Here Are The First 20 Startups In Southland’s Startup Village Highlighting The South East

We’re less than a month away from the inaugural Southland conference combining the best of southern culture and technology. The two day conference takes place June 12-13th at the Cannery Ballroom and the Mercy Lounge in downtown Nashville. It’s been strategically placed between the CMA Music Festival and Bonaroo.

Launch Tennessee, a public/private partnership with the state of Tennessee, and responsible for the state’s nine accelerator regions, is spearheading and organizing the Southland Conference along with the Music City Music Council.

The conference is highlighting startups and entrepreneurship across the 12 states in the southeast. To that end, the first twenty startups (out of 50) have been selected for the startup village. These startups will get a chance to show off in front of all of the event attendees including 41 venture capital and angel firms that have committed to attending the event. They’ll also be competing for $10,000.

The 20 startups released so far are a great representation of the entire south east region, many of which we’ve covered here at nibletz.com the voice of startups everywhere else.

Distil Networks, Washington DC area (Northern Virginia) is a technology startup that protects proprietary online content from bots and scrapers. We covered Distil back in August, here.

The Royalty Exchange: is a Raleigh based startup that provides an online marketplace platform for those who want to buy, sell, license, all types of alternative assets and royalty streams.

Variable Inc, is a Chattanooga startup that makes the NODE device for iPhones and Android phones. This bluetooth connected device has sensors built in a small body that measure a variety of things,

World Housing Solution: an Orlando based startup, wants to make a difference in the lives of others through the design, manufacture and construction of sustainable buildings. They do this through structural, insulated, composite panels.

Banyan, based in Chattanooga they were the big winner at last year’s GigTank investor day securing an additional $100,000 at the end of the investor day pitches. The startup began in Florida and relocated to Chattanooga. They provide a cloud based collaboration tool for researchers and did a great job during this pitch to show how the gigabit ethernet in Chattanooga benefit their startup.

QuickCue: is another Chattanooga startup that we actually saw pitch at an event in Nashville. They provide a table reservation and communication platform for restaurants.

Verdeeco: is a smart grid analytics startup based in Atlanta.

Do 5 Things, based in Knoxville Tennessee this startup is a marketing optimization platform for utilities looking to increase rebate redemptions and encourage behavior change.

Patient Focus, is a Nashville startup that is exclusively for patient pay collections “after insurance and before bad debt”

Kufikia, is a new off-shoot of Memphis based WorkForPie. We’ve covered WorkForPie extensively at nibletz.com. Kufikia is a hybrid between online accelerator, internship, and hiring tool connecting highly skilled developers and software engineers to companies through cohort based learning.

Splitsecnd is a Nashville based hardware technology startup focused on connecting motorists in accidents to help. Similar to Onstar but focused on splitsecnd quick response, the devices sensors can determine accidents and connects the motorist to a 24 hour emergency response center.

viaCycle is an Atlanta bike sharing startup focused on the “next generation of bike sharing” we reported on them back in April of 2012.

VIPAAR This startup based in Birmingham Alabama at the Innovation Depot is “telepresence software”. They were the first startup to receive funding from the Central Alabama Angel Network. We covered that story last September.

American Songspace: is a Nashville startup that according to our friend Milt Capps at Venture Nashville and is “relaunching this summer” and they describe the platform as “a song catalog management system,”

Beam Technologies, is a Kentucky based startup that has literally appified the toothbrush. We interviewed their CEO Alex Frommeyer back in August.

Evermind, is a Nashville startup and Jumpstart Foundry alumni. The founding team came out of Griffin Technologies. We saw them pitch their hardware startup that monitors a loved one by their electric current habits. Check out this innovative startups pitch here.

Ridepost was a graduate of the Iron Yard accelerator in Greenville South Carolina and is now incubating at the Fort based in the 1776 DC space. We interviewed this ride sharing startup back in August.

Gatske, it’s not a sexy startup but definitely useful. This startup based in Greenville SC helps plan and manage audits.

NextGxDx is a Nashville startup and 2010 graduate of Jumpstart Foundry. They’re an online marketplace for genetic testing.

Populr.me is a Nashville startup. We’ve covered them extensively and their co-founder Nick Holland has been an extremely useful resource, and almost mentor to the Nibletz team. We’ve covered Holland and Populr extensively here at nibletz.com

Here’s more on Southland at nibletz.com The Voice of startups everywhere else.

Big Data Conference, StampedeCon, Heads Back To St. Louis Featuring Walmart, Ford & More

If you’re in a big data startup, the StampedeCon big data conference in St.Louis is a can’t miss event. Last year we partnered with StampedeCon as their official media sponsor. Speaker after speaker explained this fast growing technology sector, that’s spawning new, great startups every day.

