OpenCoffee Leeds {Sei} - The Low Down

November 6th was the first Tuesday of the month and that means only one thing ... OpenCoffe Leeds. (Actually it means many things, not the least my Mum's Birthday! - but you get my point)

So the 6th OpenCoffee Leeds, on the 6th of November saw a happy band of loose affiliates and common interest holders once more descend on the venue and partake of the refreshments and WiFi all kindly provided once again by Justin.

Having pulled a couple of all-nighters, the feeble efforts of his ring tone invoked by my incessant stabbing of redial were inadequate to rouse Imran from his well disturbed slumber and so he never made it. Which is a shame, firstly because there were a number of interesting newcomers and secondly because it falls to me to report on the event!

Not the biggest turn out but we did notch up 23 concurrent OpenCoffee-ers (?) and see around 27 people in total pass through at some stage. Word on the street has it that many people were at their home/office frantically working on their demos and presentations for BarCamp.

As per usual we managed a nice spread of geeks, designers, entrepreneurs, academics, Venture and other generally tech related peeps.

It was heartening to see that the new faces doted around the place were getting actively involved in conversations. Had I realized I'd be on point as official correspondent this month I would have made more of an effort to get round everyone, as it is I got drawn into a number of very engaging discussions. However two stories I can recount are illustrative of the day.

1. Richard came along for the first time. He is overseeing the set up of interesting new MVNE company smallPlanet based in Huddersfield, and was fortuitous enough to be able to discuss the ins and outs of making a success of a small Telco player with Plus Net founder and tech business guru Lee Stafford.

2. Paul, a biochemist based in Leeds came along for a very different reason. He has a couple of very intriguing business ideas which he and a partner are currently developing. Paul is a smart guy but not well enough versed in computing to get a handle on the tech requirements of his product and so was seeking some assistance in this regard. Firstly he came away assured that yes indeed, there is more than sufficient talent around the area to help him spec up and build his product. Secondly that it wasn't necessary to blat around Cambridge, London or Silicon Valley to get tech startup funding (I was not the only one present to speak from personal experience on this topic). Finally he came away having met people who could either offer advice, help him directly or refer him to the tech talent he is going to need. And really, thats what this thing is all about.

Best of luck to both Richard and Paul and to all the others in the region who are cracking on and launching their own ventures.

No photos this month I'm afraid!

The December event is set for Tuesday 4th once again at Loftart on Vicar Lane - details of everything cam be found on Upcoming.