Five companies have been picked to compete in the Grand Finals of the 2023 Global Startup Pitch, by WiT and Phocuswright, at WiT Singapore, Oct 2-4.
In the four-hour virtual Semi-Finals which ran today, a team of almost 20 judges picked these finalists from the different regions, as well as a Wild Card category.
Asia Pacific: Tour Amigo
Middle East/Africa: Direx
Europe: ZYYLYN Technologies
Americas: Legends
Wild Card: Squadtrip
“Congratulations to the five winners of the Semi-Finals, they represent superbly the robust innovation and diversity of global travel tech landscape,” said Yeoh Siew Hoon, founder, WiT. “We are excited to welcome them to Singapore where we will pick the Global Startup of the Year. It’s been a long journey – this event started in March with 111 startups, whittled down to 25 in May and then five yesterday. There will be a sixth finalist chosen during the Korean Travel Startup Pitch at the WiT Bootcamp.”
“It was a marathon session and it’s rewarding to see the different threads of this year-long competition converge at WiT Singapore, and the ultimate winner gets a presentation spot at Phocuswright in Fort Lauderdale, Nov 13-16,” said Pete Comeau, managing director, Phocuswright. “All the startups did an incredible job pitching and we thank the judges for their hard work getting us to the Grand Finals.”
Investors speaking at the event remain bullish about travel, despite the challenging funding climate amid high interest rates.
Andreas Nau, partner, ennea capital partners, said that unfortunately the high interest rate environment would prevail for a while, and there would be a higher hurdle for funding “but when you talk to the right investor, long term prospects are good for travel”.
“With the changes happening – environment, inclusivity, mobility – there are so many different areas that are growing and it’s a great time to double down. Besides, there could be attractive valuations around.”
Cara Whitehill, founder of Unlock Advisors, is bullish on the mobility space – “the idea of fractional mobility is interesting and could be explored in how it could be applied to cities and municipalities” – and decentralized ID. “We started to see some of that during the pandemic but they fell away. I’d like to see more of that.”
With her focus on B2B, she sees “interesting potential for rethinking how travel is presented to a younger demographic, the creator economy and new ways of planning, shopping and booking. I was asked by a young person the other day, why would we use a booking engine? Their generation is video-driven, image forward.”
Nau said travel was such a huge market and there were still so many niches that could be attacked in different ways, even in matured markets.
“During this competition, we saw a lot of startups solving real problems – they may be boring – but they are real problems. We still see many new travel startups coming through the door and that’s great. Everyone loves to travel.”
Both were lukewarm on AI-driven trip inspiration, and blockchain, but bullish on the creator economy. “Power to the people,” said Nau.
