Toyota Startup Accelerator winners impress with their sustainable and inclusive innovations

• The second edition of Toyota’s Startup Accelerator in Europe seeks innovative solutions in Sustainability and Mobility for All
• Five winning startups pitched their proof of concept to investors, media and executives from Toyota Motor Europe (TME) and its partner, ISDI, on a Demo Day
• Toyota Startup Accelerator brings together the innovative thinking of startups with the knowledge and scale opportunities of established corporations

Five startup finalists pitched their innovative solutions for Sustainability and Mobility for All at a Demo Day pitch, in front of investors, media, and executives from Toyota and ISDI Digital Business School.

The event, held last week, marked the culmination of a year-long journey that started in July 2021 with an open call to recruit startups from Toyota Motor Europe (TME), in collaboration with ISDI.

In October, the 10 most innovative startups were selected from around 150 applications, from more than 40 countries. These participated in a bootcamp in December to hone their business skills and projects. The programme focused on hands-on interactive learning with entrepreneurs, C-level executives and Toyota experts, in areas such as agile product design, working with corporations, talent scouting, Intellectual Property Rights, and international strategy.

At the end of the bootcamp, five winning startups were chosen to proceed to the six-month final acceleration phase. They developed their proofs of concept using funds granted by Toyota and with close support from business mentors and Toyota Guides.

Kylie Jimenez, Senior Vice President, TME People and Innovation, Information, Technology and Digital and Corporate Affairs, commented: “For Toyota it is key to remain innovative in this fast-changing world. We look at what is good for Toyota as well as for society overall, especially in the fields of sustainability and inclusive mobility. Startups are true game changers with their innovative technologies. As a large company we can help them to scale their solutions while we learn and become more innovative ourselves. That is what makes this Toyota Startup Accelerator programme fantastic.”

Monica Perez Lobo, Head of TME Sustainability and ESG commented:  “It was very inspiring for me today to feel the passion and spirit of all these startups. Attending their pitches, I am sincerely convinced that we achieved what we were looking for: finding ways to contribute to society through sustainable innovation. And although we need to weigh elements such as the business model, KPIs and return on investment, in essence this is about so much more. It is about helping to create a better world. This is a journey we are on together, and in which startups like the ones we have seen today play a major role.”

The five best innovators of the Toyota Startup Accelerator:

Revolve Wheel (Germany)    

The world’s first active wheelchair that fits aircraft cabin luggage size standards. 

Andrea Moccelin, Founder and CEO Revolve Wheel: “Toyota Startup Accelerator has helped us take more than one step forward on a clear path towards the most important goal, which is to achieve strategic partnerships, collaborations and PoCs with airlines, athlete organisations and Toyota. This created the opportunity to demonstrate the potential of Revolve wheelchair to early adopters, receive further feedback and make it a market-ready product. In effect, new possibilities open up in terms of business model and future strategy.”

HySiLabs – hydrogen stored as liquids  (France)

An innovative solution for large-scale hydrogen logistics for all kinds of applications.

Pierre-Emmanuel Casanova , Co-founder HySiLabs: “We aim to revolutionise the hydrogen value chain and decarbonise mobility. The gaseous state of hydrogen makes its storage and transportation difficult. Our liquid carrier is a game changer in this because hydrogen can be transported via the existing infrastructures.”

PurCity (Denmark) – turning buildings into large scale CO₂ capture air purifiers

Aims to improve air quality by turning buildings into large-scale CO₂ air capture facilities.  

Morteza G. Eftekhar, Founder and CEO PurCity: “The Toyota Startup Accelerator has been generating great value and impact for us, from commercialising aspects, to connection with a hand-picked team of efficient expert advisors and mentors. They have been helping us to further develop our business and be better prepared to negotiate upcoming large-scale projects. This accelerator has also allowed us to implement and validate the third generation of our commercialised panels (GapS 3.0) and related system, which has boosted our growth.”

CargaTuCoche (Spain)

CargaTuCoche is a platform providing residential charging services in the electric vehicle (EV) ecosystem

James Dress, Chief Sales Officer CargaTuCoche: “The Toyota Startup Accelerator has really helped us think about how to scale our solutions both within our home market, Spain, as well as internationally. The expertise we have been able to access, and a possible proof of concept opportunity with Toyota, have been key in our growth plan.”

MWS – Microwave Solutions (Switzerland)

Accelerates circular carbon economies by recycling plastics, rubbers and carbonaceous materials into critical and advanced materials such as graphene.

Florian Turk, Co-founder and CEO Microwave Solutions GmbH: “With Toyota Startup Accelerator we have gained deep insights into the automotive industry, access to critical expert advice and additional PoC data. This is allowing us to further shape our solution to be the best fit to unleash sustainability and circular economies for highly complex products.”

ENDS

About ISDI Accelerator

ISDI Accelerator was founded at ISDI, the leading digital business school in Spain in 2014 with the aim of channelling the entrepreneurial efforts of ISDI students into Europe’s startup ecosystem by facilitating collaboration between public entities, corporations, educational entities, investors, and founders. Since its inception, ISDI Accelerator has developed dozens of incubation and acceleration programmes that have helped accelerate hundreds of startups and thousands of companies. ISDI Accelerator appears at the top of the European and global rankings, and in 2019 its IMPACT Connected Car programme was chosen as the best startup acceleration project that year by the European Commission.