Firestarter Trailblazers 2020 – Shortlist

We have a bumper number of entries to the Tech Trailblazers Awards this year. 2020 has seen a considerable uptick since last year, an increase of over 50%, demonstrating that even more startups in the enterprise tech space are continuing to take positive steps to gain the recognition from awards in order to stand out from the crowd when it comes to seeking investment, clients, and potential acquirers.

The Firestarter Trailblazers is a bursary is for non-VC backed startups up to two years old. It was created to ensure that entry fees wouldn’t be a barrier for the new lean startups who are still securing major funding from VCs. The program aims to attract more earlier stage startups within the accelerator and incubator communities as well as those self-funding or with angel, seed, and crowd-funding as their primary source of investment.

Congratulations to this year’s shortlist for the Firestarter category:

• AirVTing – AirVTing is a social commerce platform that focuses on equipping users with live-streaming tools for the promotion of e-commerce activities. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• Avalance Global Solutions – Avalance aims to abolish the possibility of unauthorized access to databases by classifying the weaknesses in the digital space. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• Codastra – Codastra is a unique code visualisation and discovery tool, revolutionising how applications can be viewed and developed. Website Twitter
• Cyvatar – Cyvatar is a technology-enabled cybersecurity-as-a-service provider delivering smarter, measurable subscriptions to help firms achieve compliance and security faster and more efficiently. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• Eldir – Eldir is a collaboration between security and software experts, developing and supporting solutions designed to manage the lifecycle of personnel and equipment. Website LinkedIn
• Fortifai – Fortifai offers a cybersecurity tool to build defences directly into your application code. It is capable of detecting Zero-day attacks through use of AI-powered behavioural analytics. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• NexBotix – NexBotix  is on a mission to disrupt the Intelligent Automation industry with its platform that combines RPA with advanced AI capabilities, all delivered via a fully managed service. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• Shyn – Shyn is working to build a new generation of quantum contextual engines. Website
• Vastmindz – Vastmindz is aiming to transform regular consumer technology devices into comprehensive non-invasive diagnostic tools using artificial intelligence. Website Twitter LinkedIn
• ZipiStream – ZipiStream is a new platform that allows podcaster to send messages and special offers to all their listeners. Website Twitter

Firestarter Trailblazers  success – the story so far

The Firestarter Trailblazers was introduced as a new category in 2015. Since then there has been a trio of firms who have won or been shortlisted which have gone on to be acquired. For instance, the winner in 2017, CLTRe, went on to be bought by KnowBe4 in 2019.

Runners-up have also been successfully purchased. NodePrime, a runner-up in 2015, was picked up by Ericsson the year after entering the Tech Trailblazers Awards. It took a little longer for one of our 2017 runners-up, OpenIO, to go on and be acquired by OVHcloud in July of this year.

This all goes to show how not only winners but also those recognised by our esteemed judges can catch the eye of a larger firm who then buys them up, often the startup founder’s dream exit.

Now we’re onto the second round of judging and the voting stage of the Awards. The public vote is now open, vote here now! Voting closes on Thursday 3rd December and the winners will be announced on Tuesday 8th December.

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Other shortlists

AI	Big Data	Blockchain
Cloud	Containers	Developer
Female CxO	FinTech	Firestarter
IoT	Male CxO	Mobile
Networking	Security	Storage