Last year’s inaugural event featured speakers from Facebook, Read Write Web, Kraft foods and more.

This year’s event will be held July 30-31st at the Washington University School of Medicine and will feature speakers from; Walmart, Ford Motor Company, Deloitte, Riot Games and more.

“Big Data is growing exponentially. Understanding how to control the amount of data available and create a strategy to leverage it is vital to today’s workplace,” said Gary Stiehr, StampedeCon organizer. “Companies without an understanding of Big Data are at a severe disadvantage in today’s marketplace. StampedeCon’s goal is to provide that knowledge to everyone.”

StampedeCon runs July 30-31. The first day will provide insight into developing data and analytics strategies. The second day presents a view into the technologies available to implement data and analytics strategies.

StampedeCon 2013 training partners include Cloudera and Inferology. On July 29^th, Inferology is offering a pre-conference course on NoSQL databases. On August 1^st, Cloudera is offering post-conference training workshops on Hadoop, Hive and Pig.

StampedeCon features presentations benefiting both seasoned IT professionals and those getting started with Big Data. The agenda includes twelve speakers and a panel discussion, with the following agenda highlights:Big Data Analytics: Inside and Out
Michael Cavaretta, Ford Motor Company
Cavaretta will present three areas of opportunity for Big Data Analytics: improving internal processing, understanding customers though external data (including social) and vehicle sensor networks. The presentation will include tips for starting your own Big Data projects.

Big Data at Riot Games

Jerome Boulon, Riot Games

Riot Games sought to understand and improve the player experience for its 32 million users. Boulon will review the challenges they faced creating a Big Data infrastructure that delivers the ability to provide continued insight.

Five Trends in Analytics… How to Take Advantage Today

John Lucker, Deloitte Consulting

Lucker will discuss the latest advancements in the world of analytics and offer strategies for tapping into their potential. The topic areas include visualization and design, mobile analytics and strategy analytics.

Big Data, Big Law

Anthony Martin, Walmart

This presentation will tell the story of one global, multi-channel company’s walk through the increasingly complicated legal, compliance security maze while trying to recognize the implicit value of Big Data programs.

For more information visit Stampedecon.com

St. Louis is one of the fastest growing tech cities in the U.S., here’s why.

Buffalo NY Startup Gradfly, Portfolio’s For High School Students

Everyone’s familiar with how artists and designers have portfolio’s for their work. An artist or designer’s best work is kept in one place, now online of course, so that it’s easy for fans, clients and even buyers to see.

Well Buffalo NY startup Gradfly is doing the same exact thing for high school students with a concentration in science and technology students who are “building the most awesome things”, Oscar Pedroso, Gradfly’s CEO and co-founder said in an interview.

Students who enjoy STEM-oriented activities such as building robots, writing code, or solving complex math equations, can build an online portfolio and share their technical creations and achievements in picture, video, or Pinterest-like format with friends, colleges and companies. GradFly’s vision is to bridge the gap between a STEM education, technical training and employability.

GradFly is committed to help open doors in STEM and STEM only. It’s not just going after any high school or college student, GradFly is going after students who want to succeed in this new information-based and highly technological society; the company even welcomes curious students. GradFly understands students need to develop their capabilities in STEM to levels much beyond what was considered in the past. At GradFly, talented students are taking their first step by creating an online portfolio and then connecting to technical colleges and companies that are looking for tomorrow’s scientists, technologists, engineers and mathematicians. GradFly is empowering these students (and their parents) to make the best and most affordable decisions about their education and career in STEM. For college and companies, GradFly will standout by offering modern tools focused on sourcing, talent analytics, assessment, interview management and search.

The startup’s team, which also includes Anna Hadnagy (CIO), Elliott Regan (Front End Programmer) and Herb Susmann (Chief Architect) were selected last fall for the Z80 Labs Technology Incubator.

The work they’ve done over the last 9 months really paid off as they were one of the startups selected to pitch on the TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013 Battlefield stage.

During that appearance, the judges questioned why high school STEM students couldn’t just use GitHub. To that Pedroso says that Gradfly is more visual, helping students tell a story with their work. They also have a focused community of high school aged students, where of course there is no age requirement for GitHub.

Check out our video interview with Pedroso below and for more information visit gradfly.com

Check out all these other startup stories from TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013

Kentucky Startup Givr Launches Frictionless Giving To Charitable Causes

As the mobile wallet space and frictionless payments for consumers continues to explode, socially charged entrepreneurs are starting to explore using that technology for good. Specifically, socially conscious startups are starting to embrace technology, and mobile technology to facilitate charitable transactions.

