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Eye candy at SURGE 2016 Bengaluru
The best gathered at SURGE 2016 Bengaluru on 23-24 February, better than the best reached the finals. Yet, some that couldn’t reach the finals grabbed attention, and a lot of it. The energy that flowed at SURGE was young but enthusiastic. Read on
The ongoing SURGE Conference 2016 Bengaluru, the Indian leg of Web Summit, has just announced the Arcatron Mobility, which aims to make mobility for disabled and other patients easy, as the winner judged by veterans Sachin Bansal (Flipkart) and Di-Ann Eisnor (Waze), after a close competition with locus.sh and SME Corner.
Hundreds had applied, more than 400 were finalised, of which yet another 40 were invited for a round of pitching. What made the competition tougher still was the young blood. Started by youth, led by youth, financed by youth, employing youth, aimed at youth… ScooNews profiles a few youth-oriented startups featured at SURGE 2016 Bengaluru, in no particular order:
Ather S340: This new energy-efficient scooter, technology-driven, is not a means of commuting but an entirely new experience. Launched at SURGE 2016 Bengaluru, visitors have already fallen in love with this product. So have we. The scooter comes with a well connected touch-screen dashboard, synced with cloud database and, to top it, it is electric, which means it has ‘better control’. The idea that an electric scooter won’t catch-up with speed is soon to be busted by this new kid on the block — conceptualised, designed and made in India by Ather Energy, a two-wheeler startup by Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain. Mehta believes, “Electric vehicles are an inevitable future.”
BananaBandy: This is a platform designed for all creative minds of India, where they can showcase their creativity and thereby promote themselves. Several other companies, looking for creative people in India, have already joined BananaBandy and are finding recruitment easy now! And who stands behind it? A team of 20-somethings. Shashank Jogani, 21, and Kavan Antani, all of 19 as of now, launched the website in 2015. Antani, the CEO and co-founder at 19 years of age, impresses with the idea behind it as he says, “We cater to the Indian creative ecosystem. On our website, any creative can sign up, upload his/her portfolio, interact with like-minded professionals, and also explore projects of different genres.”
Bubblo: New in the city and looking for a new restaurant? Ah, you are a tourist? Well, here’s Bubblo for your help. Bubblo tells you the top five DJs closest to your location, or bars, or fine-dine restaurants, in a bit more detail. It in fact tells you the kind of food being served, or the kind of music being played, etc, all based on the location. Watch real-time videos, know how crowded the place is, read the latest tweets about the venue, and a lot more. Makes it easy to decide? Well, why not, when they call themselves the DECISION app.
CodersTrust: An online educational platform for those interested in coding in developing countries, CodersTrust, founded by Ferdinand Kjærulff in 2013, provides not just education but also microfinance to students to help them upgrade and enhance programming skills. Having already won some startup awards, Kjærulff hopes to find many users from their base, Dhaka, Bangladesh and the subcontinent. In an interview, he said, “CoderTrust is a magnifying platform to fund education to take it to mutual market.”
HomBot: SmartHome is the next thing. With GenY travelling throughout the world for professional or personal reasons, Dhruv Bansal (the guy behind Vikilabs) aims to make striking a balance between home and office easier with HomBot. Quite easy on the pocket, it is an automation system, which, installed inside the switchboards, helps in controlling homes and appliances from anywhere ‘across the world.’ Across the world, did we hear that right?
MyFlatCV: Someone said, ‘Only 10 seconds can decide your future. Regardless of your professional and educational background, your career will be summed up in the blink of an eye on a single piece of paper.’ And Bhasker and Nikhil happened to read it. Living in a country abundant with talent, the two young men from south India realised the importance that your CV holds. And thus came about myflatcv.com, which designs paperless and responsive CVs, making it easy for employers to search too.
