2017

The City of Haarlem and Harlem, NY strengthen its unique historical bond

Well-received International Pitch Event Haarlem2Harlem official mark in this unique friendship

As announced in a short post last week, Dutch startup NoFoodWasted is the proud winner of the Haarlem2Harlem International Pitch Fest that took place on May 30th in Harlem, New York City. The event was hosted at the beautiful location of WeWork Harlem, a co-working office space in the heart of Harlem’s bustling business district. 3 Dutch startups (NoFoodWasted, SwipeGuide & Mensken) & 3 American startups (Oweyaa, PriceCheck & Duro UAS) were given the opportunity to pitch in front of an enthusiastic audience and experienced judge panel. The evening started with an official moment: Mayor of the City of Haarlem Jos Wienen and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer signed a Memorandum of Intent to strengthen the cooperation and develop closer ties between Haarlem, the Netherlands and Harlem, NY on an economical and cultural level, specifically focusing on areas as innovation & startups and education.

This was the second edition of the Haarlem2Harlem Pitch Event that was organized by Present Your Startup - Haarlemvalley together with Silicon Harlem. The 3 Dutch startups that traveled with Haarlemvalley to New York, are all finalists of Present Your Startup 2016. Since the event last November, the 3 startups have all successfully raised capital in the Netherlands and are now taking steps to launch their businesses internationally. Besides the 2016 finalists, other entrepreneurs joined our trip to New York. One of them was Sylvia Kieft, founder of the Haarlem based startup Muurmeesters, also interested to launch in the United States. The judge panel was composed of experienced entrepreneurs, such as Merijn Everaarts (founder of Dutch social enterprise Dopper), Martijn Bevelander (internet entrepreneur and organizer of Europe’s biggest free jazz event ‘Haarlem Jazz & More’) and Mesut Celebi (founder of StartupBootcamp New York) selected NoFoodWasted as the winner of this year’s event. NoFoodWasted’s mission is to turn food waste into a choice with its Best-before app which shows you at a glance which products are nearing their best-before date in a supermarket near you and are marked down because of it.  

Present Your Startup founder Valérie Vallenduuk looks back at a successful event:

“It was a great evening, wonderfully organized by our partner Silicon Harlem at the beautiful venue of WeWork Harlem. And of course I’m very proud that one of the Dutch startups NoFoodWasted was selected as the winner of the event!”