Last week in Memphis Tennessee, Pam & Tom Cooper launched their startup Boosterville, out of the Seed Hatchery accelerator program. Boosterville embraces mobile technology, incorporates loyalty, rewards, mobile payments and fundraising, all in one easy to use app.

Now we drive up the road to Danville Kentucky where Brock Klein along with Brushfire Interactive started Givr.

“Givr is a native iPhone payments application dedicated to helping charitable organizations achieve their giving goals. The Givr app provides users with an elegant, frictionless giving experience that dramatically reduces the time and stress associated with mobile giving.” Phoenix based Brushfire’s Brandon Clarke told us in an interview.

The logic here being that as it gets easier to actually donate money to a cause or charity, more money will be donated. This has been shown time and time again when natural disaster’s have struck and the Red Cross has mobilized donations via text message. With the simplicity of using a mobile phone to quickly donate money, more money comes in.

Check out the rest of our interview with Givr below.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

Givr was founded out of a passion for technology and philanthropy by Brock Klein. After studying economics and statistical analysis at Centre College in Kentucky, Brock worked in the financial services industry. His evolving interest in digital development led him to Phoenix, Arizona based BrushfireInteractive, where he worked as project manager. With the support of Brushfire’s founder, Gabe Cooper, Brock began to refine the scope of Givr and development began in the Fall of 2012.

Where are you based?

Danville, KY (Central Kentucky)

What is the startup culture like where you are based?

Nascent. Startups have been coming out of Kentucky for a while but the community is just beginning to get connected and evolve.

What problem does your startup solve?

Remove the friction with routine giving. Don’t have cash on you? Don’t have a checkbook? Not in front of your computer? You can still give to a cause or organization important to you.

What is one challenge that you’ve overcome in the startup process?

One of our greatest early challenges was defining the scope of the project, balancing big dreams with a lean launch.

What are some of the milestones your startup has achieved?

Our first milestone was closing our seed round of financing, catalyzing our development process.

Our biggest milestone was launching our iOS app in the App Store.

What are your next milestones

Our next milestone is 100 nonprofit organizations adopting our platform with at least 1,000 users (Givr’s) using the app for their routine giving with these organizations by the end of the year.

Who are your mentors and role models?

We wouldn’t be where we are today without the mentorship and counsel we’ve had. One of our early investors, First Southern National Bank, has consistently given invaluable counsel – particularly the chairman and founder, Jess Correll and the Director of Culture and Outreach, Dan Lewis. Gabe Cooper and LorenKutsko of Brushfire Interactive have also given consistent and indispensable advice and insight into the mobile giving space. Finally, Brian Crall, an executive coach and successful business leader, consistently points us in the right strategic direction.

What are some of the advantages/disadvantages growing your startup outside of Silicon Valley.

Quiet. We’ve been able to put our heads down and focus on our product and our mission. We’ve had all the benefits of top line expertise without any of the noise.

What’s next for your startup?

We’re moving into the broader launch of our platform. “How can we help people express their generosity through mobile?” Wherever that answer leads is where we will go.

Where can people find out more?

People can see our product at www.givrmobile.com.

Startup America and Startup Weekend have merged, story here.

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

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Chicago’s Startup Community Announces New Founder’s Circle

Chicago is a special place for startups. Despite a crazy warped opinion from Pando Daily a while back, people have started to see Chicago’s thriving entrepreneurial and startup ecosystem for what it really is.

While the verdict is out on the actual success of Groupon, we can’t discount the story of it’s rise to fame and popularity from it’s downtown Chicago headquarters. Despite the fact that ousted CEO Andrew Mason is retreating to Silicon Valley, Groupon, like Belly and GrubHub are products of the Chicago startup ecosystem.

While Groupon, Belly, GrubHub, Lightbank, SimpleRelevance and others are names a lot of tech entrepreneurs from across the country know, what’s really amazing is the success that the 1871 incubator has had since it opened it’s doors. 1871 has housed 225 startup companies, creating 800 jobs. 1871 companies have generated $12.7 million dollars in revenue and drew $27.6 million in venture capital. Of course we can’t forget to mention that Chicago is home to one of the newest Techstars programs.

With this wild growth at just one address (albeit a gigantic one) in downtown Chicago, the entrepreneurial leaders in the city announced Wednesday the formation of Chicago Founder’s Circle (CFC). CFC is a new Peer-to-Peer Networking Group offered exclusively to Founders and CEOs of emerging growth companies in Chicago, with a focus on supporting and nurturing the expanding and vibrant emerging growth company community in the region.

