NewME PopUp Finds Some Great Entrepreneurs In Memphis

In February the NewME Accelerator announced a nationwide tour, a series of PopUp Accelerators. The program–which will visit 13 cities by the end of 2013–is sponsored by Google for Entrepreneurs.

Last weekend the PopUp Accelerator camped out in Memphis, TN. They ate a little BBQ, saw a little Beale Street, and met a lot of entrepreneurs.

And Memphis showed its best at the Sunday Demo Day. Whether they are testing for bacterial infections or selling wedding supplies, the founders were passionate and excited. Many of them already had traction and customers.

“There were so many great founders in Memphis that is was such a hard decision picking the winner . . . Additionally, the amount of talented entrepreneurs was exciting to witness, from non-profits to social enterprises to for-profit ventures we were impressed with the talent there and are looking forward to staying in close contact with them,” Angela Benton, CEO of NewME, said in an email.

So, who were those winners, and what did they win?

3rd place, with $22,000 in products and services, went to Brit Fitzpatrick of MentorMe.

2nd place, and $36,000 in products and services, went to Richard Billings of Screwpulp.

And 1st place went to Charleson S. Bell of BioNanovations. 1st prize was $46,000 in products and services and a spot in the August cohort of the full NewME Accelerator in California.

NewME focuses on accelerating businesses founded by minorities and women. Acceptance to the program doesn’t include seed funding, but participants have access to the vast network Benton and her team have cultivated. Besides Google, that network includes Ben Horowitz and several top-ranking Twitter employees. Utilizing this network, almost all of the companies in the last 4 cohorts have raised significant funding.

The PopUp Accelerator in Memphis was sponsored by Start Co and the FedEx Institute of Technology. Start Co also runs the local accelerator the Seed Hatchery, which most recently accelerated both MentorMe and Screwpulp.

“We were happy to partner with NewMe to bring their POPUP Accelerator in Memphis, TN. I was really impressed with all the entrepreneurs that pitched and we hope to work with them going forward at Start Co,” said Eric Mathews, founder and co-president of Start Co.

There’s always something unique about hosting people from out of town. When we look at our world through the eyes of a visitor, we begin to see things differently.

That’s exactly what happened with NewME in Memphis. Seeing the excitement of the NewME team re-energized Memphis founders and pulled the ecosystem a little closer together. New founders mingled with veterans, and everyone walked away with new ideas and new energy.

I also discovered some awesome startups. Look for coverage of those exciting companies in the coming weeks.

This huge conference for startups “everywhere else” is also in Memphis.

A Must Attend Conference For Startups Everywhere Else, Early Bird Discounts Going Away

The inaugural “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” was heralded by forbes.com as a “Must attend” This one of a kind conference caters to the collective trials, problems and victories unique to startups “everywhere else”, giving founders from anywhere USA access to the kind of conference that typically costs thousands of dollars to attend.

The first conference, held February 10-12th in Memphis Tennessee was attended by over 1200 attendees from 43 states, 7 countries and 3 continents with over 75 startups in the startup village from an equally large footprint across the country, and around the world. Attendees were treated to keynotes, workshops, networking, pitch contests and three great after party events.

On day one all of the attendees went together to the Memphis Grizzlies vs Minnesota Timberwolves game. The other, overflowing parties included one at the world famous Ernestine and Hazels (a brothel over 30 years ago) and Raiford’s a one of a kind discotech djed by an old man with a cape that brought the house down. Far and wide people are still talking about that party.

We’ve got some amazing things lined up for our next Memphis conference February 17-19 2014 and an even bigger announcement at the end of July (stay tuned).

We have longer sessions, even better content, catered breakfast and lunch sessions, learning sessions on marketing, branding, startup accounting and legal issues and much more. Mike Muhney the godfater of CRM and founder of ACT, Gary Swart, CEO of oDesk, Jonathon Perrelli, Danny Boice, several 500 Startups founders, YCombinator Founders and Techstars founders and many more have already committed to the next conference and we’ll have a bunch more announcements in the coming weeks.

With that in mind you want to act now and get your attendee tickets or startup village booth during the early bird discount period where you can get tickets to the next conference (and startup village booths) at the same rate as last year. Attendee discounted tickets are $59 and Startup Village booths (including 3 tickets) just $395. These discounts absolutely end July 6.

Startup Village booths get:

3 conference passes for your team. Exhibitors will have the same access as paid attendees to everything found here
Tickets to all of our after conference events
pitch contests
8×10 exhibit booth space
6 foot table
Description in our professionally printed program
Description on the everywhereelse.co website (startups will be posted starting October 15)
Early access on to set up and late access to take down
Yes you can purchase extra tickets for team members beyond the initial three tickets. Those “exhibitor guest” tickets are only $50
Can we sell stuff at our booth YES
Can we demo our app at our booth YES
Just so we’re clear if your team is 3 people or less, you DO NOT need to buy additional attendee tickets.
We do ask that your booth is manned by at least one human being from your team during all exhibition hours but feel free to rotate that human and enjoy the rest of the event.

Memphis Startup Xtrant Could Be The Tumblr of Project Management

At SXSW David Karp talked about his motivation for building Tumblr.

I tried all of the great tools that were around at the time—WordPress, Blogger—and obviously all the specialized tools—Flickr for photos and YouTube for videos—and I kept falling down. I was perfectly happy with all these tools but at the same time, constantly frustrated by the limitations imposed by all of them.

So, with that love/hate thing going on, Karp set out to iterate on the “tumblelog,” and turned it into a business worth $1.1 billion dollars (at least to Yahoo).

The guys behind project management company Xtrant feel the same way. Email, Dropbox, and chat all have their good parts, but they also all have frustrating limitations. (Missing email thread, anyone?)

