Director of Software Cornwall and Event Director for Startup Cornwall, powered by Slush’d, Niki, is your event host and compare for the day.

Niki has 15+ years’ of experience in marketing for tech/software companies and is the former Head of Marketing for award-winning cleantech startup, Verv, helping to take them from seed investment to Series A.

Software Engineer turned “The Mary Poppins of Startups”. Naily brings her multi-faceted toolkit to lead complex software projects and launch new products for seed startups and large corporations like Siemens Industry Software. She helps startups and scale-ups improve the maturity of their tech teams, and prepare for investor due diligence while continuing to deliver what customers expect.

In her talk, “If I build it, they will come… I think?”, Naily will share her expertise on how to test the market and validate your tech product before you spend valuable time and resource building it. 

Simon founded innovative marketing strategy company X-CMO in 2018, having spent 15 years in leading London agencies working with global brands.

With a fresh approach and a host of innovative marketing and brand development tools, Simon applies his marketing expertise to start-ups and scale-ups, working with passionate business leaders whose ambition matches his own. Simon empowers them to “communicate what makes them x-traordinary and communicate x-traordinarily”.

His talk, “What your company sells is not what your customers buy” will help you find the real problem your customers have. 

Tim is the CEO and co-founder of Codices; creating live interactive game shows and corresponding toolkit.

Founded at Cornwall’s venture studio, Falmouth Launchpad, Tim has raised over £2m in funding for Codices. Their product, Quiz Kit, boasts over 3 million players per month on Twitch. Recently, they released a brand new standalone live-streaming platform called Moar, which is designed for short-form live interactive game show content.

In Tim’s talk, ‘How To Tell a Start-Up Story’, he focuses on explaining the building blocks of getting an idea across to investors, customers, and employees before writing a single line of code.

With experience in television broadcasting, corporate communications, reputation and project management, Kirsty leads the Growth Hub operations team.

Kirsty is hosting the ‘Finance in Fifteen’ panel to help introduce the audience to the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly Investment Fund, grant funding and financial support available in Cornwall. 

Communications & Business Development Specialist with extensive project management experience in strategic communications, business development and program management. Anna’s career spans over 25 years working in the financial sector in Jersey, Channel Islands, as an Associate Director in a strategic communications firm and as a Head of Strategy for Cornwall Development Company, the previous economic arm of Cornwall Council.

Her current position is an Investment Manager for the FSE Group supporting SMEs based in Cornwall and the South West to access to commercially focused finance and address the equity gap in start-up, early stage and development capital.

Anna joins the ‘Finance in Fifteen’ panel to share more on local funding opportunities. 

Andrew is a qualified business coach with 30+ years of experience in commercial management. He specialises in business growth strategy and investment readiness.

Andrew manages the Access to Finance programme in CIOS that has raised over £40m for clients and will take part in the ‘Finance in Fifteen’ panel.

Nina is an award-winning x2 exited founder named as one of the most influential people in fashion in the noughties and is known as a world-leading expert in customer behavioural analytics. Nina now mentors & helps to raise capital for start-ups with positive impact consultancy IUSEGENIUS, guiding them through their Pre-Seed to Series A rounds.

Nina is a judge at our startup pitch competition and is also hosting the ‘Igniting Investment’ panel.

Zoe joins the ‘Igniting Investment’ panel to talk all things crowdfunding. 

Inspirational, heart-led leader, pragmatic manager, visionary doer. Passionate about businesses succeeding, business leaders being happy, achieving their dreams, fulfilling their full potential and creating brilliant environments for their teams.

Ally is on the Advisory Board for Startup Cornwall, powered by Slush’d and will be hosting the ‘Cornwall Startup Stories’ panel.

Lucy co-founded Frugi, with her husband Kurt, back in 2004. Cornwall’s own organic childrenswear brand, the original vision was to fill a gap in the market by manufacturing clothing that fitted over environmentally friendly (but bulky) washable nappies. The business grew to a turnover of £10M+ in 2018, that employed 100+ people. The business won 3 Queens Awards, was a “The Times” Fast Track “One to Watch” in 2016 (amongst other accolades) and gave over £1M to charity.

Lucy and Kurt sold an 80% share of Frugi to private equity company True in 2018. Lucy has had the ultimate roller-coaster journey and will share the lessons learned in her story. 

Jeremy is a passionate CEO with a demonstrable career history of leading innovation in the information technology and services industry.

Jeremy’s company, TouchByte was recently acquired. Jeremy will share his learnings as part of the ‘Cornish Startup Stories’ panel. 

Nigel joins the ‘Funding in Fifteen’ panel to talk about how Barclays Eagle Labs are supporting the tech startup ecosystem. 

Angel Investor, South West Tech Advocate, Strategic Advisor to StartUp and ScaleUp businesses, Entrepreneur, Mentor. 

Ben is the Co-Founder of the Bristol Angel Investor Network, Director at Skowt Consulting and Funding and Support Lead at Tech South West. 

Ben joins our ‘Igniting Investment’ panel to share insights on Angel Investing for startups.