OpenTalent
BBVA OpenTalent contest is a startup competition hosted by BBVA. The bank seeks to discover and promote talent from whom they can learn and share knowledge. It is aimed at ideas in e-commerce, security, mobile payments, data and others.
When we were told that we were the finalist of BBVA OpenTalent among more than 900 startups of 25 countries, we really freaked out. It was an incredible honor.
We were not sure about traveling to Buenos Aires. It is a 12 hours flight from Madrid and very expensive for a startup like us. It took us some time to decide. We had the opportunity of doing the pitch on Skype, but of course, it wouldn’t be the same. Finally, we thought that any time we go to an event we are happy in the end.
More than a prize
We had to compete with 13 teams in the technology category to win 100.000€, but we were 20 teams in total. The other 7 competed in the fintech category. It was stunning to read about the projects we are competing with, some of them had risen millions.
But the first day when we met them at Endeavor office, everything changed. They changed from being competitors to being persons, with the same problems, fears and dreams.
We had the great opportunity to meet Sergio of Bananity, he has built two startups but he seems to have built thousands, Juanma of Quonf, an amazing speaker, Daniel of Rocket, an amazing person, David of Unicoos, very funny, Jose and Borja, of Traity, one of the winner projects, Rubén of Twittflow, who did an incredible pitch, and up to 20 projects more.
It was only three days but we had an amazing time and we made awesome friends.