Ljubljana is a beautiful city. So beautiful, I would say, that one should have no reason whatsoever to want to go on a business trip, let alone move to the US to grow the business, as some Slovenian entrepreneurs are planning to do. Enter Credo Week which took place from the 31st of August to the 2nd of September 2011, organized by Credo Ventures, Czech venture capital fund.
Credo team decided against driving all the way from Prague, and settled for a private jet instead, as its partner Jan Habermann is also a pilot.
For me, however, the journey is not as seamless. To get to Ljubljana, located at the heart of Central Europe, I had to travel from Northern Germany via Switzerland and Austria to finally drive across the border to Slovenia.
The first the Credo Week event was well attended - three hours was just enough time to talk to everyone. Here is a list of companies whose founders came to the meeting.
One company, represented by Leon van Bakel, analyzes Twitter content created by Slovenians and makes clippings of tweets for the businesses who aim to understand how they can use Twitter, or wish to monitor their brand’s reputation.
Ivan Turkovic talked about Kuponski, a Slovenian startup that aggregates deals and offers them to mobile phone users in real time.
A company, whose name I will not disclose yet: its technology simplify organisation of sport events.
Matija Klemenc from Adrialog came to talk about the online travel community and focused on the Adriatic Sea as a travel destination. The community is number one in Slovenia, and the founders are looking to expand it into other European countries.
Jure Zadravec from Genelitik discussed the company`s capability to diagnose genetic causes of various diseases. By conducting analysis of its clients’ DNA the research conducted by the company offers insight, for example, into the genetic wiring of metabolism, and how it can affect weight loss. Apparently, depending on your genes, you might need to eat more fat to remain slim.
Cica Gajic from Simplabs talked about Diet Point, the mobile application for dieting on Android and iOS platforms. In June 2011 the number of downloads surpassed 1.2 million.
Zlatko Turkalj told me about a Croatian company called Business Exchange, set to improve transparency of business reputations in the SME segment. The firm’s technology enables companies to give and receive feedback with their business partners, and place requests for proposals within their trusted network.
And finally, perhaps my favourite business, Viidea is a company whose value proposition is to provide a better experience of educational videos online. What I like about their technology is a white label service for conference organisers, which allows monetisation of recorded conference materials.
More about these and other companies later, when I get a chance to process my notes and write more about their business models and fundraising needs .
In summary, this is all for now. Zagreb, Croatia is located within 140 km from Ljubljana. It is the next stop for Credo Week.
