⚡ How this Start-Up is Making World-Class Art Accessible to all

Morning Innovators ⚡ In less than 5 minutes, we’ll cover…

🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the Start-Up world this week
📰 This week’s biggest news stories in the Start-Up world
🎨 How this Start-Up is making world-class art accessible to all
🎭 How turning a down into an up can make you go viral
🫀 A tool that enables you to build full-stack apps in a heartbeat

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this link taking you through to connect with the team members behind Chemistry VC’s debut fund of $350m which they’re investing in Seed and Series A stage companies.

Happy hustling,
Rich

🎤 Events/Opportunities

💼 KPMG have launched their ‘Access’ programme for business innovating in the future of work space that are looking to raise their Series A round in the next 12 months. You can apply here.

🌲 Sky are awarding 9 UK/Ireland businesses, who are committed to building a more sustainable future in their community, £20,000/€20,000 in TV AdSmart Credits. You can apply here.

🌡 HSBC Innovation Banking are hosting their VC Temperature Check webinar with partners from Balderton Capital, LocalGlobe and Felix Capital. You can register here.

💼 Start-Up Jobs

🧑‍🎨 Senior Product Designer, V7 Labs
🥞 Full-Stack Software Engineer, Databento
👷 Founding Engineer, Patchwork Hub

🗃 One in every two euros invested in young Start-Ups is going into AI. Sifted

🎬 Actor and Director, Olivia Wilde, launches a VC firm. TechCrunch

💰 Hummingbirds, a platform that connects local creators with brand deals in their area, raises $5.4m. TechCrunch

🇺🇸 Imperial turns to Silicon Valley to fund tech partnerships. UKTN

Cosimo: Reinventing Art Access for Emerging Creatives

Empowering Artists and Transforming the Art World
Cosimo is a platform with a mission: to help emerging artists turn their passion into a sustainable career. By bridging artists and buyers without hefty commission fees, Cosimo opens doors traditionally closed in the art world. Beyond the marketplace, Cosimo Academy provides artists with vital business skills, helping them thrive in an accessible, community-driven environment.

Solo but Supported: A Networked Approach to Building a Team
Although Cosimo is technically led by a solo founder, John Sewell, the journey has been collaborative. Advisors, tech specialists, and mentors joined the mission thanks to simple outreach and the founder’s open, direct approach. The lesson? Don’t hesitate to connect with people you admire, as they may be eager to support your vision.

Hustle in the DMs: Gaining Cosimo’s First Fans
Cosimo’s initial growth came from an unrelenting outreach strategy: lots of direct messages to artists! By personally engaging with each artist, the founder established trust early on, which was crucial in the platform’s infancy. This grassroots approach helped build loyalty and a small but committed user base.

From a Slow Start to Rapid Scaling: How Cosimo Found Its Flow
The road to growth started slow, with just a hundred users after nine months, but took off following the company’s first round of fundraising. Cosimo’s increased digital marketing efforts paid off, doubling its user base and building on direct feedback from early users to streamline onboarding and improve overall functionality.

The Power of Testing: Insights That Would Have Made a Difference
In hindsight, the founder sees the value of early testing with a small ad campaign to validate demand before scaling. Testing early would have provided actionable insights, proving the platform’s appeal to customers and strengthening Cosimo’s case to investors.

Fueling the Vision: How Cosimo Funded its Future
Cosimo bootstrapped for its first few years before securing a £15k grant from the University of Birmingham. A successful crowdfunding campaign followed, with over 150 investors coming on board through Seedrs (now Republic), along with two Innovate UK grants to expand Cosimo’s reach into eLearning and AI-driven art curation.

Crafting Urgency: Cosimo’s Crowdfunding Success
After initial attempts at securing investment through traditional pitches, Cosimo turned to crowdfunding. The sense of urgency created by the crowdfunding deadline helped secure over 150 investors, allowing Cosimo to move forward confidently and focus on growth.

Navigating Setbacks: Cosimo’s Biggest Challenges
Despite success, Cosimo’s fundraising journey wasn’t without hurdles. A complex accelerator program and an investor’s cash flow delay nearly derailed progress. These experiences taught the founder the importance of due diligence, clear agreements, and following intuition when making key decisions.

Biggest Takeaways: Connecting Early and Owning the Vision
One of the founder’s key lessons was to build relationships within the art industry sooner rather than later. Initially hesitant, the founder found immense value in the guidance and opportunities these connections provided. The takeaway? Lead with your passion and lean on your network—they may be more receptive than you think.

Carta is a platform that helps people manage equity, build businesses and invest in the companies of tomorrow. Our mission is to unlock the power of equity ownership for more people in more places. Carta is trusted by more than 40,000 companies, over 8,000 investment funds and a million employees for cap table management, venture capital solutions and more. In the UK, we support founders who are raising money through SEIS/EIS, helping with Advance Assurance, round modelling and more. To find out more, take a look at their website, or get in touch with [email protected].

Running a Start-Up really does come with constant ups and downs. However, the people over at Batch LDN did everything they could to turn a down into an up, and they’ve gone viral because of that!

Having recently moved into their brand new Covent Garden store, things couldn’t look better for the Start-Up. Devastatingly, within days of getting their flagship store up and running, two criminals put a brick through their window and stole £6,000 worth of suits.

Instead of letting this defeat them, the Batch team put it on a billboard! Taking inspiration from the famous TfL slogan, they plastered an image of a burglar in a Batch suit attached to the phrase “See it, Say it, SUITED” and “Warning, well-dressed criminals at large” on a giant billboard in London.

This campaign got them thousands of likes and countless impressions across LinkedIn. How could you turn a down into an up?

Each week we highlight our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

Bolt enables you to build full-stack web apps in a heartbeat. Simply enter the prompt, run it and edit as you please.

Next week I’ll be highlighting another awesome Start-Up, as well as sharing all the usuals including funding opportunities, Start-Up news, plus plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with me on LinkedIn…