The Seville-based companies Past View and Soltel IT Solutions are the winners of the AJE 2013 Regional Awards for Entrepreneurial Initiative and Business Trajectory, granted by the Association of Young Entrepreneurs of Andalusia (AJE-A).
The awards ceremony took place at the Royal Alcázar of Seville, in an event that brought together nearly 300 attendees, including authorities, business leaders, and associates from across Andalusia. A group of magicians and several opera singers also participated in the event.
This event, sponsored by Adalid Inmark, Fundación Cobre las Cruces and Emasesa, was attended by the mayor of Seville, Juan Ignacio Zoido, the president of the Confederation of Businessmen of Andalusia (CEA), Santiago Herrero, the president of the Provincial Council of Seville, Fernando Rodríguez Villalobos, as well as other authorities, representatives of AJE and young entrepreneurs from all over Andalusia.
The AJE Awards were announced last October by the Association of Young Entrepreneurs of Andalusia under the slogan 'Feel the magic, start your own business' to "pay tribute once again to young people who in these difficult times are able to successfully carry out their business projects."
On March 7th, the provincial phase concluded, in which almost 200 young companies from all over Andalusia participated. Past View and Soltel IT Solutions were the winning companies, in addition to the prize obtained in the provincial phase, the regional award, an iPAD, an MBA master's degree sponsored by the Vértice Foundation and a year of communication service through which the winners will be advised on the dissemination of their projects.
Past View Sevilla has received the regional award for Entrepreneurial Initiative. With this award, AJE recognizes "the originality and effort of a group of young people from Seville who have created an innovative formula that uses heritage as a basis to combine history and new technologies."
Soltel IT Solutions won the Business Trajectory award. Founded in 2002, the company offers technical assistance and training in new technologies. Specializing in IT services, it employs 150 professionals and has a presence in Spain (Seville, Badajoz, and Madrid) and Mexico (Mexico City).
Referring to the awards' motto, the president of AJE Andalucía, José Antonio Cabrera, stated in his speech that "Past View and Soltel IT Solutions are true examples of AJE companies that have found the magic formula for business success, the union of innovation and efficiency, demonstrating that young people are prepared to change the course of our economy."
Cabrera alluded to those young Andalusians who have to leave to seek a future elsewhere and concluded his speech by saying that "trusting in young people means trusting in the future."
For his part, the mayor of Seville, Juan Ignacio Zoido, highlighted the ability of young people to undertake ventures "rigorously and by generating employment." He also advocated for supporting entrepreneurs, stating that "young people are the driving force of society," and therefore considers it "necessary" to facilitate the development of entrepreneurial initiatives.
In her speech, the president of the Spanish Confederation of Young Entrepreneurs Associations (Ceaje), Pilar Andrade, recalled that entrepreneurs have something of the "bold and adventurous" about them, while demanding the approval of an Entrepreneur Law, underlining the importance of having guarantees to support projects and thus "avoid business failure".
On the other hand, Andrade highlighted the Ceaje's "already achieved" request to establish a €50 fee for the self-employed. Furthermore, he concluded by requesting that the innovation departments of the autonomous communities commit to promoting the business development model.
Finally, the president of the Association of Young Entrepreneurs of Seville (AJE-Sevilla), Mónica Moreno, played with the parameters of magic, illusion and the impossible to assure that "the best magicians are entrepreneurs since they generate employment contracts."
THE WINNERS
Past View is a young company that uses new technologies as a tool for interpreting cultural heritage. It has developed an iPhone app that "makes it possible to enjoy cultural tourism in a new way," since "it is an innovative formula that uses heritage as a basis for combining history and new technologies."
Past View is a device consisting of a smartphone that runs an app and video glasses that allow you to view infographic recreations of what a place looked like during a specific period in history. The user interacts with real historical figures, becoming the protagonist of the story.
Since November 2012, tourists and locals have been able to enjoy two different products: Past View Metropol, the Metropol Parasol video guide, where "with the simple gesture of putting on glasses, the user can get closer to each of the monuments that can be seen from the viewpoint; and in addition, they can view the infographic recreation of a panorama of Roman Hispalis."
Likewise, the ‘Past View Seville Route’ allows users to explore the city's main monuments. At each Past View point, using the glasses, users will be transported to key moments in Seville's history: the day the Giralda was inaugurated, Cervantes' imprisonment, or the arrival of the Indies Fleet.
Since its founding in September 2012, Past View has hired seven people. A young and dynamic team, made up of professionals in history, communication, infographics, and tourism. The entire team, including its co-founders, is under 40 years old.
Soltel IT Solutions, for its part, has won the Business Trajectory category. Founded in 2002, this company offers technical assistance and training in new technologies. It specializes in IT services and adds value to organizations through Information and Communication Technologies (ICT).
Soltel has a staff of 150 professionals and an annual turnover of more than five million euros in the last financial year and a presence in Spain (Seville, Badajoz and Madrid) and Mexico (Mexico City).
It is a company that adds value to organizations through information and communication technologies (ICT), with an attitude of continuous innovation, "seeking the appropriate specialization in each of the business divisions in which they articulate their solutions, that is, systems engineering, outsourcing and technical assistance, software engineering and training."
It focuses its business on innovation with the launch of its mobile products, SolCom and SolKar, and its web applications for process and administration optimization, namely SolCmi and SolGroup, Soltel Glutenfreelist, a project co-financed by the Avanza Plan, the e-democracy platform for the Seville City Council, among others.
