Katrien Herdewyn – Elegnano: UNIZO Starter of the Year 2015

Katrien Herdewyn has a doctorate in nanotechnology and loves nothing more than to solve math enigmas. But at the same time, she’s been passionate about shoes since the age of 4. As a little girl, she used to dive under the table to study grown up’s shoes. Now, she combines her passion with her scientific background. Herdewyn designs shoes that, thanks to nanotechnology, are water- and dirt repellant. And at the same time, she’s trying to find ways to improve the comfort of shoes through nanotechnology.

Business, so she says, is a matter of pure passion. As Starter of the Year she wants to motivate starters and potential starters to keep faith in their ideas. And in herself as well. “Man or woman, you just need to step up and do it. Because, in your own business, there is no glass ceiling. I want to show young people and children that, in our society, you can create your own path in life and make your dreams come true… if you dare. It’s not because you have a degree in civil engineering that you can’t make a future for yourself in fashion,” Katrien says.
Herdewyn convinced the jury with her well thought-out strategy, a solid business plan and her passion as an entrepreneur.
She sells her own creations through different channels: a web shop, regular shops and pop-up stores. Right now, she focuses on the Belgian market, but with a keen eye on international business.

Because we also believe that starters are important, we like to offer them the advice and solutions they need to start their business. Since Proximus is a UNIZO partner, we decided to give our full support to this competition and to its winner.
As part of the winner’s prize packages, we welcomed Katrien in our Proximus Shop in Leuven where she got a full telecom audit by local Bizz Expert Myriam Van Eyken.

Aside from the audit we got Katrien a brand new, complimentary Huawei G8 , including a Bizz Smart XL 60 subscription. And since she’s often abroad on business, that will certainly work to her advantage.

We wish Katrien all the best in her enterprise!