ENTREPRENEURSHIP SUMMER
SCHOOL BRUSSELS 2014
What happened
This year our flagship program saw more than 120 young startuppers coming from all over the world, including a numerous delegation of young chinese entrepreneurs.
Among the invited speakers a good mix of young, with 19 years old inventor Raul Oaida, and more established names, such as Tiziano Peccenini from Wall Street Institute and Corinne Goddijn-Vigreux from Tomtom.
Besides our consolidated entrepreneurial training, many other activities have been organised. We visited the Google Europe headquarter, attended a conference on entrepreneurship at the European Parliament, were invited for a day~long activities at the China Mission to the EU, and finally ended our journey with a gala dinner at the prestigious venue AutoWorld museum in the heart of Cinquantenaire Park.
One more thing: participants had a chance to present their business idea or company at our market place, in front of a crowd coming from all over Brussels including investors, policymakers, budding startuppers and our alumni.
Oliver Lünstedt
Co-Founder and CEO of CARZAPP
Oliver Lünstedt is CEO and co-founder of Carzapp. Carzapp is a P2P car sharing operator that connects car owners to people renting cars. It enables people to automatically and spontaneously make their cars available to rent via their smartphones. An inexpensive and theft-proof hardware solution, the ZappKit, allows car owners to do this without physically handing over keys.
Pierre Hamblenne
Founder of J & JOY
Alongside his studies, Pierre’s enthusiasm led him to gradually build up his business, and in 2007 he started out on his own. In 2011 he was awarded the title of ‘Best Entrepreneur of Wallonia’ in the ‘starter’ category. Pierre’s clothing brand is now sold in some 500 multi-brand stores in several countries (Belux, France, Switzerland, Germany, Senegal, Croatia, French overseas territories, Taiwan and South Korea).
Corinne Goddijn-Vigreux
Co-Founder of TOMTOM
Corinne Vigreux is one of the four TomTom founders and has been Managing Director of its Consumer Business Unit since 2008. She has played an integral role in the creation and development of the company by leading its growth from a small organization into a global player.
Her key responsibilities have focused on several areas, including the definition and development of the overall marketing strategy of TomTom; the geographic expansion of the company; the creation and evolution of the consumer brand; the supervision of product innovation; and the development of partnerships for commercial distribution.
Vigreux graduated in France with a BA in International Business from EPSCI (ESSEC Group) in 1987. From 1987 to 1993, she worked for Psion Plc, helping to establish and manage Psion’s European distribution network. She joined Palmtop Software in 1994, which became TomTom six years later.
The Speakers
Luigi Tiziano Peccenini
Founder and Honorary President of Wall Street Institute International
Born to a modest family in Ferrara, Italy, “Pecce” as he is known to most, started his career at the age of 19 as a sales agent. He created his first company, a computer training company called Computex, at the age of 28. He sold Computex in 1972 and founded Wall Street Institute in Italy.
In 2000, Pecce opened the first Wall Street English centre in China. Today, both companies are owned by Pearson PLC, London.
Wall Street Institute International is the world leader in the English language business, with more than 450 Centers in 27 Countries and over two million students trained. Wall Street English is the market leader in China, with 70 centres in the major cities and over hundred thousand students trained.
Rudy Aernoudt
Head of Cabinet of the President of the European Economic and Social Committee
Rudy Aernoudt studied Economy and Philosophy, both at the University of Leuven and holds a master in European economics from the College of Europe. After a career as corporate manager in the banking sector, he became principal economist at the European Commission dealing with enterprise policy, in particular the financing of European enterprises. He was special adviser to the President of the Industry Council before becoming Chief of Staff to the different Belgian Ministers of economics and innovation, both on federal and regional (Flanders and Wallony) level.
Afterwards he became consecutively Secretary-General of the Department of Economics and innovation, director-general of One laptop per child, a NGO, spin-off of MIT and Chief Economist dealing with space policy. Since 2013 he is head of cabinet at the European Economic and Social Committee.
Raul Oaida
Self-thought tech guru / entrepreneur
Raul Oaida, a 20-year-old genius builder, rocket scientist, and aspiring astronaut from Transylvania, is gifted with an uncanny ability to fabricate complex contraptions from the most humble of resources. He has built steam engines from bicycle pumps, sent Lego space shuttles into orbit, and constructed jet engines for bicycles. If that wasn't impressive enough, he created a life-sized, air-powered car, comprised of 500,000-plus Lego bricks. He was born with the willingness to see things through.
