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Accelerators Everywhere Else Are Still Great For Startups

After Thanksgiving many startup and tech sites feverishly began telling the story of doom and gloom for startups, follow on funding and startup accelerators.

This vicious news cycle began with the Dow Jones VC Edge report released at the end of November. The report highlighted many positive things, including growth for some key areas in high growth potential tech sectors both here and abroad. Fred Wilson, the principal at Union Square Ventures and a respected authority in the startup and VC space, was quick to point out that VC funding for consumer web and mobile companies was down 42% in the first 9 months of 2012.

The Dow Jones report coupled with Wilson’s commentary sent a tremor through Silicon Valley that we could be on the cusp of a bubble.

While startups and high growth potential technology companies are contributing to job growth, what’s not being considered is the fact that his down turn in VC funding may actually be more of a leveling off.

The same week the Dow Jones report and the Wilson piece came out, Paul Graham, founder of YCombinator sent out more troubling news. Again, interpreted at some of the startup and tech sites as bad news.

Graham had explained how the next cohort of YCombinator companies would receive less funding. The very next day Graham again took to the YCombinator blog to let everyone know that the class size was shrinking as well.

For a startup accepted into the program it instantly meant prestige and validation, not to mention a huge six figure seed investment. Reading the news from Graham made people all around start doubting the accelerator model. PandoDaily quickly opined. Erin Griffith, a writer for Pando Daily, said “We know accelerators are headed for a shakeout- but do they“? Griffith pointed out that there were over 100 startup accelerators across the country churning out thousands of startups with only a 10% success rate.

But what’s really happening in accelerators and across the startup space, is that people are getting more conservative in the valley because they’re used to a culture of ginormous funding rounds and even bigger exits. Everyone knows the story about Color. Everyone’s also seen the value of the Instagram Facebook deal diminish as Facebook’s stock went down hill fast. Truth be told, even after the $1 billion dollar Facebook deal, Instagram still had less than 25 employees when they moved into Facebook’s offices back in September.

That billion dollars really produced a lot of jobs right? Consider the fact that the $1 billion dollar Instagram Valuation was more than the New York Times is currently worth and they employ over 10,000 people.

The real question about accelerators is really about whether the goal behind an accelerator is to help yield larger than life venture investments or is it about building companies with solid foundations and solid founders. It is about the cash or the wave of now more educated entrepreneurs who may not get their first startup entirely off the ground but may hit a home run or even just a double in the next go round?

It seems accelerators with the real goal of producing these crazy funding rounds and crazy exits are no better than public schools who are just teaching whatever standardized test it is to graduate the next class.

The beauty about accelerator programs “everywhere else” is that the startups in the programs are being taught important lessons about starting up, business and even life.

It’s awesome that YCombinator and TechStars have mentor networks that read like a “Who’s Who” in the startup and tech world. Every startup founder wants to learn from these great mentors, and they can, sometimes even in small towns. Take Oklahoma City’s Blueprint For Business accelerator. They all got a chance to learn from a day with Brad Feld.

Perusing the websites of startup accelerators outside the valley (everywhere else) you don’t typically find a “who’s who” of the startup and tech world. What you do find is a “who’s who” in most local business communities.

Startups may apply to programs like the Fort in DC because they want to be close to the epicenter of government. They may apply to the Brandery in Cincinnati because they want to be close to the biggest branded company in the world, Proctor & Gamble. Startups that are logistically focused or enterprise focused may want to apply to Seed Hatchery in Memphis to be close to FedEx. Startups in the entertainment and music space may choose an accelerator in Los Angeles or even Jumpstart Foundry in Nashville.

While some of these accelerators “everywhere else” may have mentors from the Valley participate or founders with big exits, the bulk of their mentor list is either mentors who speak to their niche or mentors in the local community. Which can be equally, if not more important than name brand mentors elsewhere.

Are you building solid companies or is the accelerator only looking for “the next big thing”?

Linkage

Apply for SeedHatchery here

Check out these accelerator stories from nibletz, the voice of startups “everywhere else”.

And check out the two great accelerator panels at the everywherelse.co The Startup Conference, the biggest startup conference in the U.S

Memphis Startup: AFocusED Path Starts Helping Students With Careers In Middle School

AFocusED Path was one of the four startups built during Memphis’ recent 48 Hour Launch for women as part of their new UpStart program. AFocused Path is essentially a social network surrounding a students academic life, and their support infrastructure. It’s also a great way to keep a child’s support network, no matter how close or far away they live from the child, involved.

Parents of school aged children can sign up for a free profile at AFocusED Path. From there they will add information about the student academically and socially as it related to their child’s development. Report cards, progress reports, key assignments, reports, intramural sports achievements, school play programs, you name it all of this can be added to a child’s AFocusED Path profile. This will serve as the ultimate archive for a child’s early years.

With all this information collected and displayed in a private social network, families are building an online resume of their child dating back to the earliest years. Long gone are the days of throwing shoeboxes filled with photos away during the next move.

This aspect of the the platform is also great for keeping aunts, uncles, grandparents, friends and other supporters, up to date with a child’s progress, achievements and areas of improvement. Now grandma and grandpa in Florida get to participate more actively in their grandchildren’s lives. If the student got good grades they can leave praise, if they are having a rough period they can be there for support.

Eventually the startup would like to add other key players in a child’s scholastic career in the platform as well. Guidance counselors, teachers, and coaches could all be involved in the overall well being of the child through their school career and then even onto college.

The second part of AFocusED Path is equally as interesting.

