Look Who’s Charging out-pitched nine other start-ups to be crowned the winner of CeBIT PitchFest on the final day of CeBIT Australia.
Founded by Stuart Grover, Look Who’s Charging is a Lake Macquarie-based FinTech start-up, which has set out to simplify the process of recognising unknown bank statement transactions and reconciliations.
“Winning the prestigious CeBIT PitchFest competition provides validation that our mission, to eradicate the 10 million plus hours Australians waste trying to figure out who has charged their card, is a core issue that every Australian can relate to,” Grover said.
“This is our first PitchFest competition, and already doors have opened with meaningful business and investor conversations.
Look Who’s Charging and the other nine PitchFest contestants were judged by a line-up of Australian and international leaders in the start-up sector; namely, Maureen Murphy, Commercialisation Adviser, Accelerating Commercialisation; Raj Dalal, Principal BigInsights and President of TiE Sydney; and James Cameron, Partner at AirTree VC.
Look Who’s Charging won a package valued at over $20,000 including an exhibition stand at CeBIT Australia 2018, a 12-month hosted cloud services package from OrionVM valued at $1,000 per month, and a 1-year membership to TiE Sydney.
Second place and third places went to Sydney-based start-ups Rivuu, a social media content approval and scheduling tool, and Sound Scouts, an app that is revolutionising hearing tests for school-aged Australians through gamification. Both start-ups will enjoy a 1-year membership to TiE Sydney.
NSW Minister for Trade and Industry, Niall Blair, commented on the PitchFest winner announcement:
“The NSW Government is investing in our state’s start-up sector because we recognise the potential to create jobs and economic growth. It was fantastic to see eight out of the ten PitchFest finalists were from NSW – it shows our state truly is the start-up state, home to 40% of Australia’s start-up founders.
“Congratulations to Look Who’s Charging for taking out the 2017 PitchFest title and I look forward to hearing more about their progress into the future,” Blair said.
CeBIT Australia will return to ICC Sydney to showcase the best business technology from across the Asia Pacific region on 15-17 May 2018.
