Winners announced for our Wales Coast Path GeoVation Challenge
After a day of pitching their ideas to the GeoVation judging panel at Cardiff’s SWALEC stadium last week, five groups of entrepreneurs have been given the funding to turn their visions for the Wales Coast Path into a reality.
Having been tasked with coming up with new innovations and ideas to help Wales make the most of its new coast path – the five winners were awarded a slice of the £125,000 funding following successful pitches to a judging panel.
They were: Perfect Visitor Companion is an idea by Jamie Hanna and Julie McNiece of MyTourTalk. This multimedia video experience will guide visitors to the Wales Coast Path through a smartphone app that would be 100% accessible as the data would be stored offline. This group was awarded £40,000.
Food Finder is an idea by sisters Helen and Nicola Steer. This online app and offline map would highlight local, sustainable and delicious food (and beer), farms, wild food hotspots, food activities and places to eat along the path. Awarded £30,000, Food Finder also won the Community Award of £1,000 after a vote from the invited audience.
Igam Ogam is an idea from Cardigan team Steve Knight, Sean Vicary and Rowan O’Neill. This bi-lingual smartphone app will tell people’s local stories of the places and features along the path for visitors to the areas. It was awarded £30,000.
Living Paths is an idea by Roger Bamkin and Robin Owain of Monmouthpedia. It will allow communities along the path to create a Wikipedia page and post stories about their communities allowing diverse local information to become accessible. It was awarded £17,500.
Growing Routes is an idea by Richard Fairhurst. This web-based app which will combine data from a variety of sources to provide gap analysis and help build economies along the path by showing where the businesses opportunities are. It was awarded £7,500. GeoVation is our innovation network supporting new geography and mapping based business ventures that have an economic, social or environmental benefit for the country. GeoVation does this by running themed challenges, which address real world problems and opportunities.
With the path now officially open, the GeoVation Challenge, Wales’ first Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI), funded in partnership with Ramblers Cymru, the Welsh Government and the Technology Strategy Board (TSB), looked at how people who live and work near the path can benefit from this ‘world first’ opportunity.
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