Usually when a student hits 8th grade they start getting the first real inclination of what they may want to do when they grow up. Whether the child wants to be a doctor, vet, counselor, entrepreneur or an electrical engineer, AFocusED Path is able to help create a clear plan as to what the child should be doing in their school years to prepare for college in that field.

The system will know what classes to get and what grades to maintain and if that student is underperforming or overachieving when it comes to those goals.

Naturally, starting a career path at 8th grade usually means a pivot or three and AFocusED path can accommodate that pivot and several others. The platform can also let a student and their support system know how hard it will be to change career paths at whatever point they make that decision.

They hope to become the goto social platform for everyone scholastically prior to college.

Denise Davis PHd and Rod DeBerry are the two founders behind this new startup and they are anxious to get it moving. They worked relentlessly with their 48 Hour Launch team to perfect their pitch as well as starting their social media channels. Check out their Friday pitch video:

Here’s the pitch video from Sunday evening:

Linkage:

Check out UpstartMemphis here

Here are more startup stories from “everywhere else”

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Month One In A Startup Accelerator, Cliff McKinney CEO, Work For Pie

“This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.”

So I’ve started a couple of companies before. Okay I say “started companies,” but I don’t really
mean either of those words. I just incorporated some ideas I had. I got business cards with my
name on them. I built a little website for interested people to sign up. One of them even earned
me a little play money. But in truth, I was just playing house.

When I walked in the door a month ago at Seed Hatchery, a startup accelerator in Memphis,
TN, I hadn’t discovered that yet. In my mind, I was kind of a badass. I had read more books
about entrepreneurship than anyone I knew. I had listened to every episode of This Week in
Startups. Hell I even suffered through a few episodes of This Week in Venture Capital. My
team had a GREAT idea that NOBODY ELSE was doing (or doing well, at least), and I had this
awesome, undiscovered savant of a co-founder and we were just going to waltz in there and
kick serious butt.

And day one was awesome! I was part of a special fraternity of entrepreneurs, and we were all
going to change the world. It was all champagne and roses. And I really felt that way. It was
wild man. Like livin’ on Haight in ’67.

Then the rest of the week felt something like this:

“Your idea sucks. No one is doing it because it sucks. You haven’t thought it through, you
haven’t done a bit of customer research, and it’s amazing that you didn’t have the good sense
to realize it before you walked in this door. You are only slightly less likely to fail because you’re
here than you were before you got here, which is to say that the likelihood of your failure just
went from 100% to something closer to 99.5%. Your pitch sucks. It’s too long. Where’s the
real pain? Are you solving a real problem? Your presentation isn’t that great either. Too many
words, not enough substance. You’re half as talented as my mother and you’re in Memphis-
freaking-Tennessee. They don’t give money to stupid people here. They don’t even give it
to smart people. You have 90, 89, 88, 87, 86 days to make a great product, and you haven’t
shown me anything that makes me believe that will happen yet…”

Thank you Drill Sergeant, may I have another?

It was an awakening, to say the least. Turns out everything I thought mattered didn’t, and
everything I thought was true wasn’t (except for the bit about the genius co-founder), and
everything I had learned wasn’t relevant anymore. By the end of that first week, I was huddled
in a corner with my rifle, crying, hoping the whole thing would just blow up and take me along
with it.

“Okay, forget everything we just said.”

But I kept coming back, because it was the most awesome thing I had ever done. Humbling,
yes, but awesome nonetheless. I was doing THIS. I was being brought to my knees HERE,

doing OUR THING. We didn’t answer to anyone but ourselves. We were keeping late nights
because we wanted to, not because some freaking busybody micro-manager in another
department needs her TPS reports by noon tomorrow. We were living the dream!

And we were getting better. Bit by bit. By week two the pitch had improved. We met mentors
who had been there and were willing to guide us through the trials and tribulations. We were
doing customer research and starting to turn our crappy little idea into something that just
might work. We had this amazing, awesome group of cohort companies, each with great
entrepreneurs and talented individuals, helping us along the way. We were making progress,
and we were doing it at a speed that my counterparts in “the real world” wouldn’t even be able
to comprehend.

So three weeks in we said “okay, forget about everything we just said,” and changed just about
everything about our original idea. Three days (and about 12 hours of sleep) later, we pitched
that new idea to investors for the first time. We had come far enough to be able to say “yeah,
this one is going to be better, and it’s okay that we have to scrap a bunch of stuff to make it
work.” It was progress, and the investors noticed. It IS a better idea, and they knew it. And we
had survived. It wasn’t pretty, but we had survived. At least the first battle.

“You think Grendel’s a bear–you should meet the mother!”

Things aren’t any easier these days. Not at all. Sleep still comes in short bursts. The pressure
is building as we get closer and closer to demo day, and the expectations are higher because,
somehow, we’re infinitely better than we were when we walked through the door a month ago.
We’ve got a month to build a product that thousands of people will one day use. 31, 30, 29, 28
days. They pass before we even know what hit us.

But the false hope that got turned into realistic doubt in that first week is creeping into the
territory of realistic hope. And what we’re hearing in week five sounds a bit more like this:

“Your idea sucks, but you’ve got time to make it better. You haven’t thought it through, but
you’ve got the tools to do that now. You haven’t talked to your customers enough, but we’re
going to help you do that. And no matter what you think, we didn’t bet on your idea. The only
thing you brought with you was you, and you are what we bet on, not your stupid idea. You’ve
got a shot at this. Keep going.”

