Inaugural awards for enterprise tech startups announce BRICS
specialist firm as exclusive VC mentoring partner for Emerging Markets
Trailblazers
LONDON,
UK – August 31 2012 – The inaugural Tech
Trailblazers Awards for enterprise tech startups today unveiled Amoo Venture Capital
Advisory as the venture capital (VC) mentoring partner for the Emerging Markets
Trailblazers category. The boutique advisory firm will work with the winners
and runners-up in the emerging markets category.
Amoo's founder and MD, Nzube Ufodike,
said: “Starting a business can be daunting – but with the right support, tools
and planning, tech startups can launch their innovations into commercial
success. Initiatives such as the Tech Trailblazers Awards are a key part of that
support network. We are pleased to be an industry supporter and look forward to
working with emerging markets trailblazers, who sometimes have many more
hurdles to jump to bring their ventures to fruition.”
The
founder of the Tech Trailblazers Awards, Rose Ross, commented: “The insights from funding experts such as
Amoo Venture Capital Advisory are valuable to all startups, but even more so for
startups from emerging markets such as the BRICS region. Having access to Amoo’s
specialist knowledge will be a great prize for our winners from the emerging
markets.”
The Tech Trailblazers Awards represent
the first independent initiative to recognize and reward enterprise technology
startups in a global arena. Prizes include business-development products and
services worth thousands of dollars, plus expert advice in the form of
mentoring from VCs and major vendors’ CTO offices. In addition to emerging markets category, other award categories
include: big data, cloud, infosecurity, mobile, networking, storage,
sustainable IT and virtualization.
There
is a heavily subsidized entry fee of just $50 for a standalone submission to
the emerging markets category. Tech startups
entering any other categories may also enter the emerging markets category free
of charge. For more information, please consult the Tech Trailblazers Awards website.
The judging panel includes
the IT industry’s leading
figures from around the world, giving little-known startups the opportunity to have
their products and services reviewed
by eminent influencers. Judges from the emerging markets include Mohit
Agrawal, Founder and Editor of Telecom
Circle (India); Elise Huang, Partner
at WestSummit Capital (China); Mark
Hillary, CEO at IT Decisions and Huffington Post blogger
(Brazil); Andrew Seldon, Editor of Hi-Tech Security Solutions,
TechNews (South Africa); and Monica Zlotogorski, Editor of Inside Latin America
(originally from Uruguay but now based in the US).
The
prize fund is supported by sponsors and industry partners including MIT/Stanford Venture Lab, the Cloud Security Alliance, Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA),
Computing, Prezi,
Startup America, StartTau, TiE
Silicon Valley, RealWire, Lissted, Launchpad Europe, Mynewsdesk, Wazoku, and ExecEvent.
Entry
forms should be submitted before the final closing date of September 12th for
consideration by the expert panel. For more information and to download an
entry form, please visit www.techtrailblazers.com.
To
join the Tech Trailblazers as a sponsor, please email innovate@techtrailblazers.com.
To be
added to the mailing list to receive the latest updates, please email innovate@techtrailblazers.com.
For
more information, please visit www.techtrailblazers.com
or follow the Tech Trailblazers Awards on Twitter @techtrailblaze, #ttawards or
on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/company/tech-trailblazers-awards.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Notes to editors
Rose
Ross, founder of the Tech Trailblazers Awards, and Amoo spokespeople are
available to comment. Please contact Olivia Shannon at Omarketing for more
information (contact details below).
Media Contacts
For Tech Trailblazers Awards
Olivia
Shannon
Omarketing
US: +1 781 519 0275
olivia@omarketing.co.uk
About Amoo
Amoo
Venture Capital Advisory is a trailblazing boutique advisory firm. They support
pre- and post-VC technology startups with strategic direction and business
development. Their experience covers advisory and fund raising services for
high potential tech companies in their second or third year of operation
looking for growth capital.
They
work with firms in the OECD and emerging markets. Their interest in the latter
has grown with the size of the opportunity and we have worked with several
emerging markets entrepreneurs looking to expand in their home markets and
abroad. We are currently working with a Nigerian startup and are relishing the
opportunity to do more work in these fast growing markets.
More
information on Amoo at: www.amoo.co.uk @amootweets
About the Tech Trailblazers
Awards
Tech Trailblazers is a new concept in awards,
designed explicitly for smaller businesses and startups that are less than five
years old and at C-series funding or below. The awards have low barriers to
entry and prizes that not only recognize startup innovation, but also
proactively help startups grow their businesses with exclusive coaching,
mentoring and development from VCs and leading CTOs as well as an estimated
prize fund worth in excess of $1m. The awards
seek to recognize true innovators in the following enterprise technology and
other areas:
- Big Data Trailblazers
- Cloud Trailblazers
- Emerging Markets
Trailblazers
- Mobile Technology
Trailblazers
- Networking
Trailblazers
- Security Trailblazers
- Storage Trailblazers
- Sustainable IT
Trailblazers
- Virtualization
Trailblazers
Entries
close on September 12th at 11:59pm PT – register your interest by
emailing us at innovate@techtrailblazers.com, following
us on Twitter @Techtrailblaze or via the hashtag #TTAwards,
or on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/company/tech-trailblazers-awards,
