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Manchester鈥檚 Turing Innovation Catalyst (TIC) opened its doors this week to a roomful of investors, entrepreneurs and industry leaders for their demo day.

Hundreds of people packed into Manchester鈥檚 Renold Building as companies from the second AI accelerator programme showcased their talents.

The programme supports selected companies with their fundraising and scaling goals with world-class AI and startup experts.

All the founders involved are Greater Manchester-based and committed to building AI platforms that span education, healthcare, climate and more.

The cohort either took part in panel pitches or individual three-minute presentations to the room.

Here鈥檚 老九品茶Cloud鈥檚 take on the 11 individual pitches.

Habeo

颁贰翱:听Alexandra Morris

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听PropTech听helping households run efficient homes, saving money, time and the planet.

The pitch: The pitches were kicked off by experienced tech entrepreneur Alexandra Morris, who is on a mission to 鈥榗hange our outlook on climate change.鈥� Its platform uses data about people鈥檚 homes and empower them to make changes within their budgets in order to reduce costs and save the planet. Morris finished a thought-provoking pitch by saying: 鈥淐hange your world to save ours.鈥�

Circkit

颁贰翱:听Joe Darwen

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听AI tool simplifying ESG data and compliance in fashion.

The pitch: Joe Darwen is best known as the founder of Veo but was pitching his startup Circkit, an AI-powered tech platform. Darwen is a confident speaker and told the audience that fashion is the second biggest polluter on the planet – only behind oil. In total, the $3 trillion industry has a waste value of around $400 billion. He wants to 鈥榗lose the yap gap鈥� by managing brands鈥� product lifecycle and optimising circular product design across environmental, social, and economic considerations.

Connected Impact

颁贰翱:听Lucy Walton

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听Uses patent-pending AI approaches to track and compare company performance

The pitch: Hugely important subject but I struggled a bit to hear all听 CEO Lucy Walton’s pitch because she had her back to the audience for parts of her presentation as she read her PowerPoint slides. Connect Impact helps companies use their ESG performance to build brand, enhance value and manage reputational risk.

MindPsy

Senior Data Scientist and Engineer:听Robert Daly

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听Uses data analysis and AI to improve evidence-based psychological support for children experiencing mental health issues.

The pitch:听Robert Daly is the former head of data and insights at ORCHA and appeared a bid nervous, which is understandable. He explained that an average of 10 children in every school class experience mental health challenges but they won鈥檛 tell anyone. The startup found that children want to talk to someone, but don鈥檛 want to talk to a human. Its platform, therefore, creates a virtual AI 鈥榖uddy鈥�, that children can talk to when they鈥檙e experiencing struggles. Looking for 拢800k investment.

The Real Birth Company

颁贰翱:听Zoe Wright

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听Digital antenatal platform to support midwifery practice and access to information for people.

The pitch:听Real Birth CEO Zoe Wright is a registered midwife and opened up with the funny line: 鈥淲ho has never been born?鈥� On a more serious note, Real Birth is helping to take stress out of the emergency services. Wright believes that everyone giving birth should have access to evidence-based birth preparation. It has been shown that the women who have taken this course have better outcomes.

Decently

颁辞-蹿辞耻苍诲别谤:听James Chapman

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听HealthTech which has developed web-based AI platform Melo, allowing teams to make more evidence-based care decisions through data collection.

The pitch:听James Chapman set up Decently with co-founder James Burch in 2021 after a close friend of his suffered a brain-related injury. Chapman gave a polished performance without notes describing Melo as being 鈥榖uilt with clinicians, for clinicians鈥�. The long-term goal for Decently is to support 10m patients, clinicians and families over the next 10 years with more evidence-based decision-making through AI. Currently raising 拢1m.

Pet Trust UK

颁辞-蹿辞耻苍诲别谤:听Felix Robinson

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听Has created a digital tag that links to a pet鈥檚 microchip and profile, filled with life-saving and critical information.听

The pitch:听Felix Robinson started the second round of pitches by bravely hobbling onto the stage on crutches on the same day that Pet Trust UK鈥檚 digital tag went live. The digital tag links to a pet鈥檚 microchip and profile. If a pet goes missing or is in an emergency, anyone can tap or scan the QR code to instantly access vital details.

gigmate

Acting CTO:听Gavin Sherratt

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听gigmate is an event discovery app that connects fans with gigs, venues, artists and fellow fans.

The pitch:听Gavin Sherratt introduced himself as a 鈥榮h*t friend鈥� and recounted how he missed a gig at a small venue with his friend when he was younger. That gig was Oasis before they went on to become global superstars. To prevent this from happening again, gigmate connects solo gig-goers together to build a community and encourage people to get to the events that they have tickets for.

GetSociable

颁贰翱:听Peter McCleery

Description:听MarTech platform for businesses in the hospitality, nightlife and live entertainment industries, maximising online engagement with real target audiences through personalised content.

The pitch:听Described as the 鈥榟ome of live entertainment鈥� Belfast-based GetSociable is aimed at increasing customer engagement. CEO and founder Peter McCleery acknowledged that nights out for young people are now 鈥榓ll about Instagramable moments鈥� and his business uses that to its advantage.

LinkyThinks

颁贰翱:听Dan Rosenberg

顿别蝉肠谤颈辫迟颈辞苍:听Platform designed to give children the skills they need to succeed beyond the classroom.

The pitch:听EdTech LinkyThinks鈥� approach to education is all about helping children听link different ways of thinking听by teaching the听critical life skills. CEO Dan Rosenberg was so excited to pitch that he accidentally got up early. His platform now has over 6,000 active users.

AUDITSU

颁贰翱:听Jason Crispin

Description: Pioneering the future of accessibility audits for mobile applications.

The pitch:听Despite being the last person to pitch, Jason Crispin听made sure he still had the audience鈥檚 attention when he entered by slamming his folders and notepads to the ground whilst shouting. He did this to emphasise his annoyance about the time it takes for businesses to ensure that they are compliant with regulatory standards. He believes AUDITSU has the solution.

Conclusion

In conclusion the demo day was a really interesting exercise. Some of the听 companies are very early stage and it wasn’t always clear to me where the AI was. It was obvious that some of the people were more confident than others when pitching, which came across in their delivery. However the problems they’re trying to fix – especially climate change – are global so if they get it right the opportunity is limitless.