PITCH DAY STARTUP WINNERS ANNOUNCED FOR PARTICIPATION IN CES 2022

The first public selection of startups to participate in the Consumer Electronic Show 2022, taking place in January of next year, was held on September 14. Eight winners were selected from 17 teams, who will receive Innovative Vouchers, exempted from paying rent on exhibition space and will exhibit their product at CES Eureka Park within the confines of the Ukrainian Startup Pavilion, to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Western NIS Enterprise Fund will fund space rent for each startup for $3,500 each. Innovative Vouchers are a novelty from the USF. It is a grant to pay for startup representatives to take part in international exhibitions, conferences, promotional tours or other international events held outside Ukraine.

The event was organized by the Western NIS Enterprise Fund and the Ukrainian Startup Fund. The distinctive feature of this event is that for the first time ever the participation of startups in the exhibition is encouraged and organized by the State. Until now, there have only been private initiatives.

Who are the winners?

• Comeback Mobility. Smart sensors for crutches to monitor the weight-bearing status of crutch-using patients with lower extremity injuries.
• Qudi. Mask enabling the sharing of any emotions on the face without revealing one’s identity.
• Neverdark. Bio fireplaces with real fire.
• Effa. Eco-friendly disposable hygiene products made from 100% recyclable and renewable materials.
• Manna. An interactive media platform that allows 3D animation of user-generated content, streaming, and social cooperation in Virtual Reality.
• Copra. Ukrainian manufacturer of premium speaker systems and sound amplifiers.
• Esper Bionics. Develops a next-generation bionic hand prosthesis and a cloud platform as a service that teaches prostheses the user’s habits while improving management.
• Cardiomo. AI-powered solutions for remote monitoring of patients provide reasonable, uninterrupted, and cost-effective out-of-hospital monitoring in real time.

Who were the jury members?

• Jaroslawa Johnson. President and Chief Executive Officer of Western NIS Enterprise Fund.
• Аndrii Sorokhan. Venture Lead at UVentures.
• Olha Kuzmenko. Innovation Manager at DTEK.
• Ihor Markevych. Head of Projects and Programs of the Ukrainian Startup Fund.
• Kateryna Dehtiar. Startup Grind Kyiv Chapter Director.
• Anton Melnyk. Expert of the Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine on startup ecosystem development.
• Iryna Novikova. Co-founder and CMO at Nanofluids and іNX Technologies, Tech Ukraine Innovation Director.
• Arkadii Vershebeniuk. Partner at JKR Investment Group.
• Vasyl Zadvornyi. Director at ProZorro State Enterprise.
• Vitalii Honcharuk. Founder of Augmented Pixels.
• Felix Litvinskyi. Managing Director at Blackstone LaunchPad.

Projects were evaluated on the basis of key criteria as the following: team, product, market, innovative market power and relevance to consumers.

View the complete pitch footage on YouTube channel here.