Back in February, before I joined the Nibletz team, I helped a friend get ready to show her startup in everywhereelse.co’s Startup Village. In the months leading up to the conference, we used the soft launch version of Xtrant to keep our team organized and on task.

That version worked really well for us. My friend was able to upload diagrams of the booth, logos she had designed, and schedules of our milestones. We kept a running conversation on the project page, as well as a calendar for all our meetings. It was far better than 50 emails for each task.

Over the last few months, though, Xtrant has rolled out several new features that make the experience even better.

Person status–Now users can see someone’s contact info and when they last visited the project page.
Pending/Send Reminder & Invite Permissions–You can see if someone hasn’t accepted the invite to a project yet and send them an email reminder. You can also allow other users to invite their team members.
Email Notifications–This is probably the biggest change to date, and one that is a huge win for UX. Previously the emails simply noted that the project had been changed. So, you had to click over, sign in, and find out if the change involved you or not. Now the emails are well-designed, with a brief rundown of the actions taken. Of course, you still click over to the page if you need to be involved, but if the changes don’t concern you, you can keep moving.
Coming soon: iOS and Android apps

Like Tumblr, Xtrant is iterating on many other project management systems. By making themselves both a “social media for work” and a “project/task management” platform, they are also streamlining the work experience, getting rid of a lot of the clunky-ness we deal with every day. With these new features, they could be poised to live up to their promise.

Sign your team up for Xtrant and keep an eye out for mobile apps this summer.

StartCo & FedEx Institute Of Technology Bringing NewMe To Memphis, Discount Codes Available

The NewMe accelerator program is a critically acclaimed accelerator in San Francisco that specifically targets women and minority startups and founders. They launched their Silicon Valley program in June of 2011, and recently announced an abbreviated “pop up” accelerator tour, coming to cities across the country.

The NewMe pop accelerator will make it’s way to Memphis June 28-30 and be housed at the FedEx Institue of Technology, on the campus of the University of Memphis.

The three-night event June 28-30 features one-on-one coaching from NewME experts, a two-part workshop titled “The Art of the Pitch” that will provide the secrets to a perfect pitch and standing out among other founders. The weekend culminates with “Demo Day,” a night where startups will network with key players in Memphis’ tech scene, special guests from Silicon Valley, and ultimately pitch their idea to a panel of judges that consists of local and Silicon Valley investors.

They’ve already held the pop up program in Miami and Washington DC. In fact, Zoobean, the Washington DC pop up winner, has closed a $500,000 seed round led by Mitch Kapor.

In addition to Memphis Tennessee, the NewMe Popup accelerator will also be held in Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, Durham, Austin, New York, Kansas City, Los Angeles and Oakland.

Participants in the NewMe popup accelerator in Memphis, or on any other city stop will get one-on-one coaching from Silicon Valley business leaders, hands on workshops, and the opportunity to pitch their idea to local and Valley-based investors with the chance to win $45,000 worth of prizes from our sponsors and the opportunity to participate in the NewME Accelerator in San Francisco.

“We’re excited about NewME’s mission and the important work they are doing to accelerate entrepreneurs across the country. Our mission with Google for Entrepreneurs is to grow entrepreneurial communities and equip them with the resources and technology they need to tackle big ideas and build amazing companies,” said Mary Grove, Director of Global Entrepreneurship Outreach at Google one of the key sponsors for the NewMe Accelerator. “We’re truly excited to be teaming up with NewME to bring this series to Memphis and can’t wait to see the big ideas that come from the teams here.”

Start Co. is eager to welcome NewME to Memphis. “We’re excited that Memphis was selected for this exclusive opportunity,” said co-president and CEO Eric Mathews. “It’s a privilege to participate as their local community partner.”

Find out more and register here for the NewMe popup accelerator in Memphis.

Use discount code MEMPHISEDU for huge discount

Are you working on your pitch deck? Check out this Pop!

Creative Marketing in the Ubiquitous World of Advertising For Startups

Sometimes companies get ideas; good ideas. They discover ideas about who they are, what they want to accomplish in the world, and how they can solve some problem that no one has found the answer to just yet. The issue is, they aren’t the only ones. That’s where advertising comes in.

Advertising takes on many forms and uses many media. But, it always has the simple objective to communicate, capture, compel, and move audiences to action. In the past, this translated to the purchase of a product/service. Today, marketing specialists extend that definition to an ongoing engagement with their brand through social media, subscriptions, or online sharing.

Each of us knows the plethora of advertisements that plague our home pages, browsers and selected blogs, and how agencies spend insurmountable funds to market to users everywhere. With this onslaught of advertisements, companies must carefully decide how they are going to meet audiences in memorable and lasting ways that make them stand apart from their competitors. Retention and engagement have always been the major goals of advertising; but with the persistence of ads into every level of the lives of consumers via television, social media, and innumerable web pages, companies now find themselves in a world in which they must consistently re-evaluate how to accomplish those objectives. One way that organizations solve this problem is through the incorporation of creative and non-traditional mediums into their marketing, like animation.

Jon Collins of the VFX studio Framestore recently said in an interview: “If you can keep a viewer in a world and stimulate those senses, they will not only engage more deeply with your brand, but their recollection of that positive experience will sustain for far longer.”

However, there is a danger in creating a world that is overly stimulating to the viewer, because they end up rejecting that vibrancy in an effort to maintain a kind of visual homeostasis. Advertisements must also be tempered with a strong and carefully crafted design that appeals to people’s sense of balance, color schemes, character associations, etc, without turning them off to your brand.

While there is no scientific formula for accomplishing this task, creative specialists use techniques like focusing on one subject while blurring out the background, using particular color patterns, or utilizing symmetry to balance out an environment. The reason for this meticulous approach to curating content for viewers is the same reason that athletes train for months on end for a brief moment in the spotlight. Sometimes a brand has only one opportunity to interact with an audience member and communicate what it is and why it is worthy of their attention. And audiences are a fickle sort. With the accessibility to perhaps hundreds of alternative products or services, brands must make that one interaction a meaningful one that the viewer will remember long after the video has ended.

