Last night in Berlin, the guys at Web Summit hosted The Europas for its 4th edition, awarding European startups, VCs, and entrepreneurs in various categories. We’ll see what the word is on how the event itself went, but Mike Butcher broke a record for being the first person to finish an award show 20 minutes ahead of schedule – one attendee said “It was like he had to catch a plane.” Talking to Web Summit founder Paddy Cosgrave after the event, he seemed to be aware of where his team, who had never organized an awards show before last night, could improve the event flow for next year, but I stand by my claim that the after party (open bar + cheap burgers) was good enough that no one will remember whether they did or didn’t like the awards part.
We already shared a list of the French nominees for awards, but we thought we’d share just how well France did last night:
Best French Startup: qunb
https://twitter.com/LiamBoogar/status/293808132499582976
Runner up for People’s Choice Award and Best Transport Startup: Blablacar
https://twitter.com/LiamBoogar/status/293809940483674112
Runne up for Best Service Provider: BallouPR
https://twitter.com/LiamBoogar/status/293810895937744896
Best Leightweight startup: Sketchfab
https://twitter.com/LiamBoogar/status/293812750298271744
Runner up for Best Commerce Startup: Dashlane (HQ in NY, but one French co-founder)
https://twitter.com/LiamBoogar/status/293825346153889792
While France was robbed on a few awards – Socialbakers taking Best Marketing Startup instead of Nitrogram, for example – there was one that particularly struck me. Despite the fact that two French startups from LeCamping won awards last night, Seedcamp, whose startups won 0 awards, took the award for best Accelerator. Now I don’t necessarily believe that these awards are indicators of who’s doing the most well, but it does make you wonder what the criteria was. For example, I think the “best Exit” award was just based off of value of acquisition, which is kind of a weird award to give.
Nonetheless, the event wraps up a near week-long series of events, which will be concluded with a Rude Baguette breakfast this morning at 11:00AM. For all teams that won or, like me, were nominated, congratulations and keep up the good work. I saw a lot of familiar French faces at The Europas, and Paddy Cosgrave told me that France was super active on the people’s choice awards, so we’re going to be pushing for some more French attention next year, perhaps even hosting the Europas in Paris? Who knows!
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