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This is Joel. He’s 28, and he earns $218,000 (£153,000) a year.
Everyone knows that, because it’s on this public spreadsheet. All the salaries are…
Read more: UK News, UK Finance, Startups, Buffer, Joel Gascoigne, Salaries, Whats Working, Money, UK News
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“I won’t give you the sort of answers that most people will.”
I’m assured this fervently by the charismatic Jennifer Arcuri at the outset of our inte…
Read more: International Women's Day, Women in Tech, Silicon Valley, Entrepreneurship, Startups, Technology, UK Tech News
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A fashion store business is one of the best startup opportunities today for various reasons. Firstly, it can be started anywhere and secondly the scalability potential cannot be ignored. There is a good chance that a fashion store started in a small shop can grow to something far bigger over a short period of time. Thinking of starting your modern fashion store this spring? Here are important tips for you.
Go over your local market needs again
If you are thinking of starting a modern fashion store this spring, there is a good chance that you have fully gone over the local needs of your target market. If you aren’t sure about what your target market wants, this is a good time to go back to your research. Many start up fashion stores fail because of this singular reason. The chance of success for your store is higher if you can find a dearth of stores that offer what the local populace is looking for.
Pick a good location
In addition to an online store front, you need to ensure find a good location for your offline store front. Apart from being close to high foot traffic areas, you need to be sure your shop is located close to other shops in your niche. For example, a fashion store that is located in the midst of auto parts and warehouse companies will likely struggle in comparison to a fashion store in the midst of beauty parlours or fitness centres.
Be ready to deploy an integrated online and offline approach
Any modern fashion store with focus on success must be ready to give offline visitors reason to visit the online store and vice versa. This integrated approach can be driven through promotional sales and discounts. It is important because you need to ensure you store is always in the face of your target audience. When they are not able to come down to your shop, they should be able to visit your online store or social media page to either buy products or take a look at new arrivals. The only way to inculcate this behaviour into them is to stylistically entrench a streamlined but integrated shopping approach.
Embrace partnerships
Unless you intend to sell your own product line, you should be ready to look beyond your initial target suppliers. You should be able to find several clothing lines that offer products that will appeal to your local demographic. You can also consider going into partnership with local fashion designers that are yet to grow big.
Design your shop layout to encourage extensive shopping
Store design is a huge part of success in the retail industry Instead of lumping all clothing items in counters and cabinets, you should be able to show off items individually. Slatwall hooks are good examples of tools that can allow you show off each individual products and increase interest and excitement around specific items.
Stay on top of fashion trends
The fashion landscape is ever changing. The success of your shop is heavily reliant on your ability to keep up with the times. The modern day consumer may be loyal especially when it comes to fashion stores and brands but you should be able to reward that loyalty with quality fashion products for all seasons.
The post Starting up a Modern Fashion Store appeared first on The Startup Magazine.
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London’s innovation consultant and tech investor LMarks has partnered with Belron the world’s leading vehicle glass repair and replacement service provider. Drive, the applications for the accelerator are open now and close on 27th March.
Nick Burton, Head of Digital & Innovative Technology at Belron, said: “We’re thrilled to be launching Drive. Our team is looking forward to learning how entrepreneurs think and approach problem solving, which will challenge us to think and act differently. And by giving these startups unparalleled access to our brands around the world, along with education and investment support, we can help them accelerate their businesses too.”
How will it work?
he twelve week programme is designed to fast track the growth of startups that can improve Belron operations and its approach to delivering an exceptional customer experience. Each team involved in the program will be partnered with one of Belron’s participating countries – US, Canada, Spain, France and Germany – with whom they will get an unparalleled opportunity to trial their products and solutions.
As well as this opportunity to validate their business in international markets, participating companies will have access to desk space in Belron’s office at Egham, UK and receive dedicated mentoring from Belron’s senior leadership. Belron and L Marks will make available a fund of £200,000 from which to invest in participating companies. At the end of the program, one team will be named the Winner of Drive and receive up to £100,000 in follow-on funding from Belron and L Marks.
What you need to do to be part of it?
Belron is looking for startups that can help them innovate in the following areas:
Applications are open to startups at all stages until March 27th 2016. Belron welcomes startups at every stage to apply for a chance to pitch their ideas on 26 April 2016.