Part of why we gravitate towards animation as a medium is because you have the ability to communicate something as complex as sustainable business practices or a commitment to ethical animal treatment (as FedEx and Chipotle both did this past year) through imagined worlds and characters that take the viewer into a beautifully crafted narrative. While you can control things like lighting, environment, and subjects while shooting in video to a certain degree, animation can create worlds and characters beyond what is only in front of us. This allows us to control things like lighting, texture, movement, and time that we would not have as much control over if we filmed subjects through a camera. All in all, video and animation are not in competition with one another, for both are tools to be utilized for the creative dissemination of messages.

At the core of who we are as human beings is the desire for meaning and significance. Advertisers try to cultivate that kind of experience in a brief interaction that connects audiences with a brand that will last long after the meeting has ended. While the time and effort that companies spend towards this endeavor is great, the hard sought after relationship with the customer is truly the golden egg.

Check out Prodigi Arts at prodigiarts.com

If you’re serious about email ditch Mailbox for this Austin startup today.

The Case For Remote Work

Some of the best companies in the world, including Github, 37Signals, and Automattic, allow their employees to work from home. It’s pretty surprising to us that so few startups follow their lead. We’re a small organization ourselves (only two full-time employees), but we don’t require each other to be on site. We live in the same city, and we go to the office often enough, but there’s absolutely no obligation that we do so. It works for us. If Brad really needs to concentrate on something, he’ll stay home (or ask me to), put on the headphones, and get to work. I do the same thing. We’re actually sometimes more productive when we’re distributed.

We thought we’d share some early stats from our anonymous job matching service to help make the case for remote work as a viable and even potentially superior alternative to on site work. Since we’re not in Silicon Valley ourselves, perhaps we have a unique perspective that can be hard to see from the inside looking out. Either way, our hope is that our conclusions will convince your team to at least consider making remote work an option.

(Shameless Plug Warning) If, by chance, you do come to that conclusion, be sure to let us know. We’d be more than happy to help you fill out your team with amazing people. You can learn more about our service here. Oh, and developers can see the FAQ (and sign up) here.

Shocker No. 1: Not all great developers want to be in Silicon Valley (or other tech hubs).

There is a “talent war” in Silicon Valley right now. Have you heard about it? Some of the side effects have been quite amazing. Aqui-hire has become a word most of us understand, developer salaries are higher than they’ve ever been, and perks and benefits offered by Silicon Valley startups are unheard of elsewhere. Another side effect is that, increasingly, developers are being lured to the valley from elsewhere. Several of the best from our hometown of Memphis have moved to San Francisco over the last couple years, and the same can be said of just about every larger southern or mid-western city in the US.

Still, for some, Silicon Valley is a difficult place to be. There are a large number of individuals who, for family or other reasons, simply can’t make the move. There are even more who choose not to. This is especially true for families. According to Wolfram Alpha, you’d need to almost double (1.9x) your Memphis salary to live similarly in San Francisco (source). That may be possible for a developer moving to the area, but can the same be said for a spouse in a different field? Silicon Valley is an amazing place for a 20-something single person. Perhaps not so much for a 30-something with a young family.

Memphis to San Francisco Wage Comparison

Shocker No. 2: Not all great developers are IN Silicon Valley.

So far, nearly 200 developers have signed up for our anonymous job matching service. A fair number are in Silicon Valley and other tech hubs (primarily NY), but certainly not the majority. We use their Work for Pie scores as an approximate measure of coding chops. The score is primarily based on open source contributions and is far from perfect, but it’s better than most of the other options out there, so for now we’ll go with it.

When they sign up, we ask developers a series of questions in order to better understand what they care about and what kind of career options they’d like to entertain. We ask them if they’d prefer to work remotely, and we also ask how important their answer is, relative to their other preferences.

The average Work for Pie score for the entire community* (thousands of developers) is 38.2. Our community boasts some of the very best and most prolific open source contributors from all over the world. WFP scores in the mid-twenties and up represent significant meaningful participation in communities like Github, Bitbucket, Stack Overflow, and (to a much lesser extent) Hacker News.

Now, the average WFP score of the nearly 200 developers who have opted in to our job matching service is 37.4 with a range from 1 to 93. That’s a bit lower than the community as a whole, but probably statistically insignificant. The average WFP score of those individuals who highly prefer remote work is 37.3, so almost the same, with a range from 1 to 86. There are clearly quite a few highly skilled developers who prefer a distributed team. Finally, the average WFP score of those individuals not in Silicon Valley and to whom relocation is not an option is 41.8, with a range from 1 to 93. Clearly, there are some excellent developers who aren’t in Silicon Valley.

The whole point of this exercise isn’t to say that developers outside of Silicon Valley are better than developers who live there. That’s ridiculous and undoubtedly false. The point of this exercise is to say that there are a lot of really great developers who live outside the Valley and don’t have any desire to be there. If your goal is to build an amazing team, it might be worth your time to look elsewhere.

Shocker No. 3: The economics of remote work make it a huge win.

We ask our job seekers their desired salary, and the illogical but not surprising truth is that most list desired salary as some function of their current salary. If they’re in TN, where average salary tops out at maybe $100k, they’ll often list something in that range. If they’re in San Francisco, where average salary is considerably higher, the desired salary follows suit.

The point is this: most people know that locating from most any place to San Francisco is going to require a huge pay boost for the economics to make sense. Someone making $100k in Memphis would need to make $190k in SF to live the same way. That fact alone convinces many to remove SF from the list of cities to consider, no matter the salary. But, a Silicon Valley salary level is pretty unheard of here in Memphis. Offer that kind of money to almost anyone here, and the chances that you’ll lure them away from whatever they’re doing now are fairly high. Throw in the fact that you’ll save money on space and catered lunches and all the other Silicon Valley perks and the economics make even more sense. Money isn’t everything, but a pay boost of $20k or more is enough to make a majority of folks at least hear you out. We’ve seen it happen time and again with many an awesome developer who can’t or won’t relocate.

