SXSW recently announced the finalists for its 12th annual SXSW Pitch event including five from Austin.
The variety of the finalists shows the breadth and depth of Austin’s booming startup community. The finalists come from a wide range of industries including beauty care, gaming, biotechnology, drones, and biodegradable plastics.
The Austin finalist in the Consumer Technology & CPG Category is Renzoe Box, which created a customized portable makeup kit.
In the Health, Wearables & Wellbeing category, TruPigment, is a cell-based pigment restoration procedure by Austin-based TeVido Biodevices, is a finalist.
In the Entertainment & Content category, St. Noire, an AI-hosted cinematic board game by Virsix Games, based in Austin, is a finalist.
In the Smart Cities, Transportation & Logistics category, Flugauto, which designs and operates cargo drones, of Austin is a finalist.
And in the Social & Culture category, Applied Bioplastics, which is working to mass-produce biodegradable plastics, is a finalist.
The pitch event takes place on March 14-15th at the downtown Hilton Austin. Winners will be selected in each category including one “Best in Show” winner.
The pitch competition received more than 900 applications globally. The finalists include representatives from India, Australia, Gibraltar, the Netherlands, Portugal, South Korea, Denmark, Egypt, the U.S. and Germany, and others.
The competition’s judges come from NEA, Accel, Backstage Capital, Mayfield Fund, Google X, Flybridge Capital, Kapor Capital, and more.
This year, SXSW Pitch added three new categories: consumer technology and consumer packaged goods, smart cities, transportation and logistics, and innovative world technologies.
“With our largest class of applicants yet, we’re pleased to see that SXSW Pitch continues to be a stage for the tech industry’s best and brightest to showcase their groundbreaking ideas and take their companies to the next level,” SXSW Pitch Event Producer Chris Valentine said in a news release.
For a complete list of finalists visit SXSW.