CFC was founded by thought leaders actively involved in the emerging growth sector from a variety of different Chicago-focused organizations, including: DLA Piper, Lightbank, Northwestern University, Deloitte, Dignitas, NEA, and Silicon Valley Bank. CFC is structured as an annual group of 25-30 entrepreneurs who will be invited to participate in a series of four events that will offer them the opportunity to connect with one another and listen to prominent speakers. A fifth networking event will serve as a “graduation” type event that will bring together the current class and, in future renditions, alumni from previous CFC classes.

“We created the Chicago Founders Circle because of the amazing entrepreneurial talent that exists in Chicago,” said Greg Grossman, Partner at DLA Piper. “By connecting world-class mentors, advisors and investors with Chicago’s most successful entrepreneurs, we’ll have the opportunity to contribute to the local economy in a very profound way. The CFC leadership team is excited to use its collective knowledge and skills to foster the growth of these companies and help these entrepreneurs succeed.”

“There is a growing and burgeoning startup ecosystem that has been building in Chicago for a while now,” added Bill Pescatello, Principal at Lightbank. “Last year alone saw a record-breaking $391 million in funding awarded to 197 local startups, which confirms the need and opportunity for a peer-to-peer networking group in Chicago. Our hope is that CFC will become one of the anchors of Chicago’s start-up community for today’s industry leaders and the future generation of motivated, young power players.”

Here’s more Chicago startup coverage at nibletz.com The Voice of Startups Everywhere Else.

DC Startup Speek, The Easiest Way To Conference, Comes Out Of Beta

We’ve been reporting on Speek, the easiest way to conference call, since we saw co-founder John Bracken pitch at TechBuzz in Washington DC last May. If Bracken’s name sounds familiar it’s because he was also a co-founder of e-vite, the easiest way to invite people to an event, which was the precursor to things like Eventbrite and Facebook events.

We quickly hopped on board the Speek train as soon as the beta was ready. In fact I was such an early user that my Speek page is http://speek.com/kyle. This URL allows anyone to conference call me anytime, on the fly and without the use of long, hard to remember toll free numbers, pin numbers and crappy elevator music.

How it works:

1. Head to speek.com
2. register your preferred username (it’s free)
3. direct people who want to conference call you to go to your speek.com page and click the button

It’s that easy. You can also use Speek as a way to give people access to you by phone without having to reveal your number. Speek’s mobile apps deliver the same easy to conference functionality in the palm of your hand.

While UberConference was the winner of the TechCrunch Disrupt battlefield last year at TechCrunch Disrupt NY, we stil found Speek to be easier to use, and much more intuitive. We got to interview the 500 startups backed, Speek team last year as well.

Now Speek is ready to come out of beta. Their official launch is coming with a new app, new ux, new design, new features, pay wall, webrtc client for VOIP and much more. They’ve seen growth double in every key metric every two months since launching in beta. Not only that but along the way Speek’s other cofounder Danny Boice, pitched their startup at SXSW this year on the Tech Cocktail stage, resulting in Bracken getting the Speek monkey tatooed on his ass.

Both Bracken and Boice are diehard startup guys. Boice even spoke at the inaugural everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference, delivering a talk he called “You Only Launch Once” (YOLO).

We’re excited to be joining Speek in two weeks at their official launch party in Washington DC. In the meantime we highly suggest that you get over to speek.com and start using the easiest way to conference.

We’ve been tracking Speek since the beginning.

Nashville Teen, Mark Daniel, Gets Into Thiel Fellowship Must Quit College

Nashville teenager Mark Daniel, 19, is the latest recipient of the Thiel Fellowship.

The Thiel Fellowship is a program, established by PayPal founder Peter Thiel that encourages young people to quit college and work on their startup. When admitted into the program participants move to San Francisco and receive $100,000 over two years, in addition to top shelf mentoring, and working alongside like minded students. During the two year program, participants must not attend college.

It’s a pretty prestigious honor to be selected into the Thiel Fellowship program. Since the program was introduced in 2011 they’ve launched over 30 companies and raised over $34 million dollars.

“As we welcome a new class of determined young people into the Thiel Fellowship community, we also celebrate the pioneering spirit of our 2011 and 2012 fellows,” said Jonathan Cain, president of the Thiel Foundation. “Over the past two years, they have launched more than thirty companies, and raised more than $34 million in outside funding, including venture investments, company sales, revenue, grants, sponsorships, and awards. They have been hiring employees, launching products, engaging with vendors and manufacturers, and advising some of the world’s most well-known technology companies. And now they’re helping the next generation of tech researchers and entrepreneurs by mentoring future cohorts of Thiel fellows.”

