Shoptalk Spring 2025: “Shark Reef” Startup Pitch

About

The “Shark Reef” Startup Pitch competition returns at Shoptalk Spring! Join us to discover transformative solutions to help your business, and have your say in determining the Audience Choice winner.

Deborah Weinswig, CEO and Founder of Coresight Research, will emcee the competition in addition to participating as lead judge.

The first round of the competition, which will take place over two sessions on March 25 (the first day of Shoptalk Spring), will see 12 early-stage innovators—six in each session—pitch their solutions for solving key retail challenges to the audience and an expert panel of judges, who will then rate each pitch.

Based on these combined ratings, the top six companies will progress to the second round (a single session taking place on March 26). Finalists will take to the stage a second time to face tough and pointed questions about their businesses from the judges, after which the Audience Choice and Judges’ Choice winners will be crowned!

The Judges’ Choice winner will receive a $100,000 investment from Shoptalk Ventures, courtesy of Commerce Ventures.

Participating innovators include: 

• Big Sur AI
• Lica World
• Lumi AI
• Nectar Social
• Novel
• PlayAbly
• RetailReady
• Selectika
• Shopeaks
• Sotira
• Wayvee Analytics

Related research:

• Essential Guide to Shoptalk Spring 2025: Navigating the Future of Customer-Centric Retail with AI and Unified Commerce
• Coresight Research will introduce each of the participating startups in our series of Innovator Profile reports as well as a full preview of the “Shark Reef” Startup Pitch in the lead-up to the event. Look out for these on coresight.com.
• Catch up on insights from previous Shoptalk events and look out for our daily coverage of Shoptalk Spring 2025 here.

More events at Shoptalk Spring 2025:

• Executive Dinner: Unveiling the Future of Next-Generation Digital Commerce