Elixir/Phoenix app Assenty Top 20 finalist in prestigious UK Northern Stars tech startup competition

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So excited to announce this.

Assenty, the social Q&A platform I’ve been bootstrapping over the last year has made it to the final 20 of the prestigious Northern Stars UK tech startup competition, out of over 200 applications. Hooray!!

Northern Stars is the UK’s most exciting pitch competition to find and showcase the best tech startups in the North of England. It is run by Tech North, a government-backed initiative charged with accelerating the growth of the digital business sector in the North of England.

Read more about it here.

It’s been a particularly busy few months for me, there’s been a never-ending list of features and user requests to add to the Assenty platform, and 12 months after its launch, just not enough time to do all the other things I’d love to do to encourage more people to learn Elixir and build apps running Phoenix.

Yes, I’ve done a couple of talks on Elixir and Phoenix channels at Manchester Lambda Lounge but I also have a few blog post how-to’s to share that just keep getting pushed to the side in the day to day realities of creating a web service, deploying it, identifying its marketplace and approaching and acquiring new users.

There’s just me, trying to do all of it! Very challenging…

So, I’m absolutely thrilled by the fact that Assenty has made the shortlist for Northern Stars. Such encouraging validation! This is also going to be very helpful:

“For the first time, all 20 Northern Stars finalists will receive support and promotion from Tech North. Both the 10 winners and the 10 runners up will receive pitch training, a PR campaign and media training as well as personalised support and communications around opportunities for their business.”

Woot! Praise the Lord!!!

Thanks again to José Valim and the excellent team behind Elixir, everyone at Plataformatec and of course Chris McCord (@chris_mccord) and the team at Dockyard for the exceptional web framework that is Phoenix.

None of this would be possible without you guys! Thank you for your commitment to make Elixir and Phoenix the best it can be. Eternally grateful.

And of course, #ThankYouJesus