Eight businesses from across Norfolk have today battled it out in the local finals of the Local Business Accelerators competition.

Braving the icy winter weather, the finalists made their pitches in front of the judges as they bid to win the local round of the competition and with it the chance to a year's worth of advertising support from Archant, publishers of the Eastern Daily Press, Norwich Evening News, and a host of weekly titles, as well as mentoring from NWES, and free membership of Norfolk Chamber.

The event took place at the City College Norwich's Start-Up lounge with each finalist presenting their vision for their business to the three judges, Kevin Horne, chief executive of NWES, Norfolk Chamber chief executive Caroline Williams, and Laura McNeil, enterprise manager at the college.

And the winner now has a chance to go on to the national final of the Newspaper Society backed competition, which includes a year's worth of mentoring from Dragon's Den star Caroline Williams, and £10,000 of support for the overall winner.

Caroline Williams, said she was impressed with the entrants.

'It shows that Norfolk has got some great new businesses coming through,' she said. 'They have all got a great future and we all felt there were areas we could support them with, whether they won or not.'

Listen to the judges announce the winner on the audio link and read more about the winning Norfolk business in Thursday's EDP