Startup incubator Y Combinator is hosting its semi-annual Demo Day today. Twice a year, the Mountain View, Calif.-based incubator parades its latest batch of companies onstage to present before potential investors.

This afternoon, 26 companies will pitch their business plans. Approximately half of them have not yet launched. We’ll be in Mountain View to cover the ones that catch our fancy.

Y Combinator companies generally receive about $5,000 plus an additional $5,000 per founder and are relocated to Y Combinator’s Mountain View destination for three months, in return for a 2-10% ownership. The program’s alumni include Loopt, Justin.tv, Weebly and Scribd.

We recently ran with the news that a suite of investment funds to the value of £125m ($200m) is coming the North East of England. A substantial proportion are dedicated for technology investments.

At the same time The Difference Engine is arriving as a new acceleration programme for early stage tech businesses supported by various local organisations and mentors. This is going to be a “more Techstars than Seedcamp” kind of programme aimed at hackers producing products quite fast.

Teams get £20,000 for 8% of common stock, mentoring and free accommodation for 16 weeks. This contrasts with Seedcamp, which takes between 5-10% (it varies) for 50,000 Euros. Some might say 8% is a bit high, but Programme co-ordinator Jon Bradford says they are “aiming for earlier stage businesses” than Seedcamp as TDE is “more comparable to YC and TechStars. Our valuations sit somewhere between these programmes and Seedcamp.”

The real estate for will be provided by DigitalCity Business in Tees Valley, and Boho One in Middlesbrough.

The funds to support it will come from regional development agencies and councils rather than central government.

Bradford tells me the “the parameters are set as widely as possible – being open to anyone from anywhere – with no obligation to remain in the region after the programme – we will, however, actively encourage them to remain in the region.”

The closing date is January 4, and you can apply here. Twitter feed is here.

Bootup Labs

After moving from the Valley, Vancouver-based entrepreneurs Boris Mann and Danny Robinson looked for a way to continue working with startups. The duo launched Bootup Labs to fix the Northern tech ecosystem and pass some of their lessons on to budding entrepreneurs. The group accepts 6 companies per program cycle for two annual cycles. Companies receive 8 months of mentorship, free office space, administrative/legal services and a $100,000 dollar covertible line of credit. In exchange for mentorship and funding, Bootup takes 5% equity from your company. If you choose to use the entire line of credit, they will receive an additional 10%. By attracting a star-studded cast of program mentors including Guy Kawasaki, NowPublic CEO Len Brody, and investor and writer Paul Kedrosky, Mann and Robinson ensure that their program's 12 annual spots are highly coveted.

Says Mann, "I asked Flickr founder Stewart Butterfield why he decided to stay in Vancouver and build his new startup Tiny Speck. He answered that he loves living here. Being a place where people love to live is hard to replicate. We have the nerds, we think it's easier for us to bring more nerds here because of immigration rules (vs. the US) AND because people love it. [We've got] mountains, ocean and it's one of the most livable cities in the world."

Bootup Labs' choices for its January cycle include event-based community Zedmo, lifestream aggregator Statusly, location-based gaming development service Compass Engine, relevancy-based web surfing aid ReadFu, online farmer's market Foodtree and enterprise storefront platform Blast Ramp.

Difference Engine

Launched this year by Jon Bradford, Difference Engine is based in the North East of England. The group offers applicants £20,000 pounds of investment capital and a 16 week program in business development in exchange for an 8% equity stake. As of January, Difference Engine will welcome 10 teams per cycle, with 2 program cycles per year.

When asked why Bradford believes his program can create the basis for a good tech community he replied, "The North East of England is home to The Sage Group - one of the largest software company in the UK.  As with many other parts of Europe it is not the lack of technical expertise but the lack of pre seed capital and support which reduces the opportunities for young entrepreneurs.  Whilst there is increasing activity with angel investors, it is still less mature that the US market...The Difference Engine provides mentors the opportunity to "get up close and personal" with teams over an extended period of time [and] mentors may ultimately invest in these businesses."

According to Bradford, one of the advantages of starting a company is Europe is the fact that developers learn to build platforms and businesses with multi-language capabilities. This attention to global markets places European and Asian companies at a potential advantage to their US-based competitors. Difference Engine's group's first intake will be in February 2010, to apply for the inaugural program entrepreneurs can submit ideas via the Difference Engine application form.