💊 Wordsmith & Simple Online Healthcare named Future Fifty, Converge finalists announced, Women to Women relaunch, Techscaler trip clapback
Here's your Campfire for the 15th of September, 2025.
💼 This issue of Campfire is sponsored by Shepherd and Wedderburn's initiative to supercharge start-ups and scale-ups. Be sure to follow the Start to Scale LinkedIn page for useful videos and posts designed to help founders.
Get out of the way and let folks figure it out
By Robert Gelb
Last week the Sunday Post ran an article criticising the Techscaler trips to San Francisco and Singapore. To call it a sensational piece (not in a good way) is a bit of an understatement, and both Steven Drost from Codebase, as well as founder Daniel Grant (his reflections are worth a read and spot on) who was quoted in the article both offered their responses and critiques to how it was positioned and presented.
Personally, I think there is so much wasted effort and spend by the Scottish government to prop up initiatives that don’t actually help founders, but rather encourage bad outcomes and confusion. But these trips, in my opinion are the exact opposite.
Starting a business is inherently tough, and competitive, and isn’t something someone else can do for you. Early stage founders are also often cash strapped. Empowering founders to travel to destinations of great entrepreneurial and investment activity and then getting out of the way so they can make the most of it and shoot their shot is a great example of providing actual value. If a founder doesn’t make the most of that opportunity, then frankly, it’s on them. They have so many options available to them to learn how to make the most of a trip like this (YC’s startup school is completely free and open to watch online). And if they don’t make the most of it, the best founders then learn from that, take that responsibility seriously and are the better as a result of it going forward.
The openness of the application process is a valid area of critique that I’d bet Codebase is aware of, but many observations the article makes about some folks being unprepared isn’t a bug, but a feature. Criticising initiatives because they provide opportunities for founders to sink or swim leads to over-programmed summer camps that don’t actually serve those with the most amount of opportunity to build something big.
If anyone in the government, or the opposition, reads this, hearing stories of failure or about folks who aren’t prepared, or people trying but not succeeding is what you sign up for when you’re investing in a proper startup ecosystem. Over-programming and making everyone feel good is a recipe for wasting money, encouraging mediocrity, and leading to resentment and tall poppy syndrome.
As Dan said: “A founder's job is to solve problems; if you need school-trip level guidance on how to hustle in Silicon Valley that is 100% a you problem… The real villains of this story are not Codebase who provided an opportunity for business and personal development in another country. It's the entitled founders who took that opportunity, squandered it, and then whined about it.”
Disagree with this take? Reply to this email or message me and we’ll get your view in another issue.
🌊 Updates
🛫 CodeBase defends Techscaler trips after a Sunday Post article criticised them as “holidays,” stressing their value in connecting Scottish founders with global investors. DGT
🎓 Converge 2025 finalists have been announced, with projects ranging from AI medtech robots to HGV trailer designs, representing 12 Scottish universities. A £400k+ prize pot is up for grabs, including £305k cash and £100k in business support. DGT
💡 Simple Online Healthcare and Wordsmith have been named in Tech Nation’s Future Fifty 2025 cohort. The 25 selected companies span AI, aerospace, and climatetech, and together have raised £1.4bn. SBN
👩💼 AccelerateHER has relaunched its Women to Women (W2W) programme, pairing Scotland’s female founders with experienced entrepreneurs and investors from Investing Women Angels and other syndicates. Applications are open to women leading early-stage companies seeking investment, as well as new or aspiring female angel investors. Apply Here. DGT
📣 Asks & Offers