Github, from what I can tell, uses this exact strategy to great effect. Find the top Rails developer in nearly every small city in the US, and the chances that he or she works for Github are pretty darn high. There is a lot of talk about great developers being 10x more productive than just average ones. I’m not sure I buy all that, but it definitely helps to have a great team. Isn’t the chance at hiring someone great worth some of the inconveniences (of which there are few) of a distributed team? Github thinks so.

Remote work is not for everyone. There are several studies that show that on site teams are more productive than distributed teams. But, if you have the chance to hire an amazing developer in Kansas for the same price as an average one in Silicon Valley, doesn’t the extra productivity from that hire make up for the potential drop due to having a distributed team? Our argument is that yes, it does. It should be something your team considers. If you’re struggling to hire, or if you can’t pay market rates with your seed money, or if you care more about building an amazing team than about having them on site, then it’s something you should consider. It’s easier than ever these days.

What do you think? Leave your comments below and check out workforpie here.

Now read: No You’re Not Better Than Silicon Valley: How To Support Your Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

No You’re Not Better Than Silicon Valley: How To Support Your Entrepreneurial EcoSystem

Cliff McKinney is the CEO and cofounder of WorkForPie and a community leader in the Memphis startup community. This post, which also appears on his personal Tumblr, can easily be applied to any town, any city, everywhere else.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Memphis lately. Where it is, where it’s been, and where it might go. What I think should be done to grow the entrepreneurial ecosystem here is perhaps a post for another day. Today though I thought I’d share a few words about how to support an entrepreneurial ecosystem. No doubt this applies in Memphis, but I’ll try to leave it general enough to apply to most any growing ecosystem. I’ll try to limit things to five general themes:

Theme One: Be Successful

Brad (my cofounder) and I talk a lot about how we might help Memphis. We do a lot of small things that we hope add up. We both serve as mentors to local entrepreneurs and lead user groups, but we always come back to the same general idea: the best thing we can do for Memphis is to become wildly successful. Doing that will bring in more investors and more interest, more jobs, and even a couple new angel investors. This goal trumps all the others, as it should. If our efforts to be successful leave us no time for all of the other stuff, then so be it.

This should be paramount for you and your company too. If you have to move to be successful, then move (but come back and invest later). If you have to put another company out of business to be successful, then do it. If taking advantage of some opportunity means others won’t have the chance, that’s okay too. It’s okay to be competitive. It’s okay to want to be better than the next guy. The success of your company is what matters most. Never forget that.

Theme Two: Give Time

I’d love to give money to my local ecosystem, but as a poor entrepreneur I just can’t afford it. What I can afford is my time, and I’d like to think that in some ways that is more valuable to local entrepreneurs. My office is always open, and my phone is always on, and I’m happy to give local entrepreneurs an earful (and often more than they bargained for) anytime they ask. Brad leads the local Python user group, and I lead the local Startup Meetup. It’s something we both do for fun, but we also do it because we feel obligated to give back to a community that has given us a bunch and that continues to support us.

Giving your time means a lot to local entrepreneurs—especially those who are just starting out. You don’t have to lead a startup meetup. Just make it a priority to attend once a month. Email startup CEOs and offer your help. It only takes a little while, and the good karma you’ll earn is totally worth it. Do what you can. Every little bit counts, and giving something, no matter how little, is always better than giving nothing.

Theme Three: Be Honest In Your Support

So here comes the first controversial part of this post. Truth is, I don’t think supporting local startups means blowing smoke up their asses. I’m a big fan of honesty, and if a local company has a terrible business model or distribution model or team then the fact that they’re local shouldn’t preclude you from saying so. In fact, I think you’re more obligated to say something if they’re local. It’s what I give, and it’s what I expect from the people I really respect.

I gave a little talk during the Seed Hatchery demo day last year. I won’t bore you with the details, but the general theme was that the companies at Demo Day weren’t competing with Memphis companies, or even Tennessee companies. They were competing with every company everywhere. If we didn’t treat them accordingly, then we were doing them a disservice. I’m hard on the local companies I mentor. I don’t call them out publicly, but in private I do as much as I can to convince them that this isn’t a mutual admiration society. You can’t build an ecosystem by calling a local company awesome when it’s clear to everyone else that it’s not. It just doesn’t work that way.

Theme Four: Pay and Get Paid

One of the biggest mistakes I’ve made as a founder was thinking that someone deserves some kind of discount or special recognition because he or she is a friend. That should never be the case. If a local company does awesome work and they charge companies $150/hr for it, then I expect to pay $150/hr. I honestly don’t care if the company is in Memphis or even if it’s run by my mother or my spouse. If the service is valuable to me, I expect to pay for it. If it’s not, and the company happens to be local, then I’ll take the time to tell them why, and if they correct the issue, I’ll pay for their service then.

Now (but not always) I feel the same way about the services I provide. I trade value for value. I have something valuable, and I expect companies to pay for it. It’s nothing personal, it’s just business. The only time we consider offering some discount for our services is when working with some company at a discounted rate is somehow highly valuable to us through the association. Despite the fact that they have millions more dollars than all of my local startups combined, I’m more likely to work with some company like Facebook at a discount than I am to discount our rate for a local company. I want to establish my value, and one of the most important places to do that is in my own hometown.

