Could it really be ‘the end of the world’ in DC?
Sitting in the auditorium of the Carnegie Library (Historical Society of DC) in my hometown of Washington, DC I could not believe my eyes when I saw Founder Institute alumni, Pablo Ambram from the multi Award Winning Agent Piggy pitching at Distilled Intelligence 2.0 (probably he was surprised to see me outside of Chile too, haha). And as it turns out it was not just him who had traveled from Chile ‘The End of the World’ South America – 6 other startups had made the trip as well. They were each competing against 99 other teams for seed capital + 6 months mentorship at The Fort Accelerator in Washington, DC.
And for good reason, according to Fortify.VC co-founder Jonathon Perelli, last year’s inaugural teams from DI 1.0, 9 in all, have raised US $30 million and created 200+ jobs. This year, from preliminary numbers they are anticipating DI 2.0 teams to achieve at least double the success.
It’s kind of like the Olympics, a fraction of a point is the difference between whether you win or lose.
– Pablo Ambram, Agent Piggy, after hearing he had just missed advancing to the finals