The name is new, but the concept is already tried and tested: students and aspiring founders take a startup idea and, within three months, develop it into a viable business model or even an initial product. Previously known as Future Founder, the programme is now called iF Pioneers to highlight its affiliation with the Impossible Founders Startup Factory. Kühne Logistics University (KLU) is also new as the host for the final pitch. The winning team was one that had already attracted attention at the Hamburg Innovation Summit.
The six teams of the university projects. © Mathias Jäger/Hamburg Startups
An opening programme featuring seven promising ideas
Before the actual pitch competition, six further teams from universities stretching from Flensburg to Rostock had the opportunity to introduce themselves. Dock Konzepte presented a modular plant pot that grows along with the plant, whilst Urbin showcased a public litter bin with a few extra features. KAMJA uses sensor technology to detect allergens in the air, OceanSense to survey bodies of water. belong is developing a platform to help people from migrant backgrounds find their feet in Germany, and BioWax is creating an environmentally friendly alternative to wax made from waste products from food production. It’s quite possible that we’ll see some of these projects in the next batch of iF Pioneers.
This is particularly true of GrowTi, the winning team at last weekend’s iF Sprint hackathon. It owes its success to a technology that utilises titanium sulphide and which can be used, amongst other things, for filters.
The teams, organisers and the jury of the iF Pioneers Demo Day. © Mathias Jäger/Hamburg Startups
New technologies for navigation, facade construction and drug testing
Twenty-eight students from seven universities qualified for this round of iF Pioneers, forming nine teams. Five were given the chance to pitch their ideas to a jury and a large audience. GravNav emerged from a previous iF Sprint and has already proven itself in a practical test in the Port of Hamburg. For ship navigation, it uses gravitational anomalies rather than GPS, which is prone to interference and errors. RoboClad aims to renovate building facades using AI-powered robots to reduce energy consumption. Qynara plans to revolutionise the quality testing of medicines by speeding up a testing process which can otherwise take hours or even days by 98 per cent.
Nidhi Mote and Kamila Kanatbay from VisFlo have won the jury prize at iF Pioneers Demo Day. © Mathias Jäger/Hamburg Startups
Prizes for vegan leather and a stress indicator
Two teams secured a comprehensive support package from Impossible Founders and prize money. The audience award, worth 1,000 euros, was won by Lleap Materials with a vegan leather alternative made from the plant component lignin. Their particularly passionate pitch and the literally tangible product were key factors in their success. The jury chose visflo, which thus repeated its success at the Hamburg Innovation Awards. A prize of 1,500 euros was given for a sensor worn like a plaster and a linked app that measures cortisol levels in a person’s sweat. The hormone is considered the most reliable indicator of stress – a problem that affects millions – which is why a solution promises great market potential.