Here’s hoping that kind of talk continues…

Author Biography:

Cliff McKinney is CEO of Work for Pie, a company that is changing the way software developers
get recruited and hired by changing the way they communicate with companies. He and his
team have conducted countless interviews with both developers and the companies that hire
them. You can find him on twitter at @cliffmckinney.

Linkage:

Learn more about Seed Hatchery, the accelerator WorkForPie went through, here

Are you coming to “everywhereelse.co The startup conference”

Check out Work For Pie here

Founder Of Memphis Startup Mentor.Me Crowdfund’s In Person For Everywhereelse Booth

This weekend was a big weekend for Memphis entrepreneurs, specifically women founders and entrepreneurs. Upstart Memphis, the latest initiative by Launch Memphis, officially kicked off with the 48 Hour Launch, women’s edition. During the 48 hour period four women CEO’s from Memphis built 4 exciting new startups; Care2Manage, AfocusED Path, Pink Robin Avenue and Mentor.me.

Throughout the weekend the women were rushing to gain as much business knowledge as they could, test their idea out and validate it with customers, and work on their pitch deck. They were also competing for a free booth space at the upcoming “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” event being held in Memphis in February.

The three day event is bringing entrepreneurs, founders, and investors from across the country and around the world to Memphis for three days of startup knowledge. A smorgasboard of panels, discussions, fireside chats, networking opportunities and parties. There’s a huge list of nationally known speakers as well. (here’s more info on the event).

Mentor.me is solving a big problem for non profit groups that are linking mentors with mentees. Until now the systems used by most mentoring non profits has been flawed.

For instance Brittany Fitzpatrick said in her pitch that a few people she knows that connect mentors and mentees have to go through thousands of applications and then they link mentors with their mentees by looking at a simple sheet of paper. This paves the way for bad connections and relationships. We also learned that most mentor relationships dissolve in six months or less and that’s actually worse for the mentee than not having been mentored at all.

Check out Mentor.me’s Friday pitch:

And here’s Fitzpatrick’s Sunday pitch:

Fitzpatrick’s web based platform will allow both mentors and mentees the opportunity to build a much more robust profile with likes, interests, needs and goals. This way both the mentor and the mentee have a better chance at vetting each other out to see if they’re likely to be compatible.

When the judges convened after hearing all four pitches on Sunday evening it was a very close call between Mentor.me and the startup that won, Pink Robin Avenue.

Undeterred, once Fitzpatrick realized she wasn’t the winner she started approaching the folks in the audience with a simple proposal, help me get my startup into the conference.

Very quickly Fitzpatrick got sponsored to the beat of $265 and at that point I kicked in the last $30 to get her startup into the conference.

Hopefully both Fitzpatrick and the winner Danielle Inez, will wow the investors the way they wowed the judges this weekend and raise some venture capital.

Linkage:

Check out Upstart Memphis here

Check out “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” here

Memphis Startup: Pink Robin Avenue Wins Free Booth At Everywhereelse.co

This weekend was Upstart Memphis’ 48 Hour Launch weekend. Upstart Memphis is the newest initiative for Launch Memphis the catalyst behind all things entrepreneurial and startup in Memphis Tennessee. Upstart Memphis is about helping women entrepreneurs and startup founders through fellowship, education and events. 48 Hour Launch, Memphis’ take on Startup Weekend, was the first big even for the organization.

Launch Memphis has held several 48 Hour Launch events. They function the same way most weekend startup hackathons function. This time was a little different though because all of the ideas pitched needed to be led by women.

Care2Manage, A focusED Path, Mentore.Me and Pink Robin Avenue were the four ideas picked to build throughout the course of the weekend. As you can see from both the Friday and Sunday videos for each startup, they got a lot of work done.

Danielle Inez and her Pink Robin Avenue was the prevailing winner though, even after an original judges tie.

Pink Robin Avenue is an easy way to plan and decorate for an event. For those who like it broken down in it’s simplest form, Pink Robin Avenue is an “event in a box”.

Inez and her team used the weekend to work on their business plan, website, social channels, customer discovery and preparing a great presentation. Inez brought out her bubbly personality and really shut the crowd down with her enthusiastic responses to every part of the Q&A, having a sensible answer for every question thrown her way.

While Inez will initially grow Pink Robin Avenue in Memphis she plans on expanding nationwide and helping people plan events, and get all the decorations they need from top to bottom in a box delivered to their door step, instructions and all.

After checking out her Sunday pitch video you’ll see why she ended up winning a free Startup Village booth at everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference. Inez will be very busy over the next two months making sure that her idea is ready for prime time and ready to go onstage in front of over 1500 people, 400 of them investors.

As a testament to the weekend startup hackathon building model check out her Friday pitch here:

and here’s her wining Sunday pitch video

Linkage:

Get your ticket or booth space at everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference, the largest startup conference in the United States, by clicking here.

Find out more about Upstart Memphis here

Here are more startup stories from “everywhere else”

Black Girls Code Coming Home To Memphis In January

Black Girls Code, Memphis, startups, developers, Kimberly Bryant

Meka Egwuekwe (rear) and his daughters Elechi (L) and Sobenna (R) talk about Black Girls Code coming to Memphis photo: nibletz LLC

Kimberly Bryant is an award winning social entrepreneur, technology junkie, an engineer by trade and a native Memphian. She relocated to Silicon Valley and now she’s launched a program that’s rolling out across the country. That program, Black Girls Code, promotes teaching coding and development to young African American Girls.

