Imec.istart Recognized as World's Top Business Accelerator in 2019
LEUVEN (Belgium), November 7, 2019 – This week, imec's accelerator program, imec.istart, was ranked in the top 5 in the 'World Top Business Accelerator - Linked to University' category and No.1 in Europe. UBI Global unveiled its biannual ranking of top university incubators and accelerators at the World Incubation Summit in Doha, Qatar. The ranking puts imec.istart at the top of the list of accelerators for technology startups.
The UBI ranking is based on the UBI Global World Benchmark Study, the world's largest survey of university incubators. This year, 1,580 programs were assessed worldwide, based on more than 50 qualifying parameters that level up to the overall impact of the accelerator program on the startup ecosystem and the performance of startups within the program.
More than 1,200 full-time jobs and 200 million euro follow-up funding
Since its inception in 2011, the imec.istart program helped more than 200 tech startups become successful technology companies across a range of industries. Companies that are part of the imec.istart are for example Datacamp, an online learning platform for data science skills which has offices in New York and London; POSIOS (acquired by Lightspeed in 2014), that provides point-of-sale solutions for retailers and restaurateurs, Piesync (acquired by Hubspot in 2019), that developed a solution to share data between different cloud apps, Graphine, worldwide leader in graphics engineering for game developers (acquired by Unity in 2019); Ontoforce, with offices in Cambridge and San Francisco, offering a solution to improve information management and UgenTec, developing software platforms for PCR workflows in molecular labs,.... Altogether, the startups in the imec.istart portfolio created more than 1,200 full-time jobs and raised more than 200 million euro in follow-up funding.
Each euro invested by imec.istart results in 20 euro follow-up funding
The imec.istart program scores well when it comes to follow-up funding.
From regional to international player
As a business accelerator, imec.istart not only helps startups through their first difficult months, but also aims to help them grow into scaleups. More than half of imec.istart companies already have customers abroad. Startups continue to land on the radar of international players in their domain, as proven by the growing number of exits. Moreover, the imec.istart program increasingly attracts international startups, with 25-30% of the applications originating from outside Flanders in most recent imec.istart open application calls.
About imec.istart
Imec.istart,imec's business accelerator, supports tech startups and their ability to start their business successfully. The imec.istart program offers a wide range of services including an initial financial injection (50,000 to 150,000 EUR of pre-seed funding), industry-specific coaching and mentoring, access to technology and office facilities, contact with a wide (inter)national network of partners and investors and much more. Since its launch in 2011, imec.istart has helped more than 200 tech start-ups in various fields to develop into sustainable businesses.
Three times a year, imec.istart organizes an Open Call where tech startups can apply to participate in the renowned acceleration program. The next open call will be launched in January 2020.
More information on www.imecistart.com
About UBI Global
UBI Global specializes in mapping and connecting global business incubation and acceleration programs. Through a network of more than 1,000 member organizations from more than 90 countries around the world, UBI Global offers matchmaking, ranking, benchmarking and research services to companies and business incubation programs.
About imec
Imec is a world-leading research and innovation hub in nanoelectronics and digital technologies. The combination of our widely acclaimed leadership in microchip technology and profound software and ICT expertise is what makes us unique. By leveraging our world-class infrastructure and local and global ecosystem of partners across a multitude of industries, we create groundbreaking innovation in application domains such as healthcare, smart cities and mobility, logistics and manufacturing, energy and education.
As a trusted partner for companies, start-ups and universities we bring together more than 4,000 brilliant minds from over 97 nationalities. Imec is headquartered in Leuven, Belgium and has distributed R&D groups at a number of Flemish universities, in the Netherlands, Taiwan, USA, and offices in China, India and Japan. In 2018, imec's revenue (P&L) totaled 583 million euro. Further information on imec can be found at www.imec-int.com.
Imec is a registered trademark for the activities of IMEC International (a legal entity set up under Belgian law as a "stichting van openbaar nut”), imec Belgium (IMEC vzw supported by the Flemish Government), imec the Netherlands (Stichting IMEC Nederland, part of Holst Centre which is supported by the Dutch Government), imec Taiwan (IMEC Taiwan Co.) and imec China (IMEC Microelectronics (Shanghai) Co. Ltd.) and imec India (Imec India Private Limited), imec Florida (IMEC USA nanoelectronics design center).