Over two years, each fellow receives $100,000 from the Thiel Foundation as well as mentorship from the Foundation’s network of tech entrepreneurs, investors, scientists, thought leaders, futurists, and innovators. Projects pursued by the 2013 class of fellows span numerous cutting-edge science and technology fields, including robotics, computer science, telecommunications, education, photonics, game development, cyberdefense, biotechnology, health I.T., law, neuroscience, fashion, and personal manufacturing.

Jim O’Neill, partner at Mithril Capital Management and fellowship co-founder, said, “Pessimists are correct that we still live in a world of scarcity and suffering. And optimists are correct that better science and technology can relieve these problems immensely. But contrary to both sides, nothing is inevitable. The young men and women Peter has appointed are committed to improving the quality of life for countless people through skillful execution of new ideas, and I am confident they will succeed.”

Daniel joins 19 other students his age who he will work alongside during the program. Daniel’s starutp, StatusHawk is a web based application that compiles and formats workplace status reports into one easy to read format.

This isn’t Daniel’s first startup. StatusHawk is an offspring of his first startup, GoalHawk, which was a social crowdsourcing platform that he cofounded with Sumukh Sridhara a California developer in 2011.

Daniel is looking forward to focusing on StatusHawk, which he says is more valuable than the actual money. The company has a dozen companies lined up to begin beta testing the product, report the Tennessean.

“As we see more and more people using mobile in their daily work, it’ll be a natural progression,” Daniel said. “I think we’ll be in a very strong position in two years. I believe we can be a $100 million company.”

Now read this: It takes a village or a startup community to build an entrepreneur center.

Fred Wilson, PrivCo’s Report On Tumblr Deal Is Total Garbage

Fred Wilson, who some consider the godfather of New York venture capital, made some money in the Tumblr deal. However he is quick to point out that a PrivCo report that suggested his firm, Union Square Ventures, netted a 5,000% return is “total garbage” Business Insider reported late Tuesday.

PrivCo is a private firm that reports on startups and they claim that they had access to details of exactly how much everyone made in the landmark $1.1 billion dollar deal between Yahoo and Tumblr.

Wilson took to Hacker News where he said “Total garbage. There is not one fact in this privco thing that is close to right. The numbers are good but nowhere close to that good. This is the same firm that predicted Foursquare would be out of business this year which will also prove to be nonsense.”

Time Magazine is reporting the Privco data, that Tumblr founder David Karp is taking home $253 million dollars in the deal. They’re also reporting that on a combined investment of $5.25 million dollars over 2007 and 2008, and in conjunction with Boston based Spark Capital Union Square Ventures saw a return of 50x which was worth $253 million to USV and $231 million to Spark.

Privco also suggests that Sequoia yielded $176 million and a combined, Greylock Partners, Insight Venture Partners, CrunchFund and Draper Fisher Jurveston made $88 million.

Wilson has not revealed what the actual numbers are, and probably won’t which could make this information just a shot in the dark.

Another early Tumblr backer, Bijan Sabet said on Twitter that the PrivCo report was “complete garbage and incorrect”.

Now check out Fred Wilson’s Venture Capital Do’s & Dont’s

MassChallenge Startup Recovers.Org To Aid In Oklahoma Tornado Relief

Two sisters, Morgan O’Neill and Caitria O’Neill took a tornado ripping through their hometown of Monson Massachusetts in June of 2011 as a signal for a call to action. The sisters began working on a startup called recovers.org that makes disaster response smarter by providing easy to use software that empowers communities to prepare together, mitigate risk and locally match resources.

They aren’t the only members of the recovers.org team that have come face to face with natural disasters. The startup’s CTO Alvin Liang grew up in Norman Oklahoma which is close to Moore where the tornado touched down on Monday.

The company, which can put together a city.recovers.org site, when disaster strikes in less than two hours, went through the MassChallenge program last fall and graduated with a $50,000 “gold” win just a week before recovers.org got a huge chance for real life case study in Hurricane Sandy.

Now the Boston Herald reports that Morgan O’Neill along with Liang and Chief Operating Officer Chris Kuryak are headed out to Oklahoma where they will spend several days teaching residents how to operate their relief website.

“Our mission is to facilitate local recovery,” O’Neill, told the Herald. “We can give them tools and institutional knowledge we have and they use their expertise in their own community to put themselves back together.”

Recovers.org has already seen 1500 volunteers sign up through their Moore Oklahoma recovers.org website. During the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy the startup saw 30,000 volunteers sign up using their platform. Hurricane Sandy spawned several recovers.org sites including; lowereastside.recovers.org, redhook.recovers.org, and astoria.recovers.org.

Everyone is accustomed to the Red Cross springing into life when disaster strikes. Typically, within hours, others try to launch informational sites, volunteer sites and fundraising campaigns. With recovers.org already in place it allows people in disaster affected areas to concentrate their efforts on recovery knowing that the infrastructure is already in place through recovers.org.

