December 14, 2019 – On Thursday, December 12, 2019, the grand finale of the Get in the Ring Split 2019 competition was held at the Radisson Blu Hotel.
In an atmosphere that even the biggest Hollywood films would boast, six finalists who underwent an extensive program of screening and evaluation by experienced entrepreneurs and investment fund representatives fought for a prize pool of HRK 250,000 and a shot on the stage of the Get in the Ring Global Competition 2020. The competition was organized by the Faculty of Economics in cooperation with the City of Split.
The finale of the competition was opened by program manager Michael Freer, who introduced the concept to the audience, after which Mayor Andro Krstulovic Opara and Dean of the Faculty of Economics in Split Maja Fredotovic addressed the crowd. The finals featured three 1-on-1 fights in front of an expert jury and audience.
According to the Get in the Ring standard, the fights consisted of the following segments: a general 1-minute introduction per competitor, then 5 rounds of 30 seconds per competitor in which they represented their team, their achievements, business model, market and finally, in the fifth ‘freestyle’ round, competitors had the opportunity to further convince the jury that they were the best startups. This was followed by 8 minutes of questions from the jury and 5 minutes of questions from the audience. The six finalists competing in the 1-on1 fights were Stiža Rezic from startup Mashroom Cups, Tomas Pinusic from startup GoToBot, Josip Marasović from Saliboat RC, Andrea Grisogono from startup Reel, Antonijo Perić Mažar from the Litto Agency and Slaven Damjanović from the startup eAgrar.
Choosing the winner, however, was anything but easy. After every fight and by the jury decision, in true boxing fashion, program manager and ringmaster Michael Freer would raise his hand to declare the winner. The jury trio then explained why they chose the winner of the fight, pointing out the key reasons, both in terms of scaling current business and in terms of long-term sustainability. Thus, the winners of the 1-on-1 fight were Stipe Režić (Mushroom Cups), Andrea Grisogono (Reel) and Slaven Damjanović (eAgrar).
The next stage of the competition saw the winners hold a five-minute Q&A session to convince the jury that they were the best startups at Get in the Ring Split in 2019. The jury named the winner Slaven Damjanović from eAgrar, who received HRK 100,000 and will compete at the Get in the Ring Global Competition 2020. Andrea Grisogono (Reel) won second place and HRK 70,000 and Stipe Režić (Mushroom Cups) won third place and HRK 50,000. The remaining finalists received a prize of HRK 10,000 each.
The jury included Tamas Bekasi (EIT Health RIS Region), Karina Lapina (Startup Wise Guys) and Krešimir Budiša (City of Split). The six finalists, out of the 20 competitors, were chosen by Iva Rakočević (NX3 Ventures London), Ivana Čuljak (Invento Capital Partners), Renata Brkić (Feelsgood Social Impact Investment Fund), Vanja Perić (Wealth Management Canada), Vedran Blagus (South Central Ventures) and Gergo Gulyas (Startup Campus London) after extensive evaluations and discussions with the candidates.
Get in the Ring Split 2019 was open to all businesses up to 5 years old, and entries were officially open from November 4 to December 4 until 11:59 pm. Twenty-nine entries were received. Thereafter, on December 6, the pre-selection committee issued a list of 20 selected project ideas. The chosen companies underwent two days of preparation to become more familiar with the Get in the Ring concept. On Tuesday, December 10th, Emanuele di Francesco of the Get in the Ring Foundation hosted the Get in the Ring Bootcamp Pitch Training, while on December 11th, the training was held by Dario Boras of Parklio, as the only Croatian representative so far at the global Get in the Ring competition.
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