Healthy £49K Investment For 21 Year Old Entrepreneur

21 year old Yorkshire entrepreneur, Joe Carnell, has secured a £49k growth support package for his innovative up and coming chain of healthy eateries, ÜGOT, after winning the Venturefest Yorkshire Investment Competition. ÜGOT co-founder and director, Joe Carnell, was up against seven other start-ups and impressed a panel of investors from Innovate UK, Exolta Capital and Silicon Valley Bank with his confident pitch, winning the £49,000 prize package put together by local businesses. ÜGOT has been operating for less than 18 months and already has two eateries at York and Newcastle railway stations with rapid growth plans by Joe and co-founder Jamal Edwards (also founder of the UK’s leading youth media brand, SBTV, and the face of PUMA, Google and Virgin) to open in a further four more locations including Leeds, Harrogate and London later this year. Joe said, “It was a huge honour to be at this year’s Venturefest especially amongst so many inspirational entrepreneurs. I didn’t go with the intention of winning, it was more to gain exposure for ÜGOT but it’s so overwhelming to be recognised for all the hard work we’ve put in over the last 18 months. “I look forward to the next stage of continuing to develop and grow ÜGOT, capitalising upon the generosity of our new sponsors and then returning to Venturefest next year to share our success.” The annual Venturefest competition is in its 12th year and is run in conjunction with crowdfunding platform, Growth Funders, inviting businesses across Yorkshire to pitch their ideas to a panel of successful business leaders. Prize packages totalling more than £63,000 saw this year’s competition reach a record number of entries.