Former corporate high flyer scoops CEO of the Year at tech startup awards 

A former corporate high-flyer who founded a fintech platform to help companies secure early stage investment has scooped CEO of the Year at a tech startup awards.

Jude Cook, who launched crowdfunding specialist Sharein in 2011, received the award a glittering ceremony at the Scottish Tech Startup Awards in Edinburgh.

Cook, who worked previously for business consulting giant Deloitte & Touche and BT, was among winners at the event on Thursday night at the Jam House in the capital.

Brian Corcoran, CEO of Turing Fest who organise the Startup Awards said: “Over the last year, Jude led ShareIn through a challenging regulatory environment which illustrated her strategic acumen and the business is now in an even stronger place. Not only is ShareIn now one of Scotland’s most highly-rated fintechs, perhaps as importantly the team has equal gender balance and over 14 different nationalities. Jude and the company are both great adverts for the very best in Scottish tech.”

The Startup of the Year award went to facial animation technology company Speech Graphics this year, a startup with a client list that includes Warner Brother and Def Jam Recordings. Speech Graphics is one of over 70 startups headquartered at Edinburgh’s tech incubator CodeBase, which was an award winner itself in the Ecosystem category. CodeBase was launched in 2014 and now has three core sites in Edinburgh, Stirling and Aberdeen and tenant companies have collectively raised over £600 million.

Corcoran added: “CodeBase is front and centre of all things tech in Scotland.  Put simply, the tech ecosystem in Scotland would not be where it is without it. It’s no surprise that many of the award winners tonight, including ShareIn and Speech Graphics, call CodeBase home.” 

The other award winners on the night were: Adimo in the Software-as-a-Service Startup of the Year category; Criton in the Mobile Startup of the Year category; Current Health in the Hardware Startup of the Year category; dresscode in the Diversity in Tech category; Design and Code in the Agency of the Year category; Intelligent Growth Solutions in the Tech for Good category, and; Techstart Ventures in the Investor of the Year category.

Corcoran said: “Tech for good was a theme running through this year’s awards and startups like Intelligent Growth Solutions is a great example of a highly ambitious company with cutting edge tech that could make a real impact on how we produce food.” 

The judging panel for this years Scottish Tech Startup Awards featured Brian Corcoran (Turing Fest), Eamonn Carey (Techstars London), Gillian Docherty (The Data Lab), Hazel Gibbens (Tech Nation), Natalie Novick (Tech.eu), Andy Robinson (Deliveroo), Darcie Tanner (Darcie Digital Co.), Melinda Matthews Clarkson (CodeClan), Meri Williams (Kindred Capital VC and Monzo Bank) and Olly Headey (FreeAgent).

Turing Fest 2019, Europe’s leading cross-functional tech conference, took place at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre (EICC) on 28-29 August with more than 3,000 attendees. Turing Fest 2020 takes place back at the EICC on 4-5 August 2020.