PERA Wins People’s Choice in London – A Breakthrough Moment for Relationship-First Founders
Nov 18, 2025
Watch the full interview back - https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLrMrateB2yVVf3BrnWuVR9WYX1ExPw_Hq&si=J3pbCe7pi9bSimG7
Connect with Katya - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kateryna-ushmaieva-5855a31bb/
Connect with Mohamed - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mohamed-omar-5a0084193/
Take a look at Pera - https://www.itspera.com/
More about City Ventures - https://cityventures.co.uk/
At every Demo Night, there’s a startup that speaks straight to the heart of our founder community. At the London edition last week, that moment belonged to PERA — and to the extraordinary co-founders Mohamed and Kateryna, who captured the room with clarity, vulnerability, and purpose.
Their win reflects exactly what the Canopy Membership exists to empower: founders solving real human problems, validating their ideas early, and building MVPs that feel both intuitive and indispensable.
A Startup Built From Real Life and Real Relationships
PERA is building Becca — a proactive relationship manager designed for people who want to stay connected without the emotional labour of constantly keeping track.
Becca lives inside your digital world, learns who matters to you, and gently surfaces the relationships that need your energy next. It supports both sides of modern life: nurturing existing relationships and enabling new, intentional connections.
It’s a problem every global founder recognises. Our community spans London, Lisbon, Boston, Bangalore, and Singapore — and almost all of us juggle networks across borders, time zones, and careers. Kateryna’s story of moving from Ukraine to Boston to London, while trying to stay close to her grandmother and friends, hit home for many in the room. Mohamed’s reminder that missed connections can cost more than opportunities — they can cost belonging — made everyone lean in.
This is validation in its purest form: when a room full of founders hears your “why” and silently thinks, yes, I feel that too.
Privacy and Trust at the Centre of Their Product Strategy
Founders and investors in the audience challenged them on security — a natural concern when an AI tool sits inside your inbox. Their response was refreshingly confident and grounded:
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End-to-end encryption
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No training data taken from user content
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No ads, ever
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GDPR compliance
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SOC 2 certification underway
For a community increasingly focused on ethical, founder-friendly AI, PERA’s commitment to trust landed powerfully. It’s the kind of early-stage discipline that investors look for long before the first cheque.
Why PERA Won the Room
People’s Choice is a vote of genuine admiration. It’s not about the slickest deck, the deepest tech, or the most polished financial model. Our founders chose PERA because:
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The problem was universal and emotional.
Everyone has felt the guilt of relationships slipping away. -
Their story was clear, simple, and human.
They resisted the temptation to explain every feature — instead, they focused on impact. -
Their co-founder dynamic shone.
Supportive. Balanced. Warm. Confident.
A partnership that makes you want to champion them. -
They prepared like professionals.
They worked with our In-Residence team — Sam, Chuck, Sarah — and transformed their narrative through feedback, iteration, and practice with strangers. That’s MVP thinking at its best. -
They made the audience feel.
And feelings win votes.
A New Addition to a Very Special Group
PERA now joins a global cohort of People’s Choice winners — 26 startups across the year who reflect the creativity and diversity of our founder ecosystem. This group gets special access to community connections, investment conversations, and ongoing support from across Canopy.
Mohamed and Kateryna, your win was deeply deserved. Thank you for bringing courage, curiosity, and emotional honesty to our London stage. You’re building something important — for women juggling global careers, for founders managing countless micro-relationships, and for anyone trying to stay connected in a noisy world.
We can’t wait to cheer you on as you evolve your MVP, expand your customer base, and engage investors who believe in relationship-first innovation.
Congratulations again from all of us at Canopy Community & City Ventures. We join you in celebrating the moment and wish you every success with your idea over the coming year.