CRIB x Launchpad Female Founders Pitch Festival

The CRIB x Launchpad Female Founders Pitch Festival invites founders to pitch their startup or business idea to a room of Venture Capital and Angel investors, and Launchpad’s community of founders and entrepreneurs.

Now on its fifth edition, this electric pitch festival is all about creating opportunities for founders who are helping to solve critical social and environmental issues. We want to empower businesses for good, help them get funding, exposure and open opportunities for them.

Calling Impact Founders

If you are an impact founder looking for funding opportunities, this pitch festival is for you! Applications are free, and are open from 08 Jan until 13 Feb. We will be selecting 5 finalists to pitch live on the night in Singapore*. Finalists will also receive personal pitch training from a professional presentation coach and a venture capitalist investor.

Apply now

Eligibility Criteria

– Registered company in Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, Thailand, Vietnam or Philippines
– Team should have at least one female co-founder
– Early-stage startup with less than USD 5 million in external funding
– Team size is below 50 employees
– Revenue generating or at least have a Minimum Valuable Product (MVP) ready for commercialisation
– Creates verifiable impact in accordance with one or more of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

For a seat in the audience

Tickets for this event are now available. This is an exciting, inspiring night – where there is not only excellent networking, but also audience members will actively participate in the selection of the winners on the night.

Apply now

Timeline

Applications open – 08 Jan – 13 Feb
Announcement of finalists – 18 Feb
Pitch training of finalists – 20 Feb – 05 Mar
Pitch event – 12 Mar

Programme Schedule

6:00 PM – Registration and networking
7:00 PM – Welcome notes by Chris Edwards and Elaine Kim
7:35 PM – Pitch 1
7:50 PM – Pitch 2
8:05 PM – Pitch 3
8:20 PM – Pitch 4
8:40 PM – Voting and announcement of winners
9:00 PM – Networking and dinner & drinks

Note

* Selected finalists are invited to pitch in person in Singapore. Flights and accommodation are at the finalist’s own expense. There is no fee to apply for the pitch competition or for the selected finalists who will pitch during the event.

Apply now

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About Our Judges

Anna Pearson

Anna Pearson has spent the last eight years investing and funding women founders around the world with a specific focus in Asia Pacific. In 2022, she established Harriet, a platform that acts as a helping hand for women in their quest to build their businesses and secure funding. Prior to Harriet, Anna served as a member of Ladies Investment Club and a Venture Partner at Her Capital, responsible for deal sourcing and deal structuring.This experience further developed her passion for start-ups and market disruption across all sectors and geographies.

Anna has 15 years of experience in commercial roles in growth companies; she was formerly the General Manager for Axiom in Singapore responsible for the company’s growth and success in the region and an early pioneer of alternative legal service providers globally. She was the co-founder of Axiom’s business in the UK building and developing the company over eight years in London. Anna also served as the General Manager for Plexus Engage in Australia and the company’s Head of People/Talent. Anna has extensive experience with global legal innovation, sales and account management across multiple geographies including leading managed services and technology sales in the sector and human resources. She started her career as a lawyer in Australia and London before moving into business roles.

Haoming Lee

Haoming Lee is the CEO of Louken Group, a venture builder specialising in brand transformation and internationalisation. He drives the company’s growth and strategic vision, leading initiatives that help businesses scale globally. Under his leadership, Louken has propelled brands like Charles & Keith, Hegen, and BreadTalk Group to international success.

Haoming also serves as a Board Advisor for food tech companies ImpacFat and Less & Co, offering expertise in strategy, brand expansion, and fundraising. Previously, as Managing Partner of Huggs Coffee, he restructured the business during Covid, achieving significant growth across Singapore and forging partnerships with companies like Samsung and Amazon.

Before Huggs, Haoming co-founded Artbox Singapore, a lifestyle event that attracted over 700,000 visitors in six days. As Regional Head of Strategy at Invade, he played a key role in organizing major lifestyle events across Asia.

Recognised as a change-maker, Haoming received the Prestige 40 Under 40 award in 2017. He is passionate about youth development and mentors young individuals and startup founders through organizations like Mentoring SG.

