This evening, I will be hosting my 8th event in Manchester. Doug Stellman of YFM Private Equity and Paul Barraclough of Tecmentor will be joined by Stuart Scott-Goldstone of Aaron & Partners, and Pam Holland of Telecity. Let me introduce the two new speakers:
Stuart Scott-Goldstone – Aaron and Partners
Stuart Scott-Goldstone is Head of the Corporate/Commercial Team at Aaron & Partners LLP, a commercial law firm with offices in Manchester and Chester. Stuart specialises in corporate finance transactions and has advised both investors and companies on a large number of early stage and start up investments in the North West, particular those involving regional venture capital funds. Stuart studied at Christ’s College, Cambridge and The College of Law, Chester before training and qualifying as a Solicitor at Laytons, Manchester. He also recently completed an MBA at Manchester Business School.
I first met Stuart whilst undertaking my Executive MBA at Manchester Business School, where he undertook an Entrepreneurship MBA. He is an exceptional individual and fully understand the startup businesses, having been involved with number of startups himself in many different roles.
Pam Holland – Telecity
Pam has a background in HR Management and Organisational Development, with her early experience gained in blue chip companies – BICC, Electrolux, Provident Financial and United Utilities. In 1999 she changed direction and joined start-up data centre & IT hosting business – TeleCity, as their HR Manager during the first Internet boom. Her challenge at TeleCity was to build a strategy to attract and retain the talent pool needed for a rapid pan-European expansion programme to take the company from 25 to 450 employees in under 2 years. Pam is a member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development and has an Economics degree, MSc. in HR Management and an MBA from Manchester Business School.
Another product of Manchester Business School (MBS), I met Pam at one of the many networking events organised by MBS. Pam has an interesting story to tell about how Telecity ramped up its operations. I also heard today that Pam will be flying to Africa for 3 to 6 months voluntary work. Make sure you quizz her on the forthcoming journey!
Other Developments
Rebranding
The event series and the web site will be rebranded as “Northern StartUp 2.0” for the interim period to increase the catchment area. This change came up after a long meeting with North West Development Agency and Sun Microsystems yesterday. Since then this initiative has been approved by our long term partner, KPMG. The definition of North is a blur to say the least. This could well be interpreted as the area above Watford, as one of our partners suggested. But in reality, the plan is to serve the four great cities of Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool and Sheffield. I am not alone in my thinking. Other similar initiatives plan for the future includes dotnorth by my friend, Imran Ali.
Web Site
The new web site is not quite ready for launch. It will eventually provide almost an one-stop-shop for Digital Start Ups in the North:
- Events – There would be at least 12 branded events this year. Other event organisers will be invited to add their events to the site
- Blog – CxO and selected individuals from support organisations will be able to blog
- News – Aggregate relevant news
- MarketPlace – Publish needs and offers of registered members
- Job Board – publish vacancies
- Directory – of Service providers
- Northern Stars – Capture the details of upcoming Digital companies in the North.
- Surgery – Sun Microsystems, KPMG, Business Link, UKTI etc hold surgeries at Daresbury Innovation Centre – registration through the site.
Sponsorship/Partner Opportunities:
Having partnered with two blue chips (KPMG and Sun Microsystems), further partnership/sponsorship opportunities are available for:
- A firm of Solicitors
- A bank or financial institution
- A software company
- A firm of Management Consultancy
Advertising Opportunities
Available advertising opportunities include:
- Advertise on e-mails to our growing database. Maximum of four e-mails per month.
- Banner advert on web site.
- Directory of service providers on web site – Free for first 25 to sign up – what are you waiting for?
At present, I have received 35 registrations through the web site and e-mails. If you have not made any arrangements to attend so far, why not drop me a text message on 07769734491 to confirm your attendance. Please make sure your text message includes your full name and company.
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