Bryant describes the mission for Black Girls Code on her website as:

“to introduce programming and technology to a new generation of coders, coders who will become builders of technological innovation and of their own futures.”

Like many others, Bryant believes there’s a “dearth” of African American women in science, technology, engineering and math professions. While some may say it’s because there’s a lack of interest, Bryant knows that it’s more like a lack of access and exposure to STEM topics. The Black Girls Code program is about making STEM topics accessible to African American girls and exposing them at a young age. It’s also done in such a way that it’s fun and positive.

Bryant has held programs through Black Girls Code in cities all over the country and some around the world. Black Girls Code has had events in San Francisco, Chicago, Oakland, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Detroit, Los Angeles, New York and even in Johannesburg. Her most recent event was this past Saturday in Atlanta where they taught kids how to develop their own apps using Google’s App Inventor.

Two of the girls that participated; Elechi (11) and Sobenna (8) Egwuekwe, came to speak on Sunday night at Memphis’ 48 Hour Launch for women event. Their father, Meka Eqwuekwe, who works for local web developer Lokian, has taken an active interest in the Black Girls Code program, and is helping to bring it to Memphis.

The Memphis Black Girls Code chapter will hold an Open House January 15th at Emerge Memphis, the local technology and startup incubator. Then, on February 16th the Memphis chapter will hold it’s first event.

Albeit a little shy, or possibly tired from the 6 hour drive back from Atlanta, both Elechi and Sobenna were glowing with excitement as their father explained the concept and program behind Black Girls Code and the events coming up.

When asked if they had fun, Elechi quickly responded by saying yes and then described the experience. Elechi told the audience of about 50 that she and her sister got to create their own app using the App Inventor platform. She was quick to point out that App Inventor is a Google product and that meant their first app was for the Android platform.

The app that the girls created was a photo app that allowed a user to add sound effects to a picture taken on an Android phone. Launch Your City’s Chief Brand Officer and the woman in charge of Upstart Memphis, and the 48 Hour Launch For Women, Elizabeth Lemmonds, was quick to point out to both young ladies that there was no age limit for Upstart and that next year she expected to see the two sisters pitching a startup at the 48 Hour Launch for women.

Linkage:

For more info on Black Girls Code visit this site

Here’s more info on Upstart Memphis

Black Girls Code will also be talking to possible new members at this exciting startup conference

Meet The 4 Women Led Memphis Startups Pitching At 48 Hour Launch

Memphis’ Launch Memphis, is holding a 48 Hour Launch made up entirely of startups founded by women. This is part of Launch Memphis’ new Upstart Memphis initiative focused on enriching women entrepreneurs and startups across the midsouth.

In addition to events like this, Upstart Memphis holds a regular women’s entrepreneur meetup and provides access to women founders and entrepreneurs to the organizations free workshops and seminars. Upstart Memphis welcomes entrepreneurs of all types from traditional small businesses to high growth potential startups.

This weekend’s 48 Hour Launch saw traditional high growth startups and a hybrid startup with huge upside potential locally and if it can build scale, nationally as well.

Care2Manage

Care2Manage is a web portal and referral service aimed at 30 and 40 somethings who’s parents may be ready for elder care. More and more of the elderly are turning to staying home rather than going into managed care centers, which can be frightening for their children, especially when 100s of miles separate child and parent.

That’s where Care2Manage comes in. This referral site and management platform allows the parent and the children to collaborate together and find the best care providers in the parents’ local area. With the service being based on the web, children from across the country and around the world can be involved in their parents care. Not only that, but Care2Manage will also staff up with 24 hour staff available to the parent or the child, and in some cases both.

Here’s the Friday raw pitch:

focusED Path

This startup plans to be a first in it’s space. Essentially focusED Path is a social network for students and parents to keep up with their scholastic activities. Using focusED path, parents and students can put all of their grades, achievements and assignments online. As the student reaches milestones they can be celebrated as well.

focusED Path takes it’s name from one of it’s key features. At the eighth grade level most students start thinking about careers and the work force. They start solidifying their first “what I want to be when I grow up” plans.

focusED Path takes those ideas and makes recommendations on courses to take and what grade averages are needed to sustain that goal. The system will also help when that student undoubtedly pivots to another career path. The student and the parent can see what changes will need to be made to keep them on the focusED path.

Finally, in their secure network students and parents can share milestones, and victories along with areas the student needs to work on with that student’s support network.

Here’s the Friday Pitch:

Pink Robin Avenue

Pink Robin Avenue is the ultimate event planning tool for the busy person. Professional career minded women, single dads, single parents and anyone who’s day to day makes them too busy to plan a party can easily use Pink Robin Avenue to design an event in a box and have the party they’ve dreamt about in just a few clicks.

The founder of Pink Robin Avenue, Danielle Inez, put together the idea when she found that with her social calendar and PR consulting firm she didn’t have enough time to think of things like cake toppers, decorations, and party favors.

Check out the Friday pitch:

Mentor.me

Brittney Fitzpatrick has noticed that there is a huge flaw in mentoring. One of her close colleagues is in charge of administering a very big mentor program in Memphis Tennessee and told Fitzpartrick that most of the mentor matching she does is strictly baed on what’s on a sheet of paper. For so many reasons this process is flawed.

Mentor.me plans on taking profiles for the mentor and the mentee and using algorithms to better match the two.

With Mentor.me a mentee will be able to better address and get more indepth about their needs in a mentor. The mentor will also be able to better see if they’re a match or not.

