SparKids, a platform created to provide support to children with high abilities, was the most outstanding initiative of the fifth edition of Startup Weekend Montevideo. The event, organized by the Uruguayan Chamber of Information Technology (Cuti) and the business incubator Ingenio, seeks entrepreneurs to incorporate skills and receive advice from experts to help make their projects a reality.
On this occasion, the event brought together more than 60 entrepreneurs - coming from various fields such as programming, design, advertising, marketing and finance, among others - who presented their innovative ideas. After the presentations, the initiatives with the greatest potential were selected and multidisciplinary working groups were formed to design business plans, with the support of 16 coaches and two facilitators.
Álvaro Lamé, president of Cuti; Sara Goldberg, operations manager of the National Agency for Research and Innovation (ANII), and Gabriel Colla, president of Infocorp, were in charge of choosing the projects, many of which focused on social issues.
The activity, which took place over 54 hours, also included the participation of a panel of renowned speakers, who gave talks to inspire entrepreneurs. Luis Ara, director of Dispel, representative of Warner Bros Pictures in Uruguay and of the multimedia production company Trailer Media; Gabriela Retamosa, Developer Ecosystems & Startups at IBM; and Sebastián Vergara, software architect, also at IBM, were the speakers of the activity.
As usual, the Startup Weekend Montevideo culminated with a round of presentation of the projects and a feedback session, during which SparKids' proposal stood out. This platform was created with the aim of becoming a reference space for children with high intellectual abilities, both locally and regionally. In the first instance, the initiative seeks to link parents with professionals specialized in the field, in order to later generate a community of children.
The entrepreneurships Reunidos, which proposes a smart way to make donations; BetChallenge, which bets that "you are the bank", and #InvestMeUp, driven to connect startups with investors, were also highlighted during the event, which was supported by IBM Uruguay, Indra and Tryo Labs.
Source: Montevideo Portal
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