Once applications have closed, Belron will invite the most promising startups to pitch for a place on the program at a Pitch Day on 26th April.
Are you ready to give your startup a competitive advantage? Apply to the Drive – Belron program now!
The post Belron launches it’s own accelerator Drive – applications open! appeared first on The Startup Magazine.
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Habits help, they give you structure, a routine. They set up the framework and help you to be consistent and persevere. Habits also define who you are…
Read more: Lifestyle, Life Lessons, Learning, Habits, Health, Healthy Habits, Productivity, Self-Improvement, Self Love, Self-Help, Entrepreneurship, Startups, Women Founders, Life Coaching, Goals, Gratitude, Grateful, UK News
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One of the Cambridge UK cluster’s most exciting cancer technology startups has folded after its lone backer declined to follow-through on the launch funding.
14M Genomics had spun out of the world-famous Wellcome Trust with £12.5 million from Syncona LLP in December 2014 and already engaged with celebrated European partners on prospective programmes.
The company was founded to generate linked genomic and clinical datasets for major cancers to provide a reference base to enable diagnostic and prognostic stratification of patients – helping to guide treatment decisions for oncologists and patients.
Chairman Andy Sandham has posted a notice on the website stating: “We were informed recently that Syncona LLP, the sole investor in 14M Genomics, is not prepared to provide further financial support to the company. The Syncona decision followed a review of priorities within the existing Syncona portfolio.
“Having carefully considered the options available, the board of 14M Genomics has decided to effect an orderly close down of the business operations.
“On behalf of the company, I would like to thank our founders, employees, collaborators and customers for their vision and commitment to our cancer clinical genomics mission over the last two years.”
The company was founded by the leaders of the Sanger Institute Cancer Genome Project, Professor Michael Stratton, Dr Peter Campbell and Dr Ultan McDermott.
Based on the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, 14M Genomics was collaborating with European clinical partners in studies to generate linked clinical genomic datasets using cancer gene panel and other technologies.
14MG licensed proprietary technology and bioinformatics software from Sanger in a bid to capitalise on the Institute’s research and clinical grade sequencing pipelines. Last July it appointed industry big-hitter Alan Schafer as CEO.
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On the 15th February, in a completely filled room showing the huge interest about the topic, on their London campus, the University Of Chicago Booth Business School organized a panel discussion to hear entrepreneurs and other influential figures at the forefront of FinTech to discuss the trends and challenges they are navigating in this field. The panel was moderated by Waverly Deutsch, Clinical Professor of Entrepreneurship at Chicago Booth, with opening remarks from Robert Wardrop, Executive Director Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. Robert Wardrop outlined a few words about the city. London has always been an important financial innovation center due to its geographical position. It is very well connected to the other continents which facilitate the financial transactions. Furthermore, the proximity of investors and entrepreneurs makes businesses more flexible. By contrast, in the US it can be very challenging to connect the investors in the east coast to the startups in the west coast. Panelists include:
Prior to the event, the team of the University of Chicago did an introduction session about their MBA program and their initiative to fund startups in the tech fields. I had an interesting chat during the pre-event drinks with a tech entrepreneur, Dolaur Liberte Crozon Cazin Caboupe, CEO of Meaning Engines, a start-up providing meaningful connectivity for data, big and small. His technology seems to be very smart in this manner to help companies to efficiently analyze data before using them.
At around 7.30pm, the attendees moved into the event room. After the kick off by Robert Wardrop, Waverly Deutsch introduced the panelists who gave a brief description about their background and early stage journey as a FinTech entrepreneur then followed challenging questions from both the moderator and the audience.
Here are the key highlights:
Relationship between Banks andFinTech
According to the panelists, the relationship between Banks and FinTech has not always been simple, sometimes complicated, but they seem to collaborate together more and more. The panelists emphasized the importance of working in partnership with Banks to offer better services to the customers. The key role played by the banking infrastructure was another point mentioned by the panel to strengthen this partnership. Thus, it is a win –win game for both parties.
However, the FinTech entrepreneurs differentiate themselves from Banks by pointing out that they are more specialized and focus, and therefore delivered better consumer satisfaction compared with traditional financial structures.
Challenges face by the FinTech founder
How about the regulation for Fintech?