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📅 Deadlines
👩💼 Applications are now open for the next Women to Women (W2W) Programme, launching Q4 2025–Q1 2026 in Scotland. Open to female founders seeking investment and women exploring angel investing. APPLY HERE
♻️ Edinburgh’s Greentech Futures applications close 22 Sept, backing founders tackling climate and environmental challenges with peer support, tools, and founder spotlights to help scale sustainable solutions. APPLY HERE
📅 Events
🤖 15/09, 12:30pm, 🗺 Falkirk: AI & Collaboration for Future-Ready Businesses. An event in Forth Valley exploring how businesses can use AI to strengthen resilience, improve decision-making, and build long-term adaptability, featuring a talk and Q&A with AI strategist Abi Odedeyi. MORE INFO
🤖 16/09, 09:30 🗺️ Edinburgh: AI for Business Innovation & Impact Explore how businesses are using AI to improve performance and drive growth. Talks, Q&A, and networking. MORE INFO
🎯 18/09, 17:30 🗺️ Edinburgh: Scotland Women in Technology - Bold Moves: Career Change Stories from Inside & Outside FanDuel Panel event exploring career pivots, transferable skills, and lived experiences from FanDuel staff, SWIT award winners, and external speakers. MORE INFO
💻 18/09, 18:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Edinburgh Data Science & AI Meetup Pizza, drinks, networking + talks: Why good code fails to make an impact + AI agents. MORE INFO
💻 18/09, 09:00, 🗺 Perth: An in-person and informal catch-up with the Perth tech community! MORE INFO
👩🏭 18/09, 10:30 🗺️ Perth: Coworking Day, A free coworking day in the Famous Grouse Idea Centre for the tech and business community. MORE INFO
💻 22/09, 12:00, 🗺️ ONLINE: Techscaler x NHS Innovation Hubs Webinar, An introduction to NHS Scotland's three Innovation Hubs, how they work and ways to engage. MORE INFO
🌞 23/09, 17:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Good Ideas Class Showcase Meet the next generation of entrepreneurs and changemakers as they launch bold new ideas to create a fairer, greener and more inclusive world, starting right here in Scotland. MORE INFO
🏗️ 23/09 -25/09, 🗺️ Hilton Glasgow: APACT Conference
Organised by CPACT, the APACT conference brings together experts in process analytics and control to share innovations, research, and industry applications. The three-day event offers technical sessions, networking, and insights into the latest developments in process technology. MORE INFO
⭐️ 24/09, 🗺️ Glasgow: Innovators, rebels, misfits and dreamers! Join us at F*ckUp Nights Glasgow to laugh, learn, and embrace the beauty of mistakes – because failure is simply a stepping stone on the journey to success. There will be tons of networking, good vibes, and the best company around! MORE INFO
💰 24/09, 09:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: Fintech Summit 2025 brings together Scotland’s financial technology community to discuss innovation, regulation, investment, and the future of financial services. MORE INFO
💸 24/09, 19:00 🗺️ Edinburgh: DIGIT’s 5th annual Scottish Financial Technology Awards celebrates achievements across Scotland’s fintech ecosystem, with categories recognising outstanding individuals and organisations. MORE INFO
👩🏭 25/09, 10:30, 🗺️ Glasgow: Co-Work Club Glasgow. Free if you download the Swurf app MORE INFO
♻️ 30/09, 09:00, 🗺️ Edinburgh: Greentech Meetup: September Edition, Join our monthly meetup where we bring the Edinburgh Greentech community together for a learning session, networking & a spot of breakfast MORE INFO
👩🏭 26/09, 08:30, 🗺️ Edinburgh: Coworking Open Day Drop in to try out the space for the day, or take a tour of the space. MORE INFO
🗂️ 30/09, 09:00, 🗺️ Inverness: Scale Your Service Business With Tech - Inverness: A half-day session at WASPS Inverness Creative Academy for service-based businesses seeking to grow through technology. MORE INFO
👩🏭 30/09, 10:00, 🗺️ Edinburgh: Co-Work Club Edinburgh Free if you download the Swurf app MORE INFO
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That’s all for this week - have a great one!
Team 🔥 Campfire
Looks like the Digit news piece has been moved to this URL: https://www.digit.fyi/codebase-defends-techscaler-trips-after-critical-report/