Theme Five: Talking Shit Hurts You More

It’s important to be proud of your city. The best way to show that pride is to talk about all the wonderful things your city is doing to support entrepreneurship. The worst way is to talk trash about other cities or other ecosystems. I’ve heard people say things along the lines of “our city is better than Silicon Valley because….” When I hear that, I almost immediately assume the person saying it is an idiot. Your city is not better than Silicon Valley. That’s why you’re comparing it to Silicon Valley. If your city was better than Silicon Valley, in any way whatsoever, then they would be comparing themselves to you. Honestly, the same goes for any criticism of another ecosystem. If you’re talking shit about them, then you’re wasting time you could be spending making your city better.

On the other hand, I happen to think that it’s completely okay to criticize your own ecosystem, and even startups or leaders within it. But, if you do, make sure you’re actually talking directly to the person or company in question. If they can’t take it then they probably need to hear it even more. And nothing sucks worse than hearing criticism secondhand. I’ve had more than my fair share of secondhand criticism and it sucks way worse than hearing it from the source.

See this guest post by McKinney’s co-founder Brad Montgomery, on “Minimum Working Thing”

Carlton Crothers Named President/CEO At EmergeMemphis

EmergeMemphis, the incubator and technology hub in downtown Memphis, has named Carlton Crothers as the new President and CEO. Crothers has 14 years experience in cultivating, developing, and bringing early stage technologies to market.

Most recently Crothers was a Principal at Innovation Ecosystem Design based in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. According to his LinkedIn profile, the private company provides successful innovation ecosystem solutions. Before Texas, Crothers was the CEO of Technology Incubation and Acceleration as part of the Michigan Tech Enterprise Corporation (MTEC SmartZone).

In his position in Michigan, Crothers oversaw 54,000 square feet of office space housing 19 companies with over 170 employees. Those companies created over 500 spinoff jobs with $68.3 million invested in a rural community of 12,000.

“Our organization’s mission is to provide value-added services to our members that will positively impact their growth, accelerate the successful development of member companies, springboard high technology education programs, and recruit new companies and talent to Memphis,” Scott Fountain, chairman of EmergeMemphis and senior Vice President/Chief Development Officer of Baptist Memorial Health Care, said in a press release. “Our board is thrilled to attract Carlton to Memphis, especially given his proven track record of job creation.”

“The measurable goals of EmergeMemphis generate wealth and economic stimulus into the Mid-South economy,” Steve Bares President and Executive Director of Memphis Bioworks said in a statement. “In addition, they seek to assist emerging businesses that are not residents in the building through our many programs aimed at assisting entrepreneurs succeed.”

Eric Mathews, Co-President at Start Co, who also served as the most recent Interim Director at EmergeMemphis, said, ” I am excited in welcoming Crothers to our growing Memphis entrepreneurial ecosystem. With EmergeMemphis, Bioworks, and Start Co operating on all cylinders, Memphis will grow its leadership role in technology, entrepreneurship, and job growth across the southeast”

Mathews’ organization, Launch Your City (recently renamed Start Co), “graduated” out of the EmergeMemphis incubator earlier this year.

EmergeMemphis is a business and technology incubator with the goal of helping high-growth start-ups and early stage companies become self-sustaining. They do this by strategically aligning entrepreneurs with various resources, a compelling environment, and mentors that help ensure the success of the participating companies. Emerge operates as a 501-c-3, but plays a unique and critical roll bridging the public and private sectors. EmergeMemphis was formed in 2001 and serves as an incubator for high-growth companies. While this often means technology-based business models, Emerge also seeks companies across a wide range of industries and models. Their renovated, historic property in downtown Memphis includes 35,000 square feet of tenant space. Today, 37 companies as well as FedEx’s Innovation Lab, are residents at Emerge.

Memphis startup organization, Launch Your City,rebrands as Start Co

Start Co Is Bringing NewMe Accelerator Tour To Memphis June 28-30

The NewMe pop accelerator will make it’s way to Memphis June 28-30 and be housed at the FedEx Institue of Technology, on the campus of the University of Memphis.

They’ve already held the pop up program in Miami and Washington DC. In fact, Zoobean, the Washington DC pop up winner, has closed a $500,000 seed round led by Mitch Kapor.

In addition to Memphis Tennessee, the NewMe Popup accelerator will also be held in Detroit, Chicago, Atlanta, Durham, Austin, New York, Kansas City, Los Angeles and Oakland.

You can apply and find out more about NewMe here and Start Co here.

Are you working on your pitch deck? Check out this Pop!

Memphis’ Startup WorkForPie Selected For Southland For Kufikia

Cliff McKinney and Brad Montgomery, the Memphis based startup team behind WorkForPie have been working on a new product called Kufikia for the past few months. McKinney explained to nibletz that Kufikia loosely means “to achieve” with that they have come up with a learning platform for advanced software developers.

With a new innovative approach, combining cohort based learning, typically found in an accelerator program, with mentoring, and early stage job placement, they were able to get selected as one of the first 20 startups in the Startup Village at the Southland conference in Nashville Tennessee next month. We revealed the entire list of 20 startups earlier today.

Kufikia participants will get the “3 S’s” out of the program according to McKinney. Those three S’s are; structure (a 9 week long curriculum), study buddies (cohorts of 10 students going through the program together), and support coming from the platforms sponsors. Each cohort will have three company sponsors that will alternate in three week intervals throughout the course of the program.

McKinney and Montgomery plan on starting the first cohort in late June. For the first program they are targeting participants in Silicon Valley, the Pacific Northwest, New York and Nashville. Actually four cohorts will run simultaneously. Although this is an online program they want the students and company resources to be in close proximity to each other.

Kufikia has already attracted some heavyweight sponsors for their platform, which they aren’t identifying just yet.

The sponsors will benefit by working closely with the students in the program and hopefully converting them to new employees. McKinney says that most companies spend upwards of $15,000 providing internships to potential employees that may not work out. By working with the students over the nine week period the company sponsors will develop relationships with them and hopefully hire them on.