Mentor.me will help both mentors and mentees waist a lot less time and get right into mentoring, which is what they’re supposed to do.

Check out Mentor.me’s Friday Pitch.

Linkage:

Here are more startup stories from “everywhere else”

Find out more about Upstart Memphis here

Come to Memphis for the largest startup conference in the country, more on that here

Voice Of Memphis Grizzlies Confirms, Grizzlies & Memphis Are All In With Entrepreneurship And Startups

Memphis startups,Memphis Grizzlies, everywhereelse.co, startups

photo: nibletz.com

Yesterday we reported that Los Angeles startup myStorey had teamed up with super star Memphis Grizzlies forward, Rudy Gay, for their new platform that “shopifies” the clothing and accessories he and other celebrities wear and use everyday. It seems with the changing of the guard and the sale of the team earlier this fall, that the Grizzlies are all about entrepreneurship, startups and cultivating downtown Memphis.

Back in November, the Memphis Grizzlies were sold by Michael Heisley to a new group led by 34 year old telecommunications entrepreneur Robert J Pera. Pera had made the list of Forbes 10 youngest billionaires in the world after the company he founded in 2005, Ubiquiti networks, went public in October 2011.

In Pera’s biography that appears in the Memphis Grizzlies programs this season, it says that it was a life long goal for Pera to be involved in professional sports which ultimately led to him leading the group that finally closed on the purchase of the Memphis Grizzlies, with NBA approval just two months ago.

Justin Timberlake, Peyton Manning’s wife Ashley and basketball star Penny Hardaway are all minority stake holders in Pera’s group.

The local Memphis part of the ownership group is more than just a group of local businessmen. Each one of the local team is an entrepreneur in their own right but they’ve also either embraced or are starting to embrace the local young entrepeneur and startup space as well.

J.R. “Pitt” Hyde, is the founder of Autozone. He has one of the most robust careers of any single person. Hyde grew up in a family of entrepreneurs and immediately got involved with the family business Malone and Hyde. After taking over Malone and Hyde he ended up being the youngest CEO of any publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange. He was also the sitting CEO when Malone and Hyde was one of the first leveraged buyouts by notorious LBO firm KKR, prior to their infamous deal for RJR Nabisco chronicled in the movie and book Barbarians at the Gate.

Hyde continued to build companies, including national auto parts chain AutoZone which is headquartered in Memphis. He also sits on the board of Memphis Bioworks, the medical device incubator that is the collaboration partner with Seed Hatchery in the Zeroto510 program. Hyde is also part of the Society of Entrepreneurs, an organization that supports local entrepreneurship, and he recently spoke at a New Memphis luncheon, where he moderated a panel with local startups PayTopia, Nanopthalmics and Bionanovations, all three of whom accelerated through Launch Memphis affiliated programs.

Staley Cates is the President of Southeastern Asset Management. He was also instrumental in bringing the Memphis Grizzlies to Memphis from Vancouver. He sits on several boards that deal directly with youth including the board of the New Hope Christian Academy, Memphis Athletic Ministries, Soulsville and the Urban Youth Initiative. Also a member of the Society of Entrepreneurs Cates participates in mentoring young companies through the organizations “Core Conversations” program.

Ed Dobbs helps lead the family business Dobbs Management Service which oversees interests in the automotive industry; restaurants and airline catering, beverage distribution and holding company Three Rivers Holdings. Dobbs is leading the family’s efforts to start and acquire new businesses. Dobbs also sits on the board of Memphis Fast Forward, an organization that fosters development, attraction and retention of talent in Memphis Shelby County.

Duncan Williams, is the President of Duncan Williams a local investment bank. Duncan Williams is very active in the Memphis community. The company was also a signature sponsor for the Southeastern Medical Device Association Conference that was held in March in Atlanta. The organization highlights medical device entrepreneurship which is a growing funnel of new startup activity in the Memphis region and the southeast.

Billy Orgel, is a Memphis communications Mogul. As the head of Tower Ventures a company that owns over 700 communications towers across the country and has sold another 280 more. Through the Society of Entrepreneurs, he too is active in fostering and mentoring young companies in Memphis. Orgel was also the angel investor that backed City Torch a Memphis location discovery startup that operated out of Emerge Memphis.

But the Memphis Grizzlies ties to entrepreneurship don’t start or stop with their list of investors and even their player involvement in social startups. Many of the men listed here along with several others tied to the organization have noticed an emergence of more and more people coming to Memphis to go to school and staying post graduation to work for or start their own companies. They’ve also taken notice of companies and startups that have relocated to the Memphis area to grow their businesses.

The entrepreneurial activity is bubbling to the degree that Memphis Grizzlies PA Announcer Rick Trotter made it a point to take notice of students staying in Memphis and the entrepreneurial activity spurring in the downtown area in a recent interview with local Memphis publication choose901.com.

Trotter tells Choose901.com

“One of my favorite things about being part of Memphis, right now is being a part of, a new culture, a new sense of optimism in this city…” He continues “I see a lot of hopeful folks, a lot of people with fresh ideas, and creativity coming to this city, people going to colleges and high schools in this city and staying here to invest…” Trotter goes on “I’ve got a lot of friends in this area who are entrepreneurs and business owners…” Check out the entire 3 minute interview below.

With the everywhereelse.co conference just over two months away, over 1500 people have already purchased tickets from across the country and around the world, to come to Memphis and see this wind of change with their own eyes. Hundreds of those attendees have identified themselves as accredited angel investors and VC’s and out of the companies we recognize there is over $10 billion dollars in venture capital that will be represented at the conference.