FinTech experts explained their good relationship with the regulators to build up together the requirements for their businesses. “Regulary – friendly” has been used by one of the panelists to explain the partnership with the regulators. It sounds like the regulators are supportive in the development of the new technology in this field.
Bitcoin in investment strategy
I was really expecting to have more flavours about Bitcoin from the panel’s viewpoint but its comments about it were not really tasty. The panel did not go in details about this area. The peer to peer entrepreneurs highlighted that Bitcoin is not in the immediate pipeline to be used for their business model. One panelist mentioned that the most interested aspect of Bitcoin is the innovation behind its technology.
Fintech in the future
The FinTech experts shared with the audience their vision about the fields for the next couple of the year to conclude the session. Here are some key takeaways:
The post Chicago conversations on FinTech Entrepreneurship appeared first on The Startup Magazine.
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Thu 03 Mar 2016 09:00 to 14:00
United Kingdom
Orsett Hall Hotel
As a business woman there are additional safety issues to take into consideration. Legal and cultural restrictions can sometimes be distracting or even confusing when travelling to grow your business overseas. This half-day training workshop on Female Business Traveller Safety Training will provide you with practical and comprehensive advice on how to keep yourself safe when travelling.
This not only provides you with confidence but also helps your organisation to comply with its requirement to provide a duty of care to employees with the UK Health and safety Law.
This workshop agenda includes:
09:00am Registration
09:30am Cultural differences impacting women travellers
10:30am Hotel Safety
11:00am Safer Local Travel
11:15am BREAK
11:30am Planning your trip
12:00pm Medical Planning
12:30pm Social Media Safety
13:00 Lunch and networking
The course is run by Susannah Poulton, UKTI Culture and Language Advisor.
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A parent’s level of involvement in their child’s educational process plays a critical role in the child’s brain development. According to a study conducted by Child Trends, parental involvement, particularly at the elementary level, has a significant impact on educational performance. This has also been connected to reduced behavioral problems, and a greater likelihood of the child graduating from high school.
Unfortunately, two thirds of parents are not as active in their child’s school life as they would like to be, primarily as a result of work obligations. Tech companies like HiMama aim to boost the level of involvement that parents play in their child’s education. HiMama is an app for nursery and early years programs that helps educators keep parents engaged in their young child’s learning and development.
Ron Spreeuwenberg, founder and CEO of HiMama, talked to us about the role technology plays in education and early childhood brain development.
What are the benefits of using technology to boost early child development?
90% of brain development happens before the age of five. This time is incredibly important, and can have a big impact on learning down the line. There is a large amount of research establishing the importance of family involvement in children’s learning and development.
With the proliferation of smartphones and the development of technology platforms such as HiMama, parents can play a much more active role in their child’s education from an early age, even if they are not physically in the same space. By boosting parental involvement, tech platforms reinforce learning that happens in social and group settings, and can improve child education.
According to a White House report on the Economics of Childhood Investment, for every $1 spent on early childhood learning initiatives, the benefits to society amount to roughly $8.60. So, not only does it benefit the child, but also society as a whole. This in itself justifies greater investment in educational technology platforms that improve learning outcomes for children. One established way of improving these outcomes is by increasing parental involvement in children’s learning at a young age, which is what our platform aims to do.
How does the HiMama platform work?
HiMama is an app and desktop service that enables educators to make profiles for children, track their development, and keep parents up to date on the journey. Educators can log attendance, upload lesson plans, share up-to-date reports and insights into the child’s behavior, send photos and videos, and even record naps, meals, and bathroom breaks. Parents can be updated through email, text, and notifications via the HiMama website and mobile app.
All of these aspects of the platform promote greater parental involvement in the child’s early development process. It can also alleviate anxiety a parent has about not knowing what their child is doing while they are at work, as well as the quality of care their child is exposed to. In fact, in a recent survey we found that 97% of the educators who use HiMama said that the app makes their programs standout from other programs, and 98% of parents say that HiMama adds to their overall satisfaction with their child care provider.
How does your platform differ from current alternatives?
HiMama differentiates itself from other educational technology platforms through our focus on early childhood development, building something specifically for educators, and by being fun. We’re an app for child care programs and while there is a lot of child care software out there, a lot of it is really cumbersome and difficult to use.