While no one wants to find themselves the victim of a natural disaster, the fact that the team has been through disasters of their own gives them “street knowledge” or the benefit of actually going through a disaster, and experiencing not only the recovery but the emotion as well.

You can find out more at recovers.org

In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, Paul Graham turned to Watsi, and then joined their board.

photo: Boston Business Journal

Designers You’re Going To Love This Madrid Startup, Concept Inbox

The best designers in the world hate having to deal with technology. As crazy as that sounds they want to create things and design things. They don’t have the time to worry about how to share it.

Now a lot of designers, at least the good ones, know that they need clients and need good relationships with them. In many ways good designers need these same personal traits that web developers have. But outside of that, great designers should be tasked with great design.

It’s that premise, and of course simplicity, that’s inspired Oscar del Rio, Miguel Angel Gaton, and Yesica Gonzalez, three entrepreneurs based in Madrid, to create “Concept Inbox”.

“As a designer, all you have to do is send your designs by email to an address that we provide, and automatically this will generate a workspace where your client and you will be able to interact quickly and easily. With Concept inbox, you can manage all your design projects with a single tool therefore avoiding distractions, and focusing on what really matters which is getting quick approval and saving time and money.” del Rio told nibletz.com in an interview.

Check out the rest of our interview with del Rio below:

What is Concept Inbox?

Concept inbox is a powerful, straightforward, and extremely easy to use tool for designers, to improve interaction with their clients, in order to get feedback, and quick approval on their designs.

In layman’s terms, how does it work? (In other words how would you explain it to your grandmother)

As a designer, all you have to do is send your designs by email to an address that we provide, and automatically this will generate a workspace where your client and you will be able to interact quickly and easily.

With Concept inbox, you can manage all your design projects with a single tool therefore avoiding distractions, and focusing on what really matters which is getting quick approval and saving time and money.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

Oscar del Rio (CEO): Studied Music (Bassoon / Piano) and Software development. Microstrategy Business Intelligence certified. 7 years experience working on design / development areas and 3 years as an entrepreneur. Started 2 companies, 1 success, 1 fail (this is third) and collaborate with others as an advisor / mentor

Miguel Angel Gatón (CMO): Computer Sciences Engineer, Master degree in Marketing. 5 yrs experience (Michelin) as Media Planner and Online Marketing manager. Co-founded 3 companies.

Yesica González (CFO): Computer Sciences Engineer, Master degree in Finances. Co-founded 3 companies.

Where are you based?

Madrid, Spain

What’s the startup scene/culture like where you’re based?

Madrid startup community is growing every day. We have great startup accelerators, tons of events and an extensive network of mentors

How did you come up with the idea for Concept Inbox?

Concept inbox is made by designers, for designers. We really love design, but it also can be very stressful …The questions, last minute changes, misunderstandings, endless calls and interruptions that can cause setbacks on deadlines.We suffered this for years, so we tried to simplify it. Concept inbox is as simple as sending an email.

How did you come up with the name?

The name came up thinking we’d like to have an unique tool with all the incoming feedback from our customers about our concepts / designs. Like an email inbox but with no penis enlargement or viagra messages and that stuff.

What problem does Concept Inbox solve?

Concept inbox provides an easy workspace to use, where designers can share designs with clients, get feedback from them and get approval faster, avoiding endless calls and misunderstandings that cause delays on deadlines

What’s your secret sauce?

We are focused on providing tools to drastically save time to both designer / agency and customer. Now we are developing the new version of the platform which includes some of that new tools.

Are you bootstrapped or funded?

We have received 40k € from Telefonica’s accelerator Way

What are some milestones you’ve achieved?

We’ve been up and running from September 2012, and we already have over 3000 designers from 17 countries using the tool.

Concept inbox was selected as one of the TOP50 Startups at Pioneers Festival, Vienna.

Also we were chosen from 450+ startups to participate in Wayra Madrid acceleration programme.

What’s your next milestone?

We are working hard to launch a new version of Concept inbox in two months.

Who are some of your mentors and business role models?

Since the beginning of the project we had the support of many different mentors, from serial entrepreneurs to multinational professionals with extensive experience.

They have helped us to look at the big picture and see things from other points of view.

What’s next for Concept Inbox?

We’re about to launch the new version and also looking for funding to let more people to know our service.

Where can people find out more?

conceptinbox.com

See the mobile email startup we like better than mailbox.