With that it’s only fitting that we’ll kick off the festivities of Sunday evening with a Grizzlies game as they take on the Minnesota Timberwolves on Sunday February 10th when they arrive for the conference. After the game all the attendees will pour onto Beale Street to take in some of the entertainment that Memphis is famous for during the Grasshopper, the Entrepreneurs’ Phone System Bar Hop.

With that, we’re so excited to welcome everyone coming to the everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference, to our house, the Fedex Forum to kick off the largest startup conference in the country, everywhereelse.co

Linkage:

Get tickets to everywhereelse.co here or register your startup for the startup village

Learn more about LaunchMemphis Here

And go ahead check out the Memphis Grizzlies.

Check out Choose901 here

Memphis Grizzlies Star Rudy Gay Featured In Los Angeles Startup MyStorey

Rudy Gay, Memphis Grizzlies, myStorey, LA Startup,California startup,startup

Memphis Grizzlies star forward Rudy Gay will be featured in myStorey (photo: nibletz LLC)

A new startup in Los Angeles called MyStorey is set to debut with some celebrity heavyweights in the mix, including Memphis Grizzlies star forward Rudy Gay.

myStorey is a we-commerce platform where users build online stores through the stories of their lives. They allow people the unique opportunity to tag the things in their personal photos from Facebook, Instagram, Flickr, or their blog and aggregate those tags into a shoppable store so that others can discover and shop them too. Celebrities, bloggers, brands, and even everyday people have found immense value in myStorey’s ability to transform their digital content into shopping opportunities.

myStorey worked with Rudy Gay’s social team to leverage his social media content and use it to highlight the products from his everyday life. myStorey will highlight some of the clothing and accessories that Gay wears in everyday life along with some of the luxury items that help bring his swag like his Audermars Piguet watch.

Anyone can use myStorey, whether you’re the average Joe or a trendsetter, myStorey lets you highlight the things you wear everyday and then helps people discover those items and purchase them.

Other celebrities participating at launch include:

US Open Surf Champion Lakey Peterson
Fitness guru Chalene Johnson
Jacksonville Jaguars Quarterback Jordan Palmer
Miami Marlin’s player Bryan Petersen
Miami Marlin’s player Logan Morrison
Beauty Biz CEO and expert Sumita Batra
HoneynSilk.com fashion blogger Stephanie Liu
Beachmint’s Social Media Coordinator Vaneza Pitynski

myStorey seems like a very innovative platform, and with the star power they’ve recruited in the beginning they should be in good shape for a successful launch. We got a chance to talk with the team behind myStorey, check out the interview below.

Startup Communities: Celebrating Victories

Brad Feld, startup investor, co-founder of Techstars, co-founder of Foundry Group, Marathon Runner, and huge startup community evangelist offers lots of great advice in his recent book on startup communities. One of the things that he speaks about when talking about startup communities is celebrating a startup community victory.

Earlier this morning we reported that Memphis startup accelerator grad Restore Medical Solutions has raised a $2.5 million dollar series A round.

That’s a huge victory for not only Restore Medical Solutions but for the Memphis Startup Community.

Linkage:

Original story

Come to Memphis for the biggest startup conference in the US

Memphis Startup Restore Medical Raises $2.5 Million Seed Round

Restore Medical Solutions, Memphis startup, Zeroto510,funded startup

Shawn Flynn (L) Ryan Ramkhelawan (R) founders of Restore Medical Solutions

Memphis’ startup community has kicked it into high gear as of late. In 2012 Launch Your City, the organization behind the Seed Hatchery starutp accelerator, the Launch Pad free coworking space and Launch Memphis, the curriculum arm behind Memphis’ startup ecosystem, had a big year. They saw two cohorts go through their Seed Hatchery program this year. One group of web/tech entrepreneurs took their startups through Seed Hatchery. The other group went through a collaborative effort between Seed Hatchery and Memphis BioWorks called Zeroto510.

The Zeroto510 program is a medical device startup accelerator that relies on Bioworks for the medical part and Seed Hatchery for the startup, and business development portion of their training. After a rigorous accelerator program, and an intense demo day in May, the six startups in the program saw 85% follow on funding. Four of the graduating startup companies received $100,000 investments from MB Ventures and Innova. The fifth startup, Restore Medical Solutions, raised a $2.5 million dollar Series A round.

It’s no wonder that Restore Medical Solutions was able to close such a large round. Co-Founder Shawn Flynn announced that the company had a $3.75 million dollar purchase order, during his investor day pitch.

Restore Medical Solutions has come up with a concept and system to more efficiently sterilize surgical instruments. When we first met with Flynn and Co-Founder Ryan Ramkhelawan explained that not only was the current system for sterilizing surgical instruments filled with flaws, to a degree it’s also dangerous.

Currently surgical instruments are grouped in sets according to the surgery that the operating room is performing. The instruments are kept in a sterile container/tray until they are brought up to the surgical suite and used. However, if one piece of equipment is either missing, or shows signs of not being completely sterilized, the entire set is deemed unusable and another set is ordered up.

The problem with that is most hospitals don’t have a bunch of reserve sets for the operating rooms. The sterilization team has put together the sets based on that days surgeries. Waiting on instruments to be re-sterilized and recompiled can take hours. At that time the patient is either kept under anesthesia or they are woken up, either option can have risks.

Not only that but some hospitals still use sterilization procedures that are likened to the way silverware is washed in a restaurant, everything dumped on one big tray and run through a dishwasher type sterilization machine. The problem with that is the instruments at the bottom may not be as sterile as the instruments on the top. This is often the cause of hospital born infections.