Many of the current edu-tech alternatives are fragmented in terms of the features they provide and do not have a specific focus for the value they are trying to offer. For us, we are trying to be the best app on the market for early childhood educators to log children’s activities, record children’s learning and development, and boost parent engagement.
We also aim to make the whole experience fun for everyone involved, including for educators and parents. For example, on our website we have The Dirty Diaper with satirical columns, kind of like the parent version of The Onion. Being a parent or an early childhood educator can be stressful at times, so we try to brighten peoples days by looking at the lighter side of things.
How did you come to found HiMama?
I studied Chemical Engineering at the University of Waterloo, in Canada and then went on to get my MBA at Harvard Business School. Outside of several student internships and work placements, my work experience was exclusively in a business consulting role. This was a great place to start my career, but I had the entrepreneurial itch to create something of my own that would provide true value.
I threw myself into networking and researching the child care industry, in particular noticing the advancements in tech and mobile apps. I wanted to create something that contributed real value to society, and I developed an interest in early childhood education, which eventually turned into a passion of mine. Edu-tech has much to offer, and I believe that by targeting these formative years we can improve childhood education as a whole.
Who are your main customers, and has this changed over time?
Our customers are operators of private child care facilities (nurseries and daycares) and early learning programs (preschools and academies). This is great for us because it is so niche, which means we’re really starting to get to know our customers well – the things they think about, where they spend their time and what they’re passionate about.
Our app is mainly used by early childhood educators and child care professionals on tablets in the classroom. With the increased accessibility of fast wi-fi, and the growing adoption of technology platforms used to facilitate education, HiMama is growing quickly. As most young parents also have a smartphone, this has also increased the pressure on the child care sector to embrace technology as a means of communication with their families.
What trends currently excite you in this industry?
There are a few trends in Early Childhood Education that are exciting to us at HiMama. First, as the importance of early childhood education becomes increasingly understood, there is a trend toward higher quality education. Instead of “daycares” where children can be dropped off for child-minding services, we are seeing an increase in early learning programs that offer stimulating learning environments for children.
Educators are also embracing new ways of teaching, shifting away from the curriculum focus with rigid lesson plans, and child assessments. Today teachers take cues from the kids – they want to really engage them, and are able to be more creative with this, and get better results. Recent innovations in technology support this. We have seen great strides in recent years, making technology (such as classroom tablets) more accessible. There are a whole range of great apps that support child learning, and they are fun for the kids too which is important.
What is your plans for future growth and development of your product?
We will continue to adapt our product to meet the needs of the emergent learning environment. Our philosophy, however, is to be very focused with our product so we will likely enhance our product to be even better in the areas that we already excel – quick and intuitive documentation for educators in the classroom and effective communication and engagement of parents in children’s learning and development.
The post Edu-Tech to connect parents and educators, for improved early learning appeared first on The Startup Magazine.
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For 3 years, my private dating events club Social Concierge has been putting on Finance and Fashion events. The thinking behind these dating parties was to create some buzz around ‘industry specific dating’. Having spent a year living and working in New York I realized my love life was curated by the events I attended. Networking became the most effective way to meet people I actually had something in common with.
So when I came back to London to set up Social Concierge, hosting private parties for single 20/30something members, I wanted to do something more networking specific.
Finance and Fashion parties aren’t new, but the reputation has always been bankers and models. With this Finance and Fashion brand, we wanted to make sure the women in finance and men in fashion were equally represented, and that we started to explore new start-up heavy industries like Financial Technology and FashTech.
2016 has been about getting exciting start-ups like online clothing retailer Finery and payment system Cake App, involved in our events. The idea is to also introduce founder talks into the events to add substance to a party brand that is also about flirting in a fun location.
Right now, we’re keen to get more start-ups to attending the events and we’re also on the lookout for those interested in having a key presence at the events – whether a panel discussion or founder talk.
Since the events also attract VCs and investors it’s also becoming a great place to make connections that could lead to investment – or love…
If you’d like to check out the action, tickets can be purchased here – with a £5 discount if you use code STARTUP.
The post Networking-Meets-Dating Brand Finance and Fashion Looks to the Start-Up World for Inspiration appeared first on The Startup Magazine.
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