By Karina Sem Glømmi, Intern at Innovation Norway San Francisco & Silicon Valley
In early October we kicked off our incubator program REACH for the fourth time. Four Nordic researched-based tech companies arrived in Silicon Valley bringing their international ambitions and potential. They all share the same goals - to identify, define and validate the path to realizing their technology’s commercial potential, sharpen their value proposition and pitch, and expand their professional network. REACH runs over six calendar months with two 14-day acceleration visits to Silicon Valley at the beginning and end of the program. The program includes a combination of top mentor sessions, potential customer identification, partner or investor meetings, workshops and business events. As the first acceleration visit has been completed and the companies are building momentum in their validation and execution, we had a talk with Erik Wilson from the company ByLife about the program so far:What has REACH helped you with the last weeks?REACH really supplied us with the tools for finding our focus. What questions do you ask yourself and how do you rate the quality of the answer? We managed to understand how to enter our first market and to dissect it to finer pieces to make the process "easy". What you are looking forward to the next months?The coming months we will take our startup to the next level. We will launch our first beta-test with paying customers and start selling. Everything we have done in the company since we started over a year ago has led up to this point. No pressure. The companies are now back in their home countries ready to keep developing and preparing for the next accelerator visit in the Spring of 2019. We at Nordic Innovation House are excited and ready to support them and help them realize their potential in the months to come!Read more about the REACH program here.
