Yester, I was able to attend the Collider Accelerator Demo Day 2018. With registration opening at 2:30 PM and the pitches starting at 3:15 PM, it was a nice change from the usual nightly affairs. I left straight after the pitches because I wasn't in the right head space for networking afterwards. But I had a lot of fun and got to exercise my critical evaluation skills by ranking the pitches by asking, "Who would I invest with?". So let's start with a few start-ups I would definitely invest with, were a venture capitalist or angel investor.

The strongest pitches on the night were new software-as-service platforms that seemed to address a clear gap in the market. In this category was Brandollo - they offer marketing advice and training to small business owners, who are shut out of the expert marketing advise due to pricing.

Also in this category were Prysim - a gig management platform and Tribefire that's catering to the online gaming and eSports industry. As a gamer, I am especially interested in Tribefire, and I think they are an early mover in competitive eSports, which may well be the next Formula 1! The Tribefire team also seem on the ball and to understand how the gaming community works. So I would very interested to see how far they go.

I guess I'll put Tixel in the saas category as well, although they are more a marketplace. But they facilitate the resell of eTickets. Due to the nature of eTickets, often just a picture or a PDF, fraud is rampant and disappointment even more so! Tixel validates before selling and blocks out users from reselling the same ticket multiple times. So based on the pitch, I would be onboard!

The platform startup I wasn't convinced by, still, is Lana. I heard their pitch for the first time during the Impact Boom Elevate+ event. I thought they might have issues then, I am more convinced than ever that they need to look at their start-up carefully. You see, the Impact Boom event was a celebration and there were no questions allowed. But this demo day was a pitch for investment. So there was a panel of expert asking questions, raising issues following the pitch. They pointed out that Lana might be trying to do too much. I think they should drop the sharing/renting aspect of their platform. I think there is a big market for high quality, designer maternity wear. While I am sure mothers will appreciate a secondary market within the Lana platform through which they could resell their clothes, I thinking the renting side is too much work for too little gain.

The other two platform startups I was not convinced by were Neon, who are trying to harness the power of VR to help you plan your wedding, and Birdee, who I would describe as constructing artificial memory for salespeople. Both are good ideas on paper but Neon needs to think outside the box to grow because their onboarding process does not seem scalable. As for Birdee, its cool on paper but I think they will find better uses for their technology in social services and healthcare industries.

Speaking of healthcare industries, apparently, we have already entered the era of companion robots! Exaptec doesn't make robots but take off the shelf programmable robots, and program them for use in aged-care, healthcare and I can also see them branch out in education. They are a startup I would like to know more about, and I am keen to see how they progress with their concept.

So this brings me to the last startup that I liked but wouldn't invest in because I am not sure if they have a future. BOP Industries is trying to make holographic projection technology, and they are doing well so far. But I don't know if they have a plan for when the novelty factor of their displays wears out. Because at the end of the day, marketing is the content, not the medium. Are they doing cool things with the content? I wasn't apparent during the pitch or based on the displays that were set up.

Lastly, you have Can't Sleep App, which is another entry in the very crowded but ever expanding wellness genre of products and services. Given the crowded marketplace, I wouldn't invest in the startup, mostly because I am not sure the CEO realises that he has to turn himself into a wellness guru to sell the app/music service.

Regardless of what I think, my hearty congratulations to all of the graduates from the Collider 2018 accelerator program. I look forward to seeing what you do next. Well done and keep going. I look forward to hearing about your startups in the future.