Restore Medical Solutions system makes the process quicker, more efficient and completely sterile.

Flynn and Ramkhelawan get anxious and excited when talking about their process and the upside potential for hospitals. With the reduction in time, the more efficient sterilization and the cut down on infections, Restore Medical Solutions is in the business of sterilizing instruments, but more importantly to the bottom line, driving costs down. Quicker turn arounds in the sterilization process also mean quicker turn arounds in the operating rooms, and more surgeries.

How much money? We’re not talking a thousands here or a thousand there, we’re talking tens of millions of dollars per hospital.

The duo behind Restore Medical Solutions has already pitched a number of hospitals in Tennessee and along the east coast. To date they are proud to announce that they’ve at least secured a follow up meeting and in other cases, purchase orders.

While a $2.5 million dollar Series A round is great for the company and will allow them to start producing to fulfill their purchase orders, it wasn’t always easy. Both Ramkhelawan and Flynn quit their good paying day jobs in Atlanta to relocate to Memphis for the ZeroTo510 program. The program gave them a $50,000 seed round but waiting for that initial funding they were sneaker-strapping it like the rest of their cohort.

Both men left families back in Atlanta and Ramkhelawan and his wife had just had a new baby daughter. With kids, families, and houses in Atlanta these two middle aged entrepreneurs set out to live the ramen noodle eating, hipster lifestyle. They immediately went on the grind to make things happen.

And happen it did.

After finding out about the ZeroTo510 program from a friend of Flynn’s who has a marketing business in Memphis the two made the trip to Memphis to scope out the city and the program. They immediately fell in love with the town. They are sharing an apartment literally within feet from the new corporate headquarters for Restore Medical which officially opens Friday.

For what they’re doing, both entrepreneurs admit that the Memphis startup ecosystem is further along than things are in Atlanta. New initiatives have begun in Atlanta which will be great for the region but Memphis is already doing it. Also, Jackson Tennessee is doing it as well. Both entrepreneurs spend time in Jackson, helping to further that cities entrepreneurs along as well.

Flynn and Ramkelawan give a lot of credit to Launch Your City’s Eric Mathews and Bio Works’ Allan Daisley who were instrumental in the Zeroto510 programs inaugural class.

Linkage:

Check out Restore Medical here

Check out Zeroto510 here

Apply for Seed Hatchery’s next session here

No one covers high growth tech in the south east, like nibletz.com

Come to Memphis for this big gigantic startup conference here

Startups Get Your Seed Hatchery Application In Before Christmas (Dec 23 Early Application Deadline)

While Santa is making his list and checking it twice, early stage startup founders across the country and around the world are checking off startup accelerators on their list. Seed Hatchery, the startup accelerator in Memphis Tennessee should be one of those accelerators. They’re looking for the type of entrepreneurs that are committed to growing their startup long term and aren’t afraid of hard work.

Seed Hatchery is now taking applications for their third class. The cohort based accelerator will begin in February and run for three consecutive months. At the end of the session you and your company will be ready to pitch real investors for opportunities to invest in your business. In the meantime you’ll be backed by the 3M’s Money, Mentors and a marine style bootcamp, in Memphis.

Although sometimes overlooked, Memphis is one of the most entrepreneurial minded cities in the world. Going back nearly 100 years, Memphis Tennessee was the epicenter for this little thing called “cotton” you may have heard of it. It was cotton and the cotton exchange that spurred one of the largest investment banks in history, Lehman Brothers.

Beyond that, other globally known phenomena like rock music (the blues), Elvis Presley, and R&B radio have their roots firmly planted in the Bluff City.

Is that not enough? Perhaps you’ve heard of this company that delivers packages via planes and trucks, overnight, yes FedEx was born and based in Memphis. Holiday Inn was born in Memphis as was Serv Pro, and Autozone. Even Debbi Fields, Yes Mrs. Fields as in cookies, calls Memphis Tennessee home.

With an entrepreneurial pedigree like that you can be assured that the mentor pool for the 2013 Seed Hatchery CoHort will be stronger than most regional accelerators Seed Hatchery’s size.

Seed Hatchery was the partner for the recent Zeroto510 medical device accelerator in Memphis where 5 of the 6 teams received follow on funding of over $100,000. One of the teams went on to immediately raise over 2 million dollars. While some startup communities are still just getting started, Seed Hatchery is backed by Launch Your City which has been working on strengthening entrepreneurs and their startups for the last six years.

If you’re a Memphis area entrepreneur or in any area and ready to relocate to Memphis it’s a great place to work and a great place to build a business. Not only that, but even though the accelerator is in the thick of the winter, it’s never ver cold in Memphis.

If you’re startup is chosen to participate you’ll receive a seed investment of $15,000, access to a very strong mentor network and a strong investment community. Seed Hatchery is looking for startups that are in the area or willing to relocate for the entire 90 day cohort and stick around Memphis to tap into the investor, entrepreneurial and startup community in the region after that. To kick off your stay in Memphis TN every team and their members selected for Seed Hatchery will receive a free ticket to the three day startup extravaganza known as “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” where you’ll get to see the great speakers already announced and have a small group session with recent graduates from TechStars, 500Startups, The Brandery and previous graduates of Seed Hatchery.

Applying is free and the application is open now. It’s not for the faint at heart but if you’re passionate about your idea and hard working, if you’re not afraid of rolling up your sleeves this is for you.