Cancer: Bad Ass Startup Chick Denver Hutt Reminds Us We’re Entrepreneurs, Not Super Heroes

Denver Hutt, Speak Easy Indy, Indianapolis startup,startup,startup news, Cancer

Denver Hutt (center) surrounded by entrepreneurs. (photo: Facebook)

Back in March, Executive Director of the Speak Easy co-working and startup event space in Indianapolis, Denver Hutt, was our Bad Ass Startup Chick here at Nibletz. We chose Hutt because she’s an Indy lover by choice, deciding to stick around Indianapolis after college. She’s a native of Santa Monica, and who gives up the gorgeous weather, sandy beaches and west coast lifestyle for the middle of the country?

A woman who is uber passionate about startups, entrepreneurs and community, that’s who.

Well like many of us Hutt lives the entrepreneur lifestyle. We originally met her last year on the sneaker strapped road trip when we stopped at a Verge Indy event held at the SpeakEasy. She then came and visited us in Memphis in February for everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference, and a month later we spent most of the week with her at SXSW.

Hutt’s been shoulder deep in running Indy’s awesome coworking space, finding mentors to help the Indy startup scene and working on the next big thing for Indianapolis startups. With a plate that full she lives the round the clock pace that we’re all accustomed to. She’s the kind of person you can ping at 3am on a random Tuesday to fact check a story or 8am on a Saturday morning to confirm details of events. She, like many entrepreneurs, goes round the clock.

That’s why when she came down with a cough over a month and a half ago, she just kept going. The cough became pneumonia. The pneumonia became double pneumonia and she ended up with two fractured ribs from coughing so much.

“I have had a cough for quite some time. More than simply being annoying, after weeks of coughing I developed pneumonia, and because I don’t like to give things just 50%, my pneumonia turned into double pneumonia. And two fractured ribs. (How’s that for commitment?!) As my cough continued despite multiple antibiotics, my doctor and I decided to begin more serious testing to determine the underlying cause.” Hutt said in an email to her community members at the Speak Easy which she shared with Nibletz today.

It was determined that the 26 year old bad ass startup chick was staring down the barrel of cancer.

On May 17th Denver began treatment at the IU Simon Cancer Center. She says she’s in good hands at her alma mater. She seemed in very good spirits when we talked with her today, and she is determined to continue to grow the Speak Easy while undergoing treatment.

There’s no exact prognosis just yet. Treatment has just started and her doctors are still determining exactly what kind of cancer it is. Denver is obviously a fighter and she will attack this cancer with the same vigor she’s been leading the Indianapolis startup community with.

When we spoke with her this morning we didn’t want to tell the, “oh my god Denver Hutt has cancer story,” instead her and I decided the story that should be told is that no matter how fast you’re moving, what you’re working on or how close you are to closing that round, you need to take care of your health and your body. That $1 million dollar series A round isn’t going to do you a bit of good if you’re not around to enjoy the fruits of your labor.

Denver had previously committed to being on the “Bad Ass Startup Chicks” panel at the next everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference. She assured me today that she will still make that appearance next February.

STOP When’s the last time you took care of you?

Find the SpeakEasy here
Denver’s message to friends and family here
Information on health insurance for entrepreneurs available through Startup America here

San Diego Startup Forward Metrics Is Strategic Planning Made Easy

San Diego startup ForwardMetrics is off to the races running. They specialize in simple, easy to understand strategic planning, but once you dive into ForwardMetrics it’s much more than just planning. The ForwardMetrics community is made up of entrepreneurs, c-level executives, executive and business coaches and people just starting out in the business world.

Last october at CTIA’s MobileCon event, ForwardMetrics founder Ozzie DiVinere told bnetTV.com that ForwardMetrics will become the goto place for anyone in business who wants to be successful.

Their enterprise class strategic planning software is based in the cloud and has two main products FM Navigator which any sized company can use to help brainstorm new strategies, hit goals and hold stakeholders accountable.

The other piece is Client Navigator which is a set of tools for executive and business coaches that offers new ways to work with clients.

Then they have the ForwardMetrics community which is designed to connect forward thinkers at any stage in their business lives, to ultimately become more successful.

We got a chance to talk with Andrew Hard the Marketing Director at ForwardMetrics. Check out the interview below:

What is your startup, what does it do?

Our startup is called ForwardMetrics, we have built enterprise-class strategic planning software that is based in the cloud. Companies can use our software (called FM Navigator) to brainstorm new strategies, hit their goals and hold stakeholders in key departments accountable.

We also have a Client Navigator product, a different version with a set of additional tools designed specifically for consultants and executive coaches that offers new ways to work with clients – along with powerful tools for acquisition, retention and revenue.

