Teenage tech entrepreneurs will defy today’s tube strike and complete a ‘startup bootcamp’ at Central Working Whitechapel, thanks to a last-minute rescue by early stage startup incubator IncuBus London.
The 20 prospective entrepreneurs between 16 and 18 years old have been taking part in the Young Founders programme since 27 July at Central Working Whitechapel.
But planned industrial action on the Underground threatened to prevent the penultimate day of seminars and workshops from going ahead.
Following a call for help on Twitter, IncuBus London volunteered their purpose-built double-decker to ferry the young attendees from Covent Garden to Central Working Whitechapel.
The ready-made desk space aboard the IncuBus will allow the cohort to continue the planned seminar en-route to Central Working Whitechapel.
The Young Founders programme advise and prepare teenage entrepreneurs to launch their products to a business market with two weeks of workshops, seminars and networking events. This year’s visiting mentors have included O2 CEO Ronan Dunne and CarThrottle CEO Adnan Ebrahim.
IncuBus London’s donation is the latest goodwill gesture received by the budding entrepreneurs. Young Founders charge nothing to attend the two week bootcamp, while Central Working have provided space at its Whitechapel club for free.
James Layfield, CEO of Central Working, said: “A key part of the Central Working ethos is that collaboration breeds success, and this is fantastic proof of that, as well as a ready-made lesson for these young go-getters.
“London’s tech community can be dog-eat-dog at times, so it’s very encouraging to see different companies join together to help the next generation of entrepreneurs.”
Rishi Chowdhury, founder of IncuBus London, added: “Entrepreneurs by nature want to move forward and progress faster. Bank holidays are an inconvenience, let alone tube strikes! To help the entrepreneurs on the Young Founders programme we’ll be utilising our London bus to help keep London’s lifeblood, the entrepreneurs, working.”
And Ed Hardy, organiser at Young Founders, concluded: “The vast majority of our cohort commute from outside of London, so IncuBus’ help is a much-appreciated lifeline.
“We’ll even be hosting our morning session on the bus as we crawl through the morning gridlock. Vojtech Horna, who does communications and marketing at Index Ventures, will be talking about non-traditional forms of marketing and reaching your consumer directly – certainly an appropriate topic!”