Hester Spiegel-van den Steenhoven

As an entrepreneur, investor and advisor, Hester Spiegel-van den Steenhoven knows what it takes to build and successfully scale a company. Hester is Founding and Managing Partner of Epic Angels, the largest all-female angel investor collective investing in women-led startups in Asia-Pacific. She is the author of Thinking Big and Small: a guide to activating your entrepreneurial mindset, in which she lays out the essential attributes of successful entrepreneurship drawing on the latest research, countless conversations and lived-life experience. In daily life, she is always on the lookout to meet founders with these attributes, and help them succeed.

Michael Blakey

Michael Blakey’s entrepreneurial journey started when he was young. He supported his way through college in the US by running some of the best music events in the city. Michael loves building things – including companies.

He isn’t your typical investor – he’s been in the trenches. He has hustled and has succeeded. Michael attributes his atypical journey to becoming a successful entrepreneur-turned-investor to having struggled for years in school, owing to his dyslexia. As a result, he was always on the lookout for ways to succeed outside of school. In turn, it is exactly this kind of differentiation and drive that he looks for in Founders as an investor today.

Since becoming an angel investor in 2000 through Avonmore Developments which he co-founded with his brother, Michael has invested in over 25 companies in the UK and achieved 7 successful exits. He’s also invested in 8 start-ups in Southeast Asia including Anchanto, PlusMargin and Nugit under the name of Cub Capital since 2013. Most recently, Michael has co-founded Cocoon Capital, an early stage fund, which is looking to invest in companies throughout SE Asia. As is his want the structure of Cocoon is very different than your typical fund, as his entrepreneurial spirit always wants him to challenge the status quo.

Tianna Nguyen

Tianna Nguyen is the founder of Alensia. She is an investment professional who has lived in the USA, Dubai, London, and Singapore and worked at global reputable firms such as PricewaterhouseCoopers, Credit Suisse AG Singapore, Invesco, and J.P. Morgan & Co. Though she has worked across several industries on international deals, geographically her primary focus is on Southeast Asian markets; aside from Singapore, Tianna has also worked in Vietnam and Myanmar. Her work included Corporate Finance, M&A, and capital raising advisory, which has extended to several fundraising negotiations and projects with technology companies involving ESG, including impact investments. She studied at The Ohio State University for her Biology and Finance degrees. Tianna also received her Master’s Degrees from Harvard University and Hult International Business School; she is currently active with Harvard Alumni Entrepreneurs as well as Harvard Global Women’s Empowerment.

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Meet The Hosts

Chris Edwards

Founder of Honeycombers and Launchpad

Chris Edwards is a serial entrepreneur having started her first business in 2008 – a lifestyle media platform: Honeycombers. It was designed to inspire Singapore residents to live better lives. Chris had only been living and working in Singapore for two years, and found that she (and her peers) were only reading international media. She felt that many expats were disengaged with the local Singapore culture, nightlife and entertainment scene, and that many people felt Singapore was “boring” because of this disconnection. With a background in marketing and publishing, Chris decided to fill the gap, and so she created a digital platform and a community that expats, as well as locals, would trust; that would engage and influence them, and unlock the best experiences in Singapore. Over the last 15 years, the Honeycombers platform has grown to become the leading digital brand in lifestyle content. In January 2022, Chris launched Launchpad – an entrepreneurial community business group, designed to help small businesses thrive through community, peer mentoring and coaching. Chris now runs five companies across four countries and spends her time split between Singapore and Australia.

Elaine Kim

Doctor, entrepreneur and educator

Elaine Kim is the CEO and co-founder Trehaus, a mission-driven company bringing best-in-class early education to millions of children across the globe.

She was founding CEO of CRIB, a social enterprise that empowers women to become successful entrepreneurs through: (1) CRIB Society’s business network, (2) CRIB Match which provides access to funding through the CRIB Angels Club network of investors, and (3) CRIB EQUIP skills equipping. She also launched CRIB’s philanthropic arm CRIB Gives Back, which helps women in children in need, including through its “Holiday for Hope” programme in Cambodia and Nepal.

Elaine was selected as a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader (WEF YGL), is a member of the International Women’s Forum (IWF), was part of Milken’s Young Leaders Circle and actively involved in the Young President’s Organisation (YPO).

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The Prizes

More details soon.