Hit the links below.

Linkage:

Here’s the application for the 2013 Seed Hatchery cohort

Seedhatchery.com

No one brings you high growth tech news for the south east like Nibletz the voice of startups “everywhere else”

And the world famous “everywhere else conference”

Memphis Social Entrepreneur Sarah Petschonek Takes Volunteer Experience Nationwide

30 Year old Memphian, Sarah Petschonek left her Nashville job in September of this year to return home to Memphis, Tennessee. Petschonek who has a socially motivated work background and a PhD, wanted to find a more impactful and meaningful path for her life.

Being a lifelong volunteer since childhood, and with the support of her family and closest friends, she did the most logical thing and went back to volunteering. This time around it would be different though — a mission.

For the entire month of November, including today, Petschonek worked each day, every day at a different volunteer organization. She blogged about each day of her journey on her website at confessionsofavolunteer.com.

Along the way she volunteered helping children, senior citizens, homeless people, urban farmers, students and more. When local CBS affiliate, News Channel 3 caught up with Petschonek she was volunteering for SAVE an organization that provides vision services for students.

“Each time you volunteer you generate a ripple effect across the community and you create positive change in the world. You don’t have to be perfect in order to be the perfect volunteer. Whatever your talents and interests, you have the potential to inspire yourself and everyone around you!” Petschonek said.

Her volunteer days go back 22 years to when she was 8 years old. Her and her two siblings would pull a wagon around Jacksonville Florida, passing out fliers and collecting food for the needy.

With this 30 day stint coming to an end, Petschonek has decided to do the next logical thing and take her volunteer experience across the country. She will begin the next leg of her journey in Portland, Oregon and travel to Boise, Salt Lake City, Kansas City, St. Louis, Nashville, Atlanta and back to Jacksonville to rekindle the youthful social entrepreneur that started this all.

Petschonek’s Memphis journey yielded media coverage from the prominent local media outlets. Her blog is already averaging 30,000muv. All Petschonek hopes to do is inspire people to donate just one hour of their time, whether it be once a week, or once a month to whatever cause they can relate to. The results are already amazing including a local law firm giving 10% of their revenues to the local food bank and many others giving personally with time, money, and resources.

Petschonek has launched an indiegogo campaign at indiegogo.com/volunteerbound to help fund the nationwide expedition. While she realizes that a journey like this may be more comfortable in the summer months, winter time is when people, and volunteer organizations need the most help.

People can stay up to date with Petschonek’s nationwide adventure at her blog site confessionsofavolunteer.com and contribute to her journey through links on that page or directly at indiegogo.com/volunteerbound.

Linkage:

Check out Sarah’s blog here

Support her on indiegogo here

No one covers startups in the southeast like nibletz.com

Sarah Petschonek will be here, will you?

Memphis’ Eric Mathews: What!! You Want Us To Just Find You A Technical Co-Founder?

One of my favorite interviews with TechStars co-founder David Cohen, is when he is being interviewed by a woman who’s asking great questions. They get into talking and Cohen says something to the effect of, “ya know that startup, that one where all these great ideas are listed and people can just buy them”, the interviewer plays into the question and Cohen says “me neither, because the startup hasn’t been made, ideas are worthless without execution”.

That same idea plays into a blog post written recently by Launch Memphis CEO and Co-President, Eric Mathews about a problem that he, and several other startup community leaders face every day, “Can you find me a technical co-founder”.

Mathews and his Launch Your City organization are responsible for running Emerge Memphis (the local incubator), Launch Memphis (startup initiatives including curriculum, support, and a free coworking space) and Seed Hatchery the cohort based Memphis accelerator.

With that wide range hats on Mathews and the other Launch Your City staff get the “can you find me a technical co-founder” question a lot. In his blog post he explains a much better way of securing technical talent.

Many people walk in our doors with ideas they believe will change the world and make them rich. The problem they invariably have is that they can’t build it. 95% of these potential founders have an idea for an mobile app or web app and they want the LaunchYourCity team to play matchmaker to a developer. These potential founders don’t realize that the developer probably has his own awesome ideas. Why would he switch from developing his ideas to developing yours? These potential founders will get no where fast with developers because they have ignored the obvious: a developer is your first investor.

Like all investments you need to earn the right to ask!

Here is the typical scenario. A non-technical founder approaches a potential technical co-founder with just an idea. These potential founders usually have very little skin in the game. They haven’t invested a ton of their own time, but expect a developer to contribute 100s of hours. They haven’t even dipped into their own funds to get something mocked up or designed. These potential founders have not invested energy into determining who the customer is, understanding their buying behaviors, or even determine if they would want the app and pay for it. The outcome is always the same. The developer says no and gets annoyed with wannabe entrepreneurs and gets turned off to the startup world.

This is a very bad outcome for our entire community. It could all be avoided.

Imagine going to a technical co-founder and saying the following:

“I have been working to validate an idea for a new app over the past couple of weeks. I didn’t know if this was a good idea so I talked to 50 customers and found out that not only was it good, but also determined what the minimum features would be to satisfy the customer. Because I wanted to continue to make progress, I taught myself to code a little bit.

“With a logo that I paid a local designer to polish up for me, I was able to get a one page website up and running articulating the features of the future app. I also was able to code the website to capture email addresses from future customers. I created a blog to talk about the industry and my perspective on the changes coming. I got a lot of feedback and interest from the blog — one post has been viewed 10,000 times and has 56 comments.

Continue reading here

Heading to Memphis for this? You should be!