World’s largest green start-up competition announces its 2019 winners
Amsterdam, 16 November 2019 – They turn disposable diapers into clean fuel for residential use. Kenyan start-up Leafy Ke won the sixth edition of ClimateLaunchpad, the world’s largest green start-up competition. The second prize went to Maclec from India with their innovative hydrokinetic turbine technology. Enerdrape from Switzerland came in third with their idea for a geo-thermal panel that efficiently captures heat in existing indoor environments located underground and transfers it into renewable heating and cooling to buildings.
ClimateLaunchpad is the green business ideas competition with a primary focus on solving the climate crisis. This year the competition attracted a record number of 2,601 cleantech entrepreneurs applying for National Competitions in 53 countries. Training and coaching was organized in 70 locations across all continents.
In the past 6 years ClimateLaunchpad has generated more than 6,700 ideas that resulted in the creation of over 8,000 jobs within 1,900 start-ups. Next year the goal is to add 17 countries to the competition and grow to 70.
The 2019 Global Final was held in Amsterdam, The Netherlands on November 14 and 15. The three Global Final winners received money prizes, and all Top-16 finalists will now enter an Accelerator Programme for cleantech entrepreneurs run by EIT Climate-KIC.
Edward Mungai, jury member and CEO of Kenya Climate Innovation Center, was impressed with the quality of the 2019 finalists: “The level keeps going up, clearly entrepreneurs are excited about the opportunity to build a healthy business and do good for the planet. ClimateLaunchpad is creating a global movement of green entrepreneurs that will fix climate change, one startup at a time. Currently over 7 African countries participate in the competition.”
New this year was the Female Founders Award to highlight start-ups that benefit from female leadership. Winner Multus Media from UK-England was presented the award by Lisa Ann Pinkerton, chairwoman of Women in Cleantech & Sustainability.
“Women leading start-ups are tackling some of the biggest challenges the green economy faces in the coming years,” says Pinkerton. “But somehow we still see women entrepreneurs woefully underrepresented in this space, and dramatically underfunded. This award highlights the great work women are doing for the climate and encourage others to start green businesses themselves.”
Frans Nauta, founder ClimateLaunchpad: “The climate crisis is the single biggest business opportunity and job creator of our time. We are witnessing a global green wave of scalable sustainable businesses spread across the globe.”
More detailed information on all 2019 finalists and their green start-ups can be found on https://climatelaunchpad.org//finalists/
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Note to editors:
For more information about ClimateLaunchpad, the Global Grand Final, press and interview requests please contact:
Andre Koster
andre@climatelaunchpad.org
Contact ClimateLaunchpad
www.climatelaunchpad.org
globalfinal.climatelaunchpad.org
Twitter: @ClimateLaunch
Facebook: www.facebook.com/climatelaunchpad
LinkedIn: ClimateLaunchpad
About ClimateLaunchpad
ClimateLaunchpad is the world’s largest green business ideas competition. Its mission is unlock the world’s cleantech potential that addresses climate change. A green future demands thousands of innovations challenging the current business models. The competition supports aspiring and promising cleantech entrepreneurs with training, coaching and networking opportunities. ClimateLaunchpad operates on a global scale, currently in 53 countries.
ClimateLaunchpad was established in 2014 and is part of the Entrepreneurship offerings of EIT Climate-KIC.
About EIT Climate-KIC
Climate-KIC is one of the Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs) established in 2010 by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), the EU body that creates sustainable economic growth in Europe, tackling the global challenges of this time.
www.climate-kic.org
About the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT)
The EIT is an independent body of the European Union set up in 2008 to spur innovation and entrepreneurship across Europe to overcome some of its greatest challenges. It brings together leading higher education institutions, research labs and companies to form dynamic cross-border partnerships – Knowledge and Innovation Communities, KICs – that develop innovative products and services, start new companies, and train a new generation of entrepreneurs.
https://eit.europa.eu
