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EU backed blockchain accelerator BlockStart selects five startups

startup accelerator

BlockStart is an accelerator program backed by the EU Horizon 2020 fund. The aim is to match blockchain startups with SMEs that can use the startup’s solutions. Last year, ten companies were selected for the second group of BlockStart startups, and today it announced the five startups that will proceed to the pilot stage.

BlockStart Announcement

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BlockStart is an EU-funded Horizon 2020 DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology)/blockchain Acceleration Programme. Its main objective is to facilitate goal-oriented, business-focused, and mutually beneficial partnerships between DLT/blockchain solution providers and more traditional end-user SMEs operating in the fintech, retail and ICT sectors. BlockStart will support 60 tech startups and 60 end-user SMEs with mentoring, networking, and a total of €795,000 in equity free grants.

BlockStart is run by a team of 3 partners: Bright Pixel, an early-stage VC investor, CIVITTA, a leading innovation management consultancy in the Eastern and Central Europe, and F6S, a global tech founders’ community.

BlockStart’s top 5 DLT/blockchain startups

In its 2nd Open Call in 2020, 10 early stage DLT/blockchain startups from all over the EU and H2020 Associated Countries have been selected to a 6-month immersive acceleration programme. From those, 5 have made it to the Pilot stage of the programme and were given the chance to test, validate and implement their blockchain-based solutions by partnering with end-user SMEs, willing to adopt their technology.

Whether you are an investor looking for your next blockchain investment, another DLT/blockchain startup looking to partner or an end-user SME wanting to implement such solutions to grow their business, check out BlockStart’s top 5 startups that are leading innovations in their area:

ComeTogether (Greece) was established in 2018. It gives control of the entire lifecycle to event organizers with the power of blockchain. It has also developed BackTogether (Covid-19 passports), a health component integrated into ComeTogether, enabling safe restart of events.

IBISA (Luxembourg) was established in 2019. It developed Minorka, a solution that helps SMEs benefiting from the value of Earth Observation satellite data for their businesses, namely independent farmers & agri-cooperatives (risk management, smart farming, revenue forecast, etc.), food related SMEs (supply chain risks, revenue forecast) and financial services (loss/fraud detection and credit scoring).

Knowtary (Portugal) was established in 2020. It aims to create digital identities and registrations for properties or goods and integrates them with company registries and notary services, so that transactions are secure, traceable, indisputable, and reliable.

LoanXChain (Italy) was established in 2017. It is the first digital secondary loan marketplace, where resources smoothly flow from savers and investors to families and corporates thanks to revamped lending capability.

Motoblockchain (Spain) was established in 2018. With Motoblockchain, the motorcycle owner can manually save all motorcycle information and the motorcycle itself can upload information recorded by Motoblockchain sensors. All the information is collected into the motorcycle’s digital identity, guaranteed by the blockchain.

Exciting times are ahead of us! By creating trust in data in ways that were not possible before, blockchain technologies have the potential to revolutionize how we share information and carry out online transactions. For this reason, BlockStart is proud to present the above mentioned startups and the work that they have been carrying out in the scope of the programme for the past 6 months.