It is all possible at ATECH, the Startup Pitch Competition. 

I sat in on some pitches, Friday afternoon, crazy geniuses pitching their ideas for the winning start-up title, in a hushed room at the Hilton Aruba Caribbean Resort & Casino, filled with interested and interesting people.

Wow, people have ideas; they follow their dreams, with a sense of entitlement.  In my generation we all got there at age 40, not at 22. We wrestled with the world’s permission: Will the world be kind enough to allow us to pursue our passion, could we, should we? Then when the inner conflict got unbearable, we went for it, and found success, most of the time.

Now, these kids at age 12 are already the CEOs of their own dream enterprises. I’ m exaggerating, but you get my drift, this millennial generation wants to work to fix the world. They pursue their ideologies.

So how about the pitches? Travel was big. Two start-ups tackled travel, facilitating quality experiences, which convert us into travelers, not mere tourists.

In the case of ZOMOZ, a startup from Venezuela, AirBnB already offers a similar program whereby locals take you to practice mountain-top yoga, or teach you to make Arepas in a country kitchen. But programs like that are unforgettable — I made pasta and pizza when in Rome — and result in a sharing economy. While I don’t see this saving Venezuela, it’s a step in the right direction.

Kryha, Blockchain solutions, enjoyed a warm reception. Apparently the young man pitching is from Aruba, a member of the Croes family, as in Fito Croes, and doing quite well in the Netherlands in the cryptocurrency field – something to do with digitalized money — when you grow up, you’ll get it. Very cool. He quoted Mike Tyson saying: Everyone has a plan ‘till they get punched in the face, meaning, watch out for the unexpected, cryptocurrencies are coming.

The startup which gave me goose-bumps came from Haiti. A young stylish woman, Daphnee Charles, with a pronounced French Creole accent, single handedly found a way to end poverty, starting with the poorest nation, Haiti, by making every single citizen an entrepreneur, a businessman/woman. She gave an example of her mom, a street vendor in the Iron Market selling spices, who took five kids through school, including university degrees on the wings of her diligence and creativity. Her group CoCread created a start up city for Micro Entrepreneurs.

The last one was a Dutchman, cracking down on food waste as the middle man between overstocked supermarkets and hungry consumers on a platform called No More Food Waste. According to his pitch about one third of all the world’s food goes to waste, and cutting down on that provides for the needy at discounted prices, makes the supermarkets some money, but more importantly, puts precious produce to good use.

I also met an innovator at the expo, Open Data Nation, a woman with a genius idea. Her start up pours over millions of city records, from accidents to insurance claims and health inspection reports to reveal leading indicators of risk, and deliver business intelligence to plan for safety. Finally, someone to read all those reports and draw some good conclusions. It’s an all women company and I think that Carey Anne Nadeau is on to something.

I had a great afternoon. Results of the competition, revealed later today.

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October 28, 2017
Rona Coster