“I used to smash my toys apart to get to the light bulbs and motors,” says Oaida—the charming (and hilarious) son of a maid and a carpenter. “I’ve always loved to try stuff and see what’s inside of things. In sixth grade I had a really successful online gaming company. I’ve built seven working steam engines—though I didn’t have many tools available so I used wire hangers and a hammer. I’ve always spent all my Christmas and Easter money on engine parts instead of clothes, which really confused my parents. I’m probably the strangest human being who has ever walked the streets of my Transylvanian town.” View interview here
Wytze Russchen
Founder & Managing Director of Russchen Consultants
After completing his thesis on European integration, Wytze Russchen worked as a private secretary for a Member of the European Parliament. Following this experience, Wytze became spokesman and parliamentary lobbyist of BUSINESSEUROPE, the European employers' organization in Brussels.
He was then appointed Senior Secretary of European Affairs in Brussels. In 2005, Wytze founded Russchen Consultants, which continues to advise various large multinationals and (European) federations in the field of EU public affairs, event management, communication strategy and project management.
David Ghysels
Founder of Events in the sky
After founding Hakuna Matata in 2002, a communication agency specialised in gastronomy, David founded Events in the Sky in 2006 with Stefan Kerkhofs.
The company organises events (dinners) in the sky and in only 5 years it managed to be available in 40 countries.
Incredible and unique dinners are organised around the world, gathering renowned chefs in magical settings like Las Vegas Strip, Dubaï Marina, Copacabana beach.
The concept was born from the idea of promoting young promising Belgian chefs. To make it feasible, David partnered with Stefan Kerkhofs, specialist in fairground structures. Prior to this, David worked at Equator (advertising agency), where he was general manager from 1999 to 2002. David holds a degree in communication, with a specialisation in advertising, and also received additional trainings in marketing and entrepreneurship at Solvay Brussels School of Management.
Pete Dowds and Tom Brooks
Founder of Mopp
Mopp was founded when two best friends, Pete Dowds and Tom Brooks had a party and spend two hours online the next day trying to find a cleaner without success.
They set up the business, launched Mopp.com on April 1st 2013 and within 2 weeks had left their highflying city jobs to run the company full time.
Isabel Benjumea
Founder and CEO of GREATNESS
Isabel became one of the youngest consultants for the World Bank Institute in Washington DC, where she worked for 4 years implementing anticorruption and transparency programs for local governments in Latin America.
In 2009 she returned to Spain and became Manager of the international relations department of the FAES Foundation - A leading Spanish Think tank. In November 2011, she started up her own company, GREATNESS, that has become a leading company in the promotion of the Spanish Cultural Heritage.
Thomas Douzis
Founder of ERGON
Thomas founded ERGON in 2008 with his brother George.
Ergon is a selection of traditional Greek products with a selective distribution in Greece and abroad it.
It has also developed a network of 4 privately owned concept outlets in Greece. Now ERGON is an attractive franchise package of combined Grocery / Deli / Cuisine that has achieved 3 franchise agreements in Greece and UK to be completed in 2013.
Katrien Devos
Founder of HR Builders
I am the proud "captain" of HR Builders. I founded this Human Resources Interim Management company in 2008.
In 6 years we became market leader in Belgium with an average of 40 people working for us and a revenue (2013) of 4 mio EUR. We work for Coca Cola, Unilever, Johnson & Johnson, Abbott, Mc Bride, Ingersoll Rand, ING, AXA... and many more. We operate from a very cool office boat in Ghent. I setup a separate company in 2012 for the expansion of our international activities throughout Europe, which is my project now, next to inspiring my Belgian team in our home market.
Our dream is to help our clients with temporary support in Human Resources, WHERE-EVER they might need it (so global ambitions).
Peter Sledsens
Born in 1960, Peter graduated as a high school teacher. Following this, he spent many years in banking, insurance and real estate both employed and self-employed. Since 1991 he has been an Amway business owner with business in Belgium, the Netherlands Germany Ukraine Poland and Moskou.