Winners Of TechHub - A&N Media Battle Of The Startups ContestInLondon Win 1M/1M Scholarships

Last night, at a packed event inLondon’s TechHub, A&N Media awarded five yearlong 1M/1M scholarships. The judges for the contest were Kevin Beatty, CEO of A&N Media, Dominique Trempont, Board Member of DMGT (parent company of A&N Media), Bill Raduchel, Strategic Advisor to DMGT, Alberto Torres, former EVP and GM of Nokia’s MeeGo division, and me.Let’s review the businesses we saw.

goCarShare

Drummond Gilbert, pitched goCarShare to connect drivers with paying passengers who wish to travel the same way, allowing them to share the journey costs. It uses Facebook to connect users with friends of friends and a rating system to help create a trusted community. goCarShare will take a commission of 15 % of the paid transaction between the passenger and driver.

Platter

Will Hodson pitched Platter, a cross between Instagram and Pinterest for food, along with other features such as micro blogging, vertical search, and so forth. Will proposes to use affiliate marketing as a way of monetization similar to what Pinterest is attempting.

Fitness Freak

Shara Tochia pitched Fitness Freak, a bookable Web platform that allows users to search for and book fitness classes and activities. It also integrates with booking partners to offer an easy-to-use service and a review platform for journalists and users.

Insane Logic

Next, Zoe Peden pitched Insane Logic and an educational iPad app called MyChoicePad. It uses symbols and sign language with speech to enable choice and communication for children and adults with learning or communication difficulties.

PopUpShopUp

Then Steven Lucero pitched PopUpShopUp, a social media for popup shops, restaurants, cinema, entertainment, charities or any and all temporary retail events, utilizing a curated member-based website, www.popupshopup.com, weekly email newsletter, mobile application and check-in technology. PopUpShopUp aims to become the marketplace for consumers to visit to learn about all popup events first inLondon, then throughout theUK and finally, in the top 100 urban areas of the world.

Hire Space

The next business pitched was Hire Space, a website that allows you to find, book and pay for publicly available space online. Hire Space works with a diverse range of venues, from schools to private function venues and provides a platform for the sale of associated services such as catering and entertainment.

TimeMaps

Jonny Britton pitched TimeMaps, a company that makes digital history maps to illustrate events over time. The company sells to schools, homeschoolers, parents and other educators all over the world.

Simplytics

Jason Cooper pitched Simplytics, a mobile advertising engagement analytics model to help better measure user engagement with ads.

Enjoy! Karaoke

Neill Watson pitched Enjoy! Karoke, a Facebook game that taps into the vast pool of singing fun that dominates prime time TV.

Thestudentjob

Jack Tang pitched Thestudentjob.com, a social-network-based job portal connecting students with local employers looking for casual staff on a one-off or part-time basis.

The winners of the contest were: Enjoy! Karaoke, Thestudentjob, InsaneLogic, Platter, and goCarShare.

As always, I would very much like to hear about your business, so let me invite you to come and pitch at one of our free 1M/1M public roundtables. We will be holding future roundtables at 8:00 a.m. PDT on:

I also invite you to join the 1M/1M mailing list for the ease and convenience of getting updates. This way we can stay in touch, and it will help you to decide if 1M/1M is a program for you.