for entrepreneurs

The Colorintech Founders Programme

Europe’s first startup accelerator for underrepresented founders, now new and improved!

Meet the 2024 Cohort!

Programme Agenda

Week 1: Leadership

Taking place over 2 days on the 8th and 9th March, we'll develop your leadership skills and character.

We'll be covering:
- What makes an incredible startup leader?
- Putting yourself forward into a position of trust as a startup leader.
- Your communication and the psychology behind building incredible relationships.
- How your leadership impacts your "personal brand" and how your personal brand impacts your startup.
- Practical presenting, public speaking, and networking.
- AI and the future of business: How to utilise it to focus on what you're good at.
- Talks from inspirational underrepresented founders and speakers.

Week 2: Revenue + Customers

Taking place over 2 days on the 15th and 16th March, we'll develop your sales and marketing pipeline practically to build your revenue, tailored to each individual and types of business.

We'll be covering:
- Mapping out stakeholders and positioning your product to them.
- Getting the narrative right and making it as useful as possible to improve leads and conversions.
- Building your funnel (practically).
- Practical B2B and B2C focused workshops (where relevant for you) - everything from scraping lists, to doing the selling, or building the brand.
- Leveraging AI tools to reduce time and improve impact in your customer development process.
- The numbers: What do "healthy" financial numbers, that are at the level investors needs to see, actually mean and look like. How do you conduct your planning and early customer acquisition to reflect this?
- Talks from inspirational underrepresented founders and speakers.

Week 3: Investment

Taking place over 2 days on the 22nd and 23rd March, we'll develop your investment knowledge and investor relations skills.

We'll be covering:
- An introduction to all things “Startup Investor”: What investors care about at this stage.
- How raising from Angels actually works; how raising from VCs actually works (in their own words).
- The different kinds of pitch decks you need, when, why, and how they differ.
- The UK's landscape currently and how this impacts your fundraise. How to use this as an opportunity and overcome the challenges this poses.
- LOTS of pitching practice and feedback.
- Talks from inspirational underrepresented founders and speakers.

Weeks 4-10: Building

Over the next few weeks, we'll have 2 online sessions per week, in the evenings, to expand on what we learned during our in-person days.

This will include:
- Online sessions on greater pitching, fundraising logistics, the operational elements behind fundraising and preparing for investment, some team building, more skills building, and more.
- Talks from inspiring successful underrepresented founders.
- 1:1 Coaching sessions.
- Legal and Investor Office Hours.
- Support while you do your own work, focusing on building your income and investor network on your own during the course of the programme.
- A pitching practice day to prepare for the showcase.

Showcase

Improving your startup’s visibility by marketing you and your startup through our channels, and finishing the programme by pitching your startup in front of a curated group of investors and community partners.

Experts-in-Residence

Experts who advise our founder network and who coach our accelerator startups

Ruben Portz

Founder of TractionPad

Gavin Presman

Author and Sales Expert

Dami Hastrup

Co-founder and CEO of MOONHUB

Lenna Lou

Founder of The L Factor

Andy Davis

General Partner & Co-founder, 10x10

Seven Jacobs

Founder of In Search of Leaders

Tashan Nicholas

Coach at Relyte

Irina Gheorghiu

Co-founder of ZIM

Scott Ohene-Nyako

Branding Specialist at 478Studios

Ina Yulo Stuve

Head of Startup Marketing at AWS

Ken Thomas

Investor at Backfuture VC

Neetu Puranikmath

Investor at Cooper Family Office

Sahil Sethi

Co-founder at Maji.io

Jinesh Vohra

CEO & Founder at Sprive

Eleonora Mantovani

Principle at PROFounders Capital

Dan Pandeni Idhenga

Investor at 1818VC

Rahmon Agbaje

Co-Founder at Loud Parade

Nigel Hall

Advisor and Angel Investor

Abi Mohamed

Head of Marketing and Business Development at Extend Ventures

Hattie Willis

Co-founder at IfWeRaise

Bjion Henry

CEO at navreo.ai

Damilola Fasawe-Aderinto

Investor at Greenhouse Capital

Yasemin Gunes

Mountside Ventures

Valérie Aelbrecht

VC Investor at AlbionVC

Oyinkansola Adebayo

CEO & Founder of Niyo Group

Rakesh Kasturi

Sprintdoctor.io

Theo-Lee Houston

Founder at Slinger

Helping founders accelerate their success, grow as a leader, and gain access to a powerful community.