The sponsors participating will have jobs to fill, and hopefully with those students. McKinney and Montgomery are making a bold bet on the success of the program. Sponsors are under an agreement to provide mentoring and coaching to the cohort but don’t make a financial commitment to Kufikia until they actually hire someone.

Both Montgomery and McKinney are looking forward to showing off this new product to the attendees at Southland including over 41 venture capital and angel firms that have committed to attend.

Find out more about Kufikia here.

Check out this awesome guest post by McKinney here: Are accelerators everywhere else better at producing groundbreaking innovation?

Memphis Animation Startup ProdigiArts To Partner With Nibletz Community

Prodigi Arts is an animation startup that works out of the same incubator that we work out of. While an animation studio may not be your typical high growth potential startup, as a technology company based in Memphis founder Chris O’Conner and all around jack of all trades and Public Relations Coordinator for the company Joshua Colfer, are running the company with the vigor of any startup.

They rely on the resources that other startups in Memphis rely on and they face many of the same issues tech startups face in a medium sized revitalizing market. As Colfer tells us below, O’Conner started Prodigi Arts as a side business or side startup and then made the decision to take the plunge and take the company full time.

Now both O’Conner and Colfer will contribute to the Nibletz community providing content based on their experiences as entrepreneurs, experience in technology and experience in technology. Prodigi Arts will contribute on a wide range of themes, from best practices for startups resorting to animation videos for telling their startup stories, to taking the plunge and pushing an idea forward.

Both O’Conner and Colfer are committed to the world of startups and animation. After just moving into the incubator they made it appoint to attend the first everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference and then sought out the nibletz team to share their thoughts. Colfer and O’Conner are joining an evergrowing stable of great people contributing to the nibletz community like Sarah Ware (co-founder and CEO of Markerly), Mike Muhney the godfather of CRM, and several members of the Young Entrepreneurs Council.

Below Colfer tells us a lot more about Prodigi Arts and just why they’re part of the nibletz, “everywhere else” community. If you want to take your animation project to the next level you can find out more about Prodigi Arts here at prodigiarts.com and you can email Josh directly at jcolfer@prodigiarts.com

Prodigi Arts is an animation studio that produces memorable and poignant multimedia productions used in advertising, commercials, product development, training videos.

Prodigi was founded in 2005 by Memphis native Chris O’ Conner. Steeped heavily in the arts world, Chris grew up sketching, singing, composing music and performing for audiences everywhere. After graduating from Middle Tennessee State University in 2006, Chris had the opportunity to continue his education in animation in Southern California, or return to Memphis to grow and cultivate Prodigi Arts. He chose to return to his hometown to work as a Marketing Representative for the Germantown Performing Arts Center from 2007 to 2010, and served as a Creative Consultant for the performing arts Group, Watoto De Africa as well. During this time, he also began fine tuning the business plan for Prodigi Arts and making connections in the area.

We are based in Memphis, TN.

The startup culture in Memphis can be likened to the AV kids in high school who find support and belonging in the dark confines of the technology room, who one day hope to join the society of filmmakers or special effects artists. Fortunately, startups in the Bluff City have the support of organizations like Launch Memphis, Emerge Memphis and the University of Memphis Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Since Memphis is a city that is not as quick to embrace innovation and technological advances, startups face some difficulty securing capital from investors willing to take risks on fresh ideas.

Prodigi Arts creates memorable, engaging and entertaining productions through the art of animation. Capturing the attention of audiences is a difficult endeavor for any company, small and big alike. We solve this problem by incorporating 2D & 3D animation, motion graphics, live action and video production into every project. We solve the problem of communicating complex ideas in a simple and concise manner for companies and organizations to tell their stories in the most understandable way possible.

A difficulty that we have faced is entering into the entrepreneurial process without investors or startup capital. Thus far, we have been able to subside entirely on revenue generated from client projects, with the intentions of holding private ownership over the company.

A recent stride that we have made as a company has been our Corporate Sponsorship of Leadership Memphis, which is shared by large entities like United Way and FedEx. In addition, we have signed a three year contract to create the animated and video productions for the CFO of the Year and Small Business Awards with Memphis Business Journal. In addition, Prodigi’s founder, Chris O’ Conner has spoken at numerous events about being a minority business owner, and was honored with the Innovator of the Year Award in Decemeber of 2012 at the “Agents of Change” Gala.

Within the next year, we hope to take on projects that will stretch our creative abilities as an animation studio and grow a more diverse portfolio that highlight different animation techniques. We also aim to become a staple animation company in the Memphis and Mid-South region within the next year that companies will go to when they seek animated commercials, instead of larger firms in the New York or Los Angeles area.

One of Chris’ mentors is a marketing professor at Middle Tennessee State University, who has helped him organize his business plan and strategize about how to market animation services to businesses in the area. Another is Dale Carnegie, author of the book “How to Win Friends and Influence People”. While no longer alive, Carnegie’s ideas about forming business relationships and working within the framework of others’ objectives is an imperative lesson for Prodigi as we seek to make connections with companies and grow our clientele base.

One of our advantages to being located in Memphis is that we are the only animation studio to occupy a niche that has previously gone unoccupied in the past. Being the only animation company, we can provide a creative service at a lower cost than the larger studios in New York or Los Angeles. However, the associations with animation have at times dissuaded businesses from using our services. More often than not, companies assume that we provide animation for children’s shows and cartoons, rather than for companies looking to tell their stories in creative ways. In Metropolitan areas, animation is used regularly in advertisements and commercials, and provides a memorable alternative to video production. Many businesses in Memphis have yet to think of these kinds of applications for animation, and still hold on to their assumptions of animation for children’s shows and cartoons. In essence, we are creating a market for animation.

At the moment we have just finished a live action animation project with Hnedak Bobo Group, and will be starting on the Small Business of the Year Awards with the Memphis Business Journal within a week. After that we have potential clients in mind that we will focus on reaching out to in hopes of partnering with them to bring their brands to life.

