00:00So, hi, I'm Laura Earnshaw. I'm the founder and CEO at My Happy Mind, which is a mental
00:07health organisation supporting children in schools to develop strategies to thrive. I
00:12think it went okay. I was first up, first of ten, so it's never fun being first, but
00:16yeah, I think it was okay. It's always interesting and hard to try and crystallise your story
00:20into ten minutes and make sure you're hitting all the points that people want to hear about,
00:23but yeah, I think it went well. Yeah, so I would describe myself as a mum on a mission.
00:28So when I first started My Happy Mind, I really had no idea how I was going to build
00:32it, but I got it into the first school and then I've grown it and grown it from there.
00:36So we're now in 2,000 schools nationally with a huge growth plan ahead. We've been able
00:41to secure funding and backing from the NHS, which has been really powerful in our growth
00:46journey. So yeah, it's been a ride, but it's been a really positive one. And I think society
00:50realises that prevention has to be part of the solution around the crisis with children
00:54and young people's mental health. So we're really well-primed to kind of capitalise on
00:57that momentum now and keep growing. I've always been really focused on impact and my view's
01:02always been, if I get the impact right, the money bit will sort itself out. So I'm focused
01:06genuinely on the metrics of how many kids have we impacted, how many schools are we in.
01:10Thankfully, we've got a really profitable business as well. So that's really helpful,
01:13but the main focus is impacting as many kids as we can across the world. So our next kind
01:18of phase of our expansion is very much looking at the global market. We've got some schools
01:21already, places like Thailand and Spain and in Middle East and Africa as well. So we're
01:28kind of growing in that space, but that's a real focus for us moving forward because
01:31mental health is culturally agnostic and it doesn't discriminate. So the issues that children
01:36are facing here are not dissimilar to the issues that children face all over the world.
01:40Hi, my name is Richard West, Chief Executive of Red Flag Alert. A presentation, it was put together
01:47last minute. We did a rebrand last night. We launched, so I had to put some new slides
01:52together. I say I had to, my team did for me. But yeah, no, look, really, really happy with
01:56how the event went. I think for me, more than just obviously getting to showcase what our
02:00business does as a Northern tech business, it was more about learning more about other technology
02:05companies in the North of England. I think you work in a silo in your industry and actually
02:10looking at some of the amazing founders who are here today, sharing their stories, some fascinating
02:14stories. And yeah, for me, it was just a good opportunity to tell my story, but also to listen
02:20to some of the stories of people in similar positions to myself. Yeah, I think there's
02:26a huge technology ecosystem in Manchester. I still think clearly London is where a lot
02:33of businesses are starting up and a lot of the talent is. But in terms of greater Manchester,
02:37the Northwest as a whole, the North, there's some fantastic technology companies up here,
02:42some amazing people, the workforce, people who tend to work in the North are extremely
02:46loyal, passionate people. So having those in your business is amazing. But yeah, no,
02:52the strength of the technology industry in Manchester is huge. I think the next challenge is how do
02:56we get these businesses access to funding and investment? Because from what you can see
03:00today, there's huge potential in there, huge returns for investors. We've just got to get
03:04more investors fishing in the North versus all that canvassing London.
03:09So I am Javid Huck. I'm a managing director at GP Bullhound, and I look after all of our
03:14activities across the North. The reason why we host the event is because we want to shine a light
03:18on all the great stuff that's happening around the modern technology ecosystem. And bringing everyone
03:22together once a year really helps build that community, build that camaraderie, and also hopefully
03:27get more people from around the country and internationally more interested in what's happening in terms
03:32of the open tech. The ecosystem goes really deep. And this isn't the first time we've
03:37run it. Obviously, this is the 12th time I was running it. And every year we keep finding 10,
03:4020 new companies that are just fantastic businesses. They present unbelievably well to the judges. And
03:44sadly, not everyone can win an award. That doesn't mean that those businesses aren't fantastic in their
03:48own right as well. What comes next? Well, every year we try to make it bigger and better. But we always try
03:53to keep it that same number of people in terms of audience and attendees. But we just want to make sure
03:59that the event creates a bigger noise for the region. It creates more enthusiasm for people
04:03operating across the region and hopefully bring more people into the region in terms of what we're
04:07trying to build and what's being accomplished around here. I am holding the Northern Tech Awards
04:112025 Overall Judges Award, which I'm very excited about. You must be. I mean, has it been a journey,
04:18would you say? It's been a journey. And, you know, there's been some amazing pitches today,
04:22some amazing entrepreneurs and organisations. So to be able to kind of claim the top prize in and amongst
04:27that talent is pretty something. Yeah.
