From June 30th to July 1st, Split was a global stage for university entrepreneurship during the international university startup competition STup!2023. This year, 30 selected startups from 17 universities in 10 countries entered the competition. All of them gathered on June 30th at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Split to present their startups to the jury and compete for a spot in the finals on July 1st among the top eight teams.

The STup!2023 competition was organized as part of the University Green Digital HUB project, with the support of the City of Split, the European University of the Seas (SEA-EU), the Croatian Bank for Reconstruction and Development (HBOR), and the Tourist Board of the City of Split.

At the beginning of this two-day competition, the participants were addressed by the Dean of the Faculty of Economics, Prof. Dr. Vinko Muštra, the Vice-Rector of the University of Split, Prof. Dr. Igor Jerković, the Mayor of Split, Prof. Ivica Puljak, and the representative of the Split Tourist Board, Mr. Duje Vulas, on behalf of the organizers and partners.

With expert moderation by Pinija Poljaković, on the first day of the competition, all 30 startups (across four groups) presented their ideas to the expert jury. Contestants had five minutes to present their ideas, followed by questions from the expert jury. Each group had four judges.
In addition to the competitive part, the program included various lectures. Alexander Bernhard (Impact Hub) discussed the topic ‘How to be an Impact (Social) Entrepreneur,’ Goran Palvov (IRI center) held a lecture titled ‘Capacity2Transform,’ and on the second day, Catherine Ogilvie (Silicon Castles) spoke on the theme ‘Story, Brand and Messaging: How to Tell Your Company Story,’ and Rafael Ventura (University of Malaga) discussed ‘What Would Maslow Say to the Startup CEO.’

After the competitive phase concluded, the jury made the difficult decision of selecting the eight startups that would advance to tomorrow’s final. Two startups from each group advanced to the final: Adity, ADSOL, Cobalt Contraception, ECODECS, Evacuate, FarmIt, Smart Nest, and Starkid Universe.

On the second day of the competition, the top eight startups presented their ideas once again to a four-member jury. All finalists were well-prepared, and put in extra effort to improve their presentations and pitch decks.

The victory and the title of ‘Best University Startup 2023’ was claimed by the startup ECODECS from the University of Malaga in Spain. The second place went to the startup FarmIt from the University of Belgrade in Serbia, and the third place went to Smart Nest team, from the University of Split.

The winners received mentoring from the Austrian accelerator Silicon Castles and the opportunity to participate and showcase at Wolves Summit 2024, the largest entrepreneurial conference in Central and Eastern Europe, connecting over 2,000 startup companies in search of investment and investors from around the world. To facilitate their marketing activities, the winning teams also secured a $5,000 credit from the SendPulse platform

The Infobip Startup Award was provided by Infobip, a global IT and telecommunications company. The first-place team, Evacuate from Malta, received €7,500 for using Infobip’s communication technology, the second-place team, Farmit from Belgrade, secured $5,000, and the third-place team, Adity from Spain, received $2,500. All three selected teams also received two tickets each for the Shift conference from Infobip.

Additionally, QuillBot provided all participants with three months of free access to their premium platform. In addition to valuable awards, it’s worth mentioning that Dalmacijavino company provided drinks for the participants, and Promet Split offered free transportation to all participants during the event. Special thanks also go to Split Tech City, which served as a media partner and provided live coverage of the competition throughout the event.

STup!2023 took place this year as part of the University Green Digital HUB project. The main goal of the project is to strengthen the digital, green, and entrepreneurial skills of students, university startups, and university staff, as well as to enhance the capacities of higher education institutions in the field of teaching for digital and green transition.