We can be found out at www.prodigiarts.com

Facbook

Twitter Name: prodigiarts1

Blog:

The Grizz N Grind Of The Grizzlies Spawn Startup Hoop City Memphis

Two Memphians who are fairly well known in the local Memphis community found common ground in a passion that the mostly blue collar city shares, the love of basketball. I must admit when Nibletz made the move to Memphis I had no idea how much Memphian’s loved the University of Memphis Tigers. Being from Baltimore and having lived in Auburn, the only Tigers I knew were of the blue and orange variety.

The Grizzlies on the other hand I knew. Baltimore’s native son, Rudy Gay, played for the Grizzlies his entire professional career until earlier this year when the Grizzlies traded him to the Toronto Raptors. Anyone from Baltimore or who lived in Baltimore in the early part of the 2000s knew that local Baltimore TV sportscasters had three segments, the Orioles, the Ravens and Rudy Gay. They tracked the high school standout right up to the point where he decided to commit to UConn instead of Maryland. With the stellar record of our closest team since the days of Wes Unsled and Manut Bol, (the Washington Wizards), it was no wonder I had turned to Memphis as my NBA team 6 years ago. So when the opportunity came to move to Memphis there was definitely Grizz appeal. I quickly became a season ticket holder.

What I witnessed first hand through the best and worst of games throughout the 2012-2013 season in person, was nothing less than remarkable. The way Memphis and Memphians come together to support their college and NBA basketball teams is nothing short of remarkable. It reminded me of the days that an AHL, not NHL team, the Baltimore SkipJacks, united Charm City.

Memphis is a town that was built on entrepreneurship, it’s just skipped a few decades recently. Household names like Fedex, Holiday Inn and Autozone found their roots in the Bluff City. The cotton trade, and water to rail transportation were staples in Memphis for hundreds of years. As of late though, the city shows signs of trying times, scars as the team from Hoop City Memphis puts it.

“We may live in an era of plastic surgery, but Memphis wears it’s scars for all to see. They are scars from our history, a darkened past many would like to forget. But all of it has made us what we are as Memphian’s. Getting here wasn’t easy, and there’s still a long way to go, but while we can, let’s pause for a moment and think about how unique Memphis is.” Hoop City Memphis writes on their website.

The t-shirt company is the brain child of two friends, a marketer, Leslie Skelton and a designer Ian Lemmonds. Both, who wear their grit n grind proudly. Skelton grew up in the Memphis area no stranger to a city who’s outskirts are crime ridden (downtown on the other hand is the safest district in Memphis), and no stranger to the businesses that left in droves through the 90’s.

Lemmonds on the other hand grew up in a family of 5 siblings on the brink of poverty. Escape for Lemmonds was found in art, skateboarding and ice hockey.

The two met at Mouse Foundry, an interactive agency in Memphis. Later, both ended up working for two different local papers. Lemmonds is a UX Designer at the local daily and Skelton is now working for one of the areas largest agencies. On the side though they created Hoop City Memphis. They weren’t’ looking to get rich, and they certainly couldn’t predict that the Memphis Grizzlies would be the favorite for many national sports publications, to win the 2013 NBA championship. Hoop City Memphis actually had more Tiger inspired t-shirts than Grizzlies.

Hoop City Memphis is a company that’s more about culture, and uniting a community through the commonality of basketball. “Nothing brings Memphis together like basketball” Skelton told us in a phone interview Monday.

The designs are all creations that Skelton gives most of the credit to Lemmonds for coming up with. While some may be a spin on something familiar they are all original. Memphians wear Hoop City Memphis gear more as a badge of honor, to “rep their city”.

Over the past few weeks, since the Memphis Grizzlies made the pages of the national papers, people have been talking about Memphis’ grit and grind. Many articles we’ve read on the big sites like SBNation, Yahoo Sports, Sports Illustrated and ESPN have talked about this underlying theme in Memphis. On the Hoop City Memphis site, both Lemmonds and Skelton nail that theme on the head. Memphis is a city that’s breaking out of it’s “low self esteem”. That idea can be seen everywhere in the Bluff City. From entrepreneurship on the rise, to the hundreds of thousands that partake in Memphis in May, to the Memphis Grizzlies.

Hoop City Memphis offers shirts that celebrate Memphis. Sure there are shirts that celebrate the Tigers and the Grizzlies but one of their favorites is one that says 38103 which is the zipcode for downtown Memphis. A few of the others deal with “grinding” a theme that Memphis is beginning to embrace, but it didn’t start in Memphis.

Lemmonds explains: “I’m actually a big hockey fan, and a lot of people don’t know, but the notion of a “grinding” team comes from hockey. It’s the idea of just to keep working hard, and eventually an opponent will give in. In the late 90′s the Toronto Maple Leaf’s were constantly called a “grinding” team. The idea of “grinding” is something Memphis needs to embrace in many areas when we compete against other cities – not just in sports, but in education, economic development, entreprenuership, etc. You may not realize it, but Memphis is competing against other cities in ways that are much bigger than sports…”

That was where Lemmonds came up with “Memphis Where Everywhereelse.co Comes To Grind” for the t-shirts given away at the inaugural everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference.

One of Memphis’ biggest industries these days is tourism. With that there are several companies that make t-shirts about Memphis. Skelton and Lemmonds are making t-shirts for Memphians that Memphians are proud to wear and can be found on any nationally televised Grizzlies game spread out in the crowd.

Skelton admitted though, that it’s nice that they are getting orders lately from all over the world. “Sure we have our site optimized but people come to Hoopcitymemphis.com and really like our designs.”

