London Venture Crawl: students meet top entrepreneurs as part of 12-hour city tour

On Wednesday (14 March), 45 students from both the Loughborough and London campuses travelled the city making stops at the likes of Stour Space, the Google Campus, NatWest E-Spark, Huckletree and Allia East for behind the scenes visits.

Throughout the day ‘VIP passengers’ boarded the bus to share their stories and stimulate conversations.

Special guests included Nneka Chukwurah, the woman behind Plexiglass, London’s latest accelerator programme for female-founded start-ups, Capital Enterprise’s Julia Rabin and serial investor in student businesses Matthew Stafford.

The 12-hour tour aimed to give students the chance to connect with real-world businesses, be inspired by industry leaders and gain skills in self-confidence, creative thinking and leadership.

Ben Cole, Loughborough University London’s Stakeholder Development Manager, said: “Events like this connect students from across both our campuses to the rich entrepreneurial scene in London. 

“They are the ‘experience difference’ for our students and one of the reasons why two vibrant campuses really make one outstanding university.”

The tour was part of the ‘London Venture Crawl’ – a unique partnership between King’s College London, University College London, London South Bank University, Brunel University London, the University of Westminster, Birkbeck University of London, University of East London, London College of Fashion and Loughborough University London.

In total, six buses carrying 200 university students – from across all disciplines – embarked on the crawl, with each bus visiting different creative hubs.

All students concluded their tours at one of Europe’s largest innovation hubs, Plexal, which is located in Here East with Loughborough University London.

The aspiring entrepreneurs took the opportunity to network with each other and VIP guests, and students from all nine universities took part in a pitching competition.

After a hard-fought set of semi-finals, the competition was won by Loughborough University London MSc Diplomacy, Business and Trade student Christina Akintoye, who pitched her range of skincare products. 

Following her win, Christina said: “This whole day has been such an incredible experience.  I’ve seen so many great spaces, met so many people, and learnt so much about the help that’s out there in London for student entrepreneurs.  My business can only grow from today.”

At Plexal, the students were also treated to a keynote from Diane Pearlman, Interim Chief Marketing Officer at leading video ad tech company Unruly, and talks from inspiring entrepreneurs including Loughborough University alumnus Laurence Kemball-Cook, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Pavegen.

Laurence commented: “Loughborough University gave me the skills and confidence to develop my idea and being part of the London tech community enabled me to turn this into a business.

“London has vital access to investors, talent and most crucially, clients. The transport links to Europe and vibrant entrepreneurial community with headline events like London Tech Week make this city a compelling destination for anyone launching a new start-up.”

For more information on Loughborough University London visit the website.