In December, Cisco launched their Start-Up Hub – a community to address the various pains and gains associated with being an entrepreneur. They are creating content with hand-picked experts and industry insiders, and BaseStone’s delighted to have been asked to be a contributor.
In this short video, Cisco interviews BaseStone CEO Alex Siljanovski about his shift into the world of startups, his inspirations and his advice for budding entrepreneurs. Watch out for future clips and blog posts from BaseStone!
BaseStone were very excited to be invited to exhibit at TechCrunch Disrupt, the tech industry’s conference to showcase revolutionary startups, game-changing technologies, and discuss what’s top of mind for the tech industry’s key innovators.
Our stand was within the Capital Enterprise Pavillon. We had a fantastic experience and some interesting conversations with the startup and investor community. Read on for some of our personal highlights!
Our highlights
Alex Depledge, CEO of Hassle, shared her experiences of building and scaling a digital company in the EU. She spoke about the importance of tenacity in difficult times, advising that “you need to do one thing and do it really well, better than the competition”! Depledge, a mentor to many women in tech, also touched on the need to equalise the maternity and paternity policy in the workplace – which becomes more acute in the startup context.
The Startup Battlefield opened the main stage to founders competing to give the best pitch for the chance to win a €30,000 prize and the Disrupt Cup. Some of rockstar pitchers included Lystable, MAXDelivery and JukeDeck – whose entire pitch was a rap to rival the likes of Biggie himself. Emotech, a fellow UCL startup, launched their voice-controlled robotic assistant Olly on stage yesterday and were also shortlisted for the Startup Battlefield.
Jenny Griffiths, CEO of Snap Fashion, was representing our IDEALondon cohort on the fashion panel speaking about the future of online shopping and using technology to balance discovery and curation.
It’s inspirational to see such disruption taking place in the tech startup scene in London. We’re very happy to be part of it!
BaseStone made it into the Top Ten for the Wild Card title – big thank you to everyone who voted for us!
BaseStone’s CEO, Alex Siljanovski, presented yesterday at the Rail Industry Association’s “Unlocking Innovation” event. Key figures from the industry were there, eager to understand and implement technology at various stages of rail projects. It was great to be invited to speak by the RIA, demonstrating the potential for tech startups within an industry with such complex information processes.
Alex’s “Elevator Pitch” covered the importance of connected data and collaboration for engineers, to ensure construction of rail infrastructure in the the UK is efficient and effective. Alex painted a picture of the future of the industry as it embraces innovations such as machine learning to intelligently work with the vast quantities of data on projects.
Other speakers from Thales and Network Rail gave interesting insights into about the collaborative Shift2Rail initiative that supports research into market-driven solutions to integrate advanced innovations and new processes in the rail industry. By seeking and implementing this kind of technology within the Horizon2020 framework, they will promote the competitiveness of the European Rail Industry and meet the changing EU transport needs.
We look forward to seeing some exciting outcomes from the day and future Unlocking Innovation events!
BaseStone’s Construct//Disrupt, our event to bring together the construction industry and tech startups, took place on the 21st October in London. The theme was Transport to the Future and we invited the latest innovations disrupting transport infrastructure to showcase and present their vision of the future of transportation.
The keynote speaker was Bibop G Gresta, COO and Deputy Chairman of Hyperloop Transportation Technologies, the 760mph capsule-based transportation system pioneered by Elon Musk.
Bibop Gresta presents Hyperloop Transportation Technologies’ vision for the future of transportation
Gresta said “We see the UK as one of the first possible candidates for the construction of a full length Hyperloop. We at Hyperloop Transportation Technologies have the technology to connect London to Glasgow in as little as 30 mins. And we could build it within five years time.”
Bibop presents to a captivated audience
“We were very excited to be speaking at BaseStone’s Construct//Disrupt in London as part of our world tour, especially as it’s one of the very few events championing the intersection of technology startups and engineering”.
He added that “London and the UK are one of Europe’s leading tech entrepreneurship centres with a thriving startup ecosystem and world class innovative transport infrastructure projects – it’s great to be on the scene at such an exciting time.”
Sustainable Materials Specialist from High Speed 2 (HS2), Andrea Charlson, gave a thought-leader piece on how sustainability will be embedded into the UK’s £43bn rail project set to kick off in 2017.
Andrea Charlson from High Speed 2 presents the benefits of the project
Alex Siljanovski, founder of BaseStone, the latest in collaboration technology for construction projects, presented his vision for the future of the industry. Alex explained how their work on Crossrail with some of the largest construction companies has uncovered huge potential cost savings whilst empowering engineers.
Alex Siljanovski presents the problems in the construction and how BaseStone addresses them
A series of startup founders gave lightning talks showcasing the next generation of technology disrupting transport across construction, engineering, logistics and manufacturing sectors. Marcin Piatkowski showcased his innovation, Jivr Bike, the sustainable and foldable electric bike. James Swanson of Voyage Control presented the latest in fleet management technology. Suryansh Chandra of Automata presented Eva, the 3D printed robot set to democratise robotics across industries.
Suryansh Chandra, founder of Automata showcases Eva, the 3D printed robotVISUALISE showcase their Oculus rift technologyThe Transport to the Future theme coincided with Back to the Future day
About BaseStone’sConstruct//Disrupt
BaseStone is a revolutionary collaboration tool for construction professionals. It links the construction site to back to the office streamlining the review of information and reducing risk by flagging issues that occur earlier, enabling businesses to fix them sooner.
BaseStone’s Construct//Disrupt events bring together industry leaders and tech startups to showcase the future technologies in construction and engineering. Construct//Disrupt is created and powered by BaseStone with a vision to collectively move towards better collaboration between disciplines and across industry lines.
Construct//Disrupt was held at BASE Kings Cross, a creative incubator space recently opened by UCL Advances, University College London’s centre for entrepreneurship. Aptly located in the heart of King’s Cross, an area undergoing significant urban regeneration, capital and transportation infrastructure investment.