The Colorintech Founders Accelerator Programme is a 12-week programme that focuses on 3 core themes:

1. Leadership
2. Revenue
3. Investment

Our updated programme is a practical, workshop-focused, growth oriented solution for dedicated underrepresented founders who have proven there is a real need for their solution. Culminating in a showcase to investors, experienced founders, and other key players, we have the perfect opportunity to help an early-stage startup succeed. And, our programme is free!

The 2024 edition is our 6th accelerator program, preparing pre-seed and seed-stage tech startups with the tools for investment, the customer acquisition strategy, and the improved network they need to increase their chances of success.

Who should apply?

You identify as belonging to an ethnic minority background and are in any co-founding role in your startup.

You have at least an MVP-stage product that has demonstrable traction, even if it is unpaid traction, that uses technology to solve a real problem.

You have an MVP and your startup is at Pre-Seed or Seed stage, and you have raised no more than $300K (or equivalent) in funding, and feel ready to raise more soon.

You have proven commitment to your startup that shows your enthusiasm and work ethic.

You can commit to the 12-week programme and building your business while on the programme (6 hours a week minimum) including 6 full days in-person in London.

You are based in the UK and speak English.

Who is this not for?

This programme is not for you if:

You have raised more than £300k

You are not ready to dedicate to being full-time on your business (you don’t need to have done this by the time of the programme or during, but should plan to soon).

You have not finished an MVP with some traction.

What our Entrepreneurs say

Over 50 founders have been through our programmes and have raised over $7.5 Million to date!

“Something I took away from Traction Club is that we need regular training and reminding, even if we think we already know something… What we’re getting from this programme is gold!”

Aaron Bedward, founder of bsktPay

“This has been a really interesting few weeks [on Traction Club] because we’ve been able to speak to people who know how to overcome these exact issues [on B2B sales in the early-stages of business].”

Mandeep Soor, founder of Bendi

“Even though I've been part of a founding team before, I've never taken the lead in fundraising and pitching. [#Build] has given me the confidence and the platform to pitch live, learn fundraising basics, and share my story for the first time.”

Jaron Soh, founder of Voda

“The programme is one of the most value adding accelerators I have been involved in. Nearly every week we had access to an industry expert, the team were always on hand... and the Showcase at the end was the cherry on top - being able to pitch to a massive audience filled with potential users."

Sohaib Ahmed, founder of &facts

“[This] is an amazing action-oriented program that has given me the tools needed to continue building Cocoon. The program made me dream even bigger and aim even higher in how far I can take Cocoon. It was especially wonderful to learn from the speakers, guests and the other women founders.”

Prisca Flint, founder of Cocoon

'I learnt a huge amount from the programme, the Colorintech team set up week after week of incredibly valuable talks. Introductions to investors and industry experts have really helped us push forward with clearer direction.'

Maya Lingam, founder of Ecospot

Sound good? Click here to apply!

Applications Open - Apply now!

Have questions? Grab a 1:1 with us to discuss!

Grab a free office hours session with Seven to discuss your application

#Build Accelerator Partners

We partner with forward thinking organizations that support our mission and want to increase diversity

Program partners
In-Kind partners

Apply for the Colorintech Founders Accelerator Programme.

Part of #Build, our pathway for underrepresented entrepreneurs.

Closed - Stay tuned!