previous winners of the Scottish Edge, are next, taking an additional £30,000 in funding. They're followed by AppointMentor (£50,000), Nomadix Media (£50,000), the Isle of Skye Candle Company (£50,000), Ocelot Chocolate (£30,000) and All Day Designs (£75,000). These are huge sums of money which provide a lifeline to companies between funding rounds, offering them the chance to develop their product or service offering further, with the support of the Scottish Edge and their partners. If waiting ten hours was not enough, the remainder of the Scottish Edge finalists are told to wait until the second batch of winners are announced. In the meantime, Soluis Labs, our second Higgs Edge winners, appear on stage, taking home £100,000, much to the delight of the team.
Next up, our guest speaker for the evening; Duncan Logan, Founder and CEO of RocketSpace joins us via web link from Shanghai where it is 3 am local time. That has got to hurt. He shares a number of insights from his experience in Silicon Valley, working with some of the world's most recognised startups including Uber and Spotify. "There is no shortage of capitalism, the shortage that we have in the Valley is talent," he says. Good news then for any tech entrepreneurs who don't like the cold Scottish weather. He also highlights the importance of building a team; "entrepreneurs build a team, the team builds the company."
Back to the awards and first up are the Wild Card Edge winners who finally discover how much they've won. You'll find all of the details on that here. The Young Edge winners are also recognised.
In what is, without question, the biggest announcement of the night, Epipole are next on stage, presenting their revolutionary technology. No, that's not the announcement. The announcement is how much they've won; at £150,000, this is the highest ever funding award at any Scottish Edge event. The audience breaks into rapturous applause.
Finally, the moment of truth for the remaining finalists, the second batch of winners are announced. CarGo Seat, Wild Card Edge winners just six months previously, are first, taking home £75,000. They're followed by Smart Compliance and Photon Force, each taking home £50,000 and £65,000 respectively. Proving that anything is possible and that the judging panel can be deceptive, Intelligent Point of Sale follow, taking home £50,000. To end the evening, Fishbox, Space Budgie and FINDRA take home £50,000, £30,000 and £75,000 respectively. It's a bumper haul. In fact, during the course of two hours, the Scottish Edge distributed more than £1.2 million in funding!
9:00 pm: The Road Ahead As I leave the Scottish Edge final at the end of a marathon day, it's interesting to consider what lies ahead. For the successful startups, we can hope to see their products and services evolve as a result of their Scottish Edge funding and support in the months ahead. For the unsuccessful startups, we hope to see them at the next round. And what about you? Evelyn, always thinking ahead, tells me that they're already thinking about Round Eight and she would encourage you to apply.
Did you attend the Scottish Edge Round 7 final? What were your highlights? Do let me know by joining the conversation in the comment section below!










