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Forresters supports rescheduled university event

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At Forresters we are continuing our support of a university event, which helps students turn their business ideas into reality.

The University of Chester has announced that The Venture Pitch 2020 will be delayed until later in the year, following government advice on Covid-19. Our intellectual property experts are fully committed to supporting the university event, which has been postponed to September 17th and 18th. The university has confirmed that The Venture Pitch 2020 will definitely go ahead on these dates and will be carried out either at the university, or virtually.

The Venture Pitch 2020 will see students and graduates, who are on the Venture Programme at the university, present their business ideas to a panel of judges. The judges will then decide which entrepreneurs win start-up funding and one of the coveted awards – including the highly sought-after Forresters Award.

Partner Kate Cruse, who is based in our Liverpool office, commented that it was great to see the competition was still going ahead. “The Venture Pitch 2020 is a really positive event, which helps to give a boost to those students that are starting a business, or want to pursue a freelance career,” she added. “It is important to support this fantastic initiative, especially as we have seen how high the quality of applications is. The entrants are all astute and business savvy, and so understand the importance of securing their intellectual property.”

Students and graduates are able to access a series of workshops through the Venture Programme to help them with their business ideas. Kate said she has visited the University for the last six years to talk to students about the importance of trade marks and patents.

“We’ve always had a good relationship with the university and we are pleased to be offering the Forresters Award again this year,” said Kate. “The prize of an iPad will benefit most of the entrepreneurs as they will be able to use it to manage their business.”

Kirsty Badrock, entrepreneurship co-ordinator at the University of Chester, explained the decision to postpone the event was made necessary because of COVID-19 and the current lockdown period: “Due to the virus, our vice-chancellor has announced that the university has ceased face-to-face teaching on campuses for the remainder of this academic year, although it is continuing remotely,” she said. “Regrettably this means that The Venture Pitch 2020 will not take place in June and has been postponed until September 17 and 18.

“While none of us can anticipate the national situation looking ahead, we would like to offer as much certainty as we can to our student body. So regardless of where we stand, it is our full intention that the event will take place at this time, either at the university or virtually. We would like to thank Forresters and all our other sponsors for their continued support during these uncertain times.”

Last year’s winner of the Forresters Award was former PhD student Henry Sidsaph, who is the founder of Miténgo Coffee. He said winning the Forresters Award made a huge difference to his ethical and environmentally friendly coffee company. “Forresters helped me secure the trade marks for Miténgo Coffee, which gave me a lot of credibility when I was pitching to different businesses,” said Henry. “I am so grateful for the help Forresters gave me, they offered me support every step of the way and there were regular follow ups so they could see how the business was progressing.”