Hoop City Memphis has done such a good job they’ve garnered the attention of a copycat who uses the name “hoop city” which is actually a trademark of the NCAA. The copy cat has actually used property of the Grizzlies by marketing t-shirts with their team name and players faces on them. Imitation is of course the best form of flattery.

I learned about the copycat on Friday night at the Memphis BBQ festival when Memphis Grizzlies DJ Justin Baker, told me the shirt I had just been given that said “Whoop That Trick” on it, was actually from the fake Hoop City company.

As the Memphis Grizzlies continue to make franchise history, you can check out Hoop City Memphis’ shirts here and order some for yourself. For the locals the duo will have a pop up shop at South Of Beale on Main Street this Saturday before game three of the Western Conference Finals.

Grizzlies are all in with entrepreneurship and startups.

Want to see what Memphis is all about, come to this:

Memphis Seed Hatchery Investor Day Draws Global Audience

On Thursday in a swank movie theater in Memphis’ revitalized midtown district, six startups presented their companies to a theater that was literally, standing room only by the beginning of the pitches.

BetterFed (farm to consumer), MentorMe (e-harmony for mentors), Soundstache (a fan engagement platform for bands), Boosterville (a huge disruption in fundraising), Musistic (Github for musicians) and ScrewPulp (a better way to self publish), took the stage for 12 minute investor pitches after concluding the three month Seed Hatchery accelerator program.

Investors and spectators from Mississippi, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee and as far away as Singapore and Silicon Valley were in attendance to take in the pitches.

Mara Lewis, a San Francisco based entrepreneur and founder of stopped.at, was in attendance for the Seed Hatchery festivities which included an after party at the world famous Memphis BBQ competition. Lewis, who’s pitched in front of plenty of crowds said that this group at Seed Hatchery was one of the best groups she’s seen. Lewis is currently working with Start Co’s co-President’s Andre Fowlkes and Eric Mathews on their upcoming Upstart women’s startup accelerator.

After playing host to a group of Memphis entrepreneurs (including myself) in Silicon Valley in March, Kuji Chahal of Fisher Investments made the cross country trek to hear the pitches from the Seed Hatchery cohort. Chahal stuck around throughout the festivities to talk with all of the new entrepreneurs.

Andre Mouton, an investor from Singapore has been ecstatic about Memphis’ entrepreneurship. He made a trip to Memphis in February which included visits to Launch Memphis, Bioworks and everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference. Mouton took meetings with entrepreneurs all weekend long at the BBQ Festival and over at the Peabody Hotel. Mouton told us that he was impressed at how hard everyone was working in Memphis, that my friend is the Grit N Grind.

Vic Gatto, a Managing Partner at Solidus, the investment firm that seeds the Seed Hatchery class along with Jump Start Foundry in Nashville, made it a point to call out investors in the room with a call to action to talk with the entrepreneurs, and see that all six businesses have a good chance of survival. Gatto’s partner Townes Duncan, along with his son Walker Duncan, co-founder and Editor in Chief at southernalpha also made it down from Nashville. The younger Duncan was returning from an event in Atlanta. Obviously the Grit N Grind of Memphis is expanding state wide.

Both Fowlkes and Mathews were quick to point out that Investor Day isn’t the conclusion of the Seed Hatchery program but rather the beginning. They recently added Rhodes graduate, Hillary Quirk, to the Start Co team as Community Manager. In her new role Quirk is forming an alumni association for Memphis’ accelerators which include the two cohorts at ZeroTo510.

You can find out more at neverstop.co and at their old site launchyourcity.com

See all the pitch videos from Seed Hatchery’s investor day here at nibletz.com The Voice Of Startups Everywhere Else.

Memphis’ Bad Ass Startup Chick Brittany Fitzpatrick Pitches MentorMe

The day of reckoning is upon us and it appears that Bad Ass Startup Chick Brittany Fitzpatrick’s nerves have calmed a bit. After working tirelessly on a startup she originally pitched at the women’s 48 hour launch in Decemeber, Fitzpatrick is ready to show the world her answer to many of mentoring’s problems.

Community service and helping people have been what Brittany Fitzpatrick’s life’s work have been about. But what makes this Memphian even more amazing is that she left a position with one of the most prestigious, well known brands in the non-profit space, Ronald McDonald House Charities, to start something of her own, again in community service.

As the communications coordinator for Ronald McDonald House Charities of Memphis, Brittany took the passion and drive she’s had since high school and through college at Howard University and Memphis University, and combined it with the tools available in recent day to double the groups social media reach. Ronald McDonald House Charities of Memphis works with the most well known children’s research facility in the world, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Over the last six years, Brittany has been a mentor and helped other mentor’s in a variety of programs. Through her work with Ronald McDonald House Charities and other stops along the way, she found that mentorship was a great thing, but flawed in many ways.

When she first pitched the idea for her startup “Mentor Me” back in December at a women focused 48 Hour Launch, she revealed that most mentor orgranizations spend more money re-placing mentors and mentees than they do setting up original pairs. Brittanny quickly realized if someone could fix the initial matching proces than these programs could focus on their original goals and save a lot of money.

That’s where her startup Mentor Me comes in. Mentor Me is a mentor and mentee online matching service that uses a variety of information given from both parties and an algorithm to make more successful matches. While Brittany is hesitant about using the verbage “e-harmony for mentor”, at the core that’s what it is and that’s why it’s going to be so successful.

But the biggest factor in the success of Mentor Me is going to be a combination of the technology and the founder. Brittany is a dynamic young woman. Back in December, the prize for the 48 Hour Launch competition was a startup village booth at everywherelse.co. When Brittany came in second place she decided to crowdfund the people in the audience so that she too could have a booth for her startup. Within minutes her mission was successful.

After working for three months in the Seed Hatchery startup accelerator, Fitzpatrick unveiled MentorMe to the public at large Thursday in Memphis. Check out her pitch below:

Find out more about Mentor me here at getmentorme.com