Roll the red carpet out, dim the lights, and welcome the winners! Last night, Mingo – the City of Vienna’s startup initiative, named the best startups in four different categories ranging from companies at the business plan stage, to growth-oriented small enterprises, products and services and social diversity. The winning projects were selected on the basis of their degree of innovation and progress over the past year.
In order for the startups to qualify for the Mingo Awards, they must have been founded within the past two years, or at least, the most significant steps of building and expanding them must have occurred during that time span. Particularly noteworthy seemed to have been projects that outlined an interesting business model, and offered a specific solution through their proposition.
The categories
Company formation (business plan) focused on startups, which are about to form their company, or which were founded no longer than a year ago. They were therefore not in competition with further developed and established companies.
The category Products and services targeted startups with more than five regional USPs. Those did not necessarily translate into innovations per se, but into flexibility and improvements, among others.
Social diversity was aimed at startups that demonstrate variety in terms of cultural, ethnic and social background among others.
The focus in the category Growth-oriented small enterprises was on companies that have experienced fast growth over the last few years.
The winners
The contenders for best Company Formation were DirectSens medical sensors, crowdinvesting platform Conda, and real estate search engine zoomsquare, of which Conda emerged as the winner.
Vienna-based startup rollerstop, which designs scooter stands, was awarded the prize in the category Products and Services and left shpock – a mobile yard sale app, and weatherpark – a startup that plans buildings with regard to the weather, as the runners-up.
The nominees in the category Social diversity were kaffeefabrik, gss-guardian security service, and equalizent, who eventually won the award. equalizent is a startup that offers training sessions for the deaf, among others.
The category Growth-oriented small enterprises was won by Whatchado (check out our profile of founder Ali Mahlodji here), who was in competition with voigtp+ and Fluidtime.
Mingo’s special prize went to the school project Wien Night Walkers.
In the end, one particular tendency stood out, which Gabriele Tatzberger summed up as follows: “We were very happy to see an increase in the number of applicants across all sectors.”
