OREANDA-NEWS. February 20, 2018. Sberbank, the Internet Initiative Development Fund (IIDF), and FortRoss Ventures today launched the second stage of selecting participants for the Global Pitch platform (http://www.globalpitch.vc/) aimed at the international promotion of Russian tech entrepreneurs. Under the patronage of experienced mentors, in June 2018 the 20 finalists will meet with major investors, representatives of global funds and corporations in Silicon Valley.

The goal of the project is to help investors and funds find new competitive projects, as well as to assist start-ups in finding major investors and getting international expertise.

Sberbank is the primary sponsor of the project.

“We actively develop start-ups within Sberbank, and support Russian innovation throughout the country and abroad. We are delighted to be part of Global Pitch, which helps our analysts find promising teams to invest in and aids Russian teams in breaking through to foreign markets,” commented Vladislav Kreinin, Vice President and Marketing Director at Sberbank.

“At the conference Russian Startups Go Global 2017 we watched 27 presentations of projects that we invited following the first selection stage. Together with our colleagues from 500 Startups and Google for Enterpreneurs we formed a jury to select the winning teams,” commented Maxim Chebotarev, Head of the Investors Club and International Development Division of the IIDF.

“We have invited the Valley’s top investors – legendary venture funds, major tech companies and their investment arms – angel investors that have played a part in the success of many companies. We will help the participants to prepare for the meetings in the best possible way: experienced mentors will help them put together their presentations and say all the right things about their projects. Initially they will present to a big audience of investors. Investors who like them will be able to meet one-on-one,” said Viktor Orlovsky, Managing Partner of FortRoss Ventures.