Last week Damien Garot pitched Stellar in front of executives from the automotive industry at the Grand Finale of the Grand Prix ACF AutoTech 2024. Stellar is one of the top 3 finalists for the Grand Prix Award and we are really honored to be part of such a prestigious competition. Being distinguished as one of the 3 finalists has enabled even more enriching conversations with decision-makers in the automotive industry. It is clear that for some players, especially Tier-1 suppliers of OEMs dealing with software, perfect internet on the move can mean survival or death of their solution.
We now look forward to continuing the promising conversations we initiated last week and turning them into commercial opportunities within the shortest time-frame. The connections we have built throughout the competition process are already proving to be very beneficial for the business development of Stellar!
Damien Garot, CEO and Co-founder of Stellar, pitching on the stage of GP ACF AutoTech 24th April 2024
The topic of connectivity is sometimes overlooked because the innovations it enables are not incremental, but rather transformational. Stellar is not about increasing efficiencies in the car manufacturing process… it’s about changing the form of a car and how it can be used. What role are cars going to play in our lives in the future? What is the untapped potential within the automotive sector? Are we going to be chauffeured by our cars, while we focus our most precious resources, namely time and attention, on things that matter the most to us? Imagine finishing up work in the car so that once you get home you can play that board game with your family that you have been postponing for weeks, or fully engaging with your friends over video call who are on the other side of the ocean? …What we are going to enable may not be clear for everyone today, but we all know that perfect and ubiquitous connectivity is indispensable if we are trying to put Europe ahead of the innovation curve within automotive.
From left to right: Laurent, Astrid Garot, Damien Garot at the Semi-Finals of the Grand Prix
Although the focus of the GP ACF AutoTech event was "automotive and business needs of connectivity" it was clear that the people we talked to personally suffer from lacking internet while commuting or traveling. It is a pain that we are all feeling more and more as the internet is playing a bigger role in our personal and work lives. Think about cloud storage, social media, movie streaming, chatting with friends, listening to podcasts… it all happens online now. And who wants to be stuck with that one downloaded movie that looked appealing before the journey but 5 minutes in it’s just… not what you want to be watching for the next 2 hours on your cross-country train…
Anyways, back to the Grand Prix ACF AutoTech event. It is an outstanding accelerator that recognizes the top automotive startup companies globally and encourages innovation within the automotive sector. The prize category for which Stellar was selected, Grand Prix ACF Award, is designed for companies that received a round A of funding or more, so we are feeling honored to be competing at this level. With the commercial launch of the GLOBBLE solution in mid-May, at Stellar, we are waiting with anticipation to start making a tangible impact on roads!
You can watch Damien's pitch here starting at 1h 26 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGAvKb7eQ3k&t=5165s