Following its journey to Oviedo, Cartagena, Bilbao and Malaga, Valladolid was the fifth stop on this tour. This is the sixth edition of Venture on the Road, the itinerant event organised by Banco Sabadell’s BStartup, SeedRocket and Wayra, Telefonica’s open innovation initiative, also partnered by Google for Startups. The objectives remain the same: to seek out the best opportunities in each region and give early stage startups the chance to present their projects to investors and build a high quality network of contacts.

The event took place on Wednesday 19 April at the Instituto para la Competitividad Empresarial (ICE), of the Junta of Castile and Leon, in Arroyo de la Encomienda, and benefited from the experience and knowledge of the local ecosystem thanks to the participation of local partners such as the ICE of Castile and Leon and its startup accelerator, Wolaria.

The four finalist startups were:

• Articae: provider of technological solutions and services aimed at optimising the energy efficiency of air conditioning and industrial refrigeration systems, using artificial intelligence and advanced control technology.
• Leial Technologies: a company that offers cross-cutting transformation in robotics, developing tools, training and methodologies to teach users how to operate any robot at any level.
• Maybein: a restaurant booking app that allows the user to monitor, in real time, table availability in top restaurants, based on an alerts system that notifies the user instantly when a table becomes free or if a reservation is cancelled.
• Rooteco: a biotech company that offers 100% sustainable biofertilizers, using living micro-organisms that improve productivity and crop yield.

The event also enjoyed the participation of Rafael Garrido, Vitamina K founder, SeedRocket mentor and startup investor, who delivered a presentation to the entrepreneurs entitled: ‘How to get investment in startups and whether it is really needed’, in which he explained what today’s investors are really looking for when they consider a potential investment in a startup.

Maybein, the winning startup of Venture on the Road in Valladolid, is guaranteed a spot in the national final, which will take place on 15 June in Madrid, alongside the winning projects from other cities. It will also form part of the Google Cloud digital natives programme, with up to 10,000 US dollars in credit valid for 9 months and technical follow-up with Google Cloud engineers. in addition to enjoying priority access to advanced training in the Google Cloud Platform training programmes.

The winning proposal of the national final of the 6th edition of Venture on the Road will be awarded a package of support from all the partners, including specialist consulting in finance or marketing valued at 3,000 euros provided by BStartup, participation as a guest project in the SeedRocket Entrepreneurs Campus, and space in the Wayra offices for 6-12 months, as well as access to events, training sessions, workshops and contacts.

Venture on the Road will soon visit Alicante, the last stop in this sixth edition, to find talent and promising startups at regional level outside Madrid and Barcelona, the two leading tech hubs in Spain. The event has already taken place in Oviedo, Cartagena, Bilbao, Malaga and Vallodolid.