Michael helps Wikipedia founder to pick £50,000 winner

EMC director Michael Pay joined Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales to help pick the £50,000 winner of a national competition for IT entrepreneurs.

Michael, who is based at our Hove office, was on the judging panel selecting and coaching entrepreneurs pitching for the top prize in the Investment Competition which formed a major part of December’s Tech Entrepreneurs Week, created by entrepreneur Martin Warner from talbiznow.com and Cabo Films.

The competition was aimed at opening up the venture funding gap in the UK by demonstrating the country’s strong technology heritage and its potential to create the next Google or Facebook.

The top prize – £50,000 worth of capital funding plus some likely venture capital investment – went to Last Second Tickets, a young company based in Butlers Wharf, London SE1, with a new and novel approach to offering late deals on a broad range of live events to thousands of people each day.

 Michael, who is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants and a non-executive director of a number of local tech companies as well as advising on international corporate finance transactions in the sector, spent four days mentoring at the competitors’ ‘boot camp’ in the City and acting as Chair of the judges.

Over 70 hopeful companies pitched their businesses to the judges before they passed over the baton to Jimmy Wales who chaired the final day’s session as Head Judge.

Just ten went through to Finals Day where they had the opportunity to present their business to some of the world’s largest venture capital funds and leading entrepreneurs.  Of the three that Michael mentored, two went through to the finals and one – Bertie and Bean, an online community for babywear – came third overall.

Michael said: “I am passionate about entrepreneurs and how they create and develop world-class businesses, so it was great to be part of a scheme to help unearth the next Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg.

“Last Second Tickets was a worthy winner and I’m sure we’ll all be hearing a lot more of them over the coming years. Meanwhile people can check them out at www.lastsecondtickets.co.uk”

Jimmy Wales commented: “I am sure we will see the next Facebook or Google amongst the contestants.”