Our very unique go-to-market strategy is not to sell directly to companies, but to license our software to consultants and executive coaches, who are the individuals that actually conduct strategic planning sessions at the vast majority of companies.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

The founders are our CEO Ozzie DiVinere and CSO Scott Warner, here are their brief backgrounds:

Ozzie DiVinere is CEO/Co-Founder of ForwardMetrics.com. He Co-Founded the company in 2011 with a vision to bring enterprise cloud-based technology to the strategic planning, performance management and project management space. DiVinere’s passion is to transform organizations by connecting them with executive coaches and strategic planners to adopt cloud technologies to help each one achieve success and grow their businesses. A win-win paradigm.

In his previous role as Senior Vice President of the Private Client Group at Altegris, which was acquired by the Fortune 250 Company Genworth, DiVinere was responsible for delivering strategic sales and support to Altegris’ wealthiest customers globally. In addition, DiVinere created a very successful toy company, Skate Monster, which had Walmart as its primary customer.

DiVinere received his B.S. in Business Administration, Marketing from San Diego State University.

Scott Warner serves as Chief Strategic Officer/Co-Founder. After Co-Founding the company in 2011, Warner provides the vision for the company and is the Chief Architect of the FM Navigator and Client Navigator platforms.Prior to founding ForwardMetrics he was the Founder, CEO and Chairman of AccuSoft Corporation, the leading imaging technology company, which was acquired in 2008. He is also the founder of several other companies in areas including fitness and real estate as well as an angel investor and adviser to numerous organizations in the area of strategic planning and growth.

Where are you based?

We are based in Encinitas, Calif. Encinitas is just north of downtown San Diego.

What is the startup culture like where you are based?

The culture is San Diego is very strong for startups, BioTech especially. The downtown San Diego area is extremely friendly for startups. Very friendly and very strong startup culture. There are a number of incubators and angel investors in the downtown area, a lot of venture capital floating around and a very strong entrepreneurial spirit.

The startup capitals in the area are in Carlsbad (biotech), Sorento Valley and downtown there are several business parks (nearby the Qualcomm campus, etc.) There are definitely pockets throughout the area – San Diego has a very unique startup culture, but there a very friendly atmosphere, resources and money to be invested.

Most San Diego-area startups are Biotech, consulting or chipmakers – ForwardMetrics is very unique for the area.

What problem does your startup solve?

Eighty percent of companies DO NOT HAVE a strategic plan – a ship without a rudder. The other 20 percent do not implement their plans properly.

Most often, a consultant will come in to an organization and conduct a lengthy and highly expensive sessions – at the end of which he hands the company their strategic plan for the next one to five years in the form of a static Excel spreadsheet. That static, print document is not dynamic and becomes old just weeks after the consultant walks out of the building – most often it ends up in a desk drawer and is looked at never or rarely, and then only by the executive team.

ForwardMetrics’ new cloud-based software lets consultants and coaches offer companies a dynamic, living strategic plan that can be tracked and implemented at an organization after they leave. The software tracks goals from the plan in different departments, making it so the company leadership can track progress and make sure that the company is performing as needed.

What is one challenge that you’ve overcome in the startup process?

We have overcome a number of obstacles. We’ve overcome the typical obstacles around raising money from investors, skepticism and reluctance to take risks. Round A of fundraising will end this coming week – after really starting the process a full year ago.

We’ve also faced the challenges that many area startups have dealt with – difficulties with finding the right outside development team, marketing/design agency and video vendors. There are many resources of this kind in the area – but many of these companies overcharge, underperform and care very little about their clients.

Shifting from a dev team in India, to our current team in the Ukraine – along with having many different remote employees — has caused all sorts of interesting communications problems.

We’ve also face the problems that a lot of startups deal with of being understaffed – people are wearing multiple hats and there is more to get done than we have resources and people to do them. Through all of that, we have managed to launch a solid, enterprise-class software app with an eager base of prospective clients and a solid social and PR presence.

What are some of the milestones your startup has achieved?

On May 15, we will launch game-changing new technology – which helps organizations change the paradigm and operate on a results-based approach. It is a revolutionary shift in how companies are run, changing the focus from managing activity to a focus only on results.

We also have a thriving community site that has grown to over 500 executive coaches, consultants and business leaders sharing content and making connections. The membership growth on this site has increased very rapidly in just the last few months – and the growth is only spiking even more.

We’ve also forged an impressive number of strategic partnerships with hundreds of consultants, executive coaches and strategic planners – generated a lot of interest from surprisingly large companies – and have also gotten some good press exposure.

What are your next milestones?

Our next milestones are to launch the product and grow to at least $2-4 million in revenue by the end of the year. We also intend to grow our community site well into the thousands by the end of the year, and of course growing our client base to several top consulting firms and prominent companies.

We also want to receive that crucial customer feedback and greatly enhance our products so that they can be integrated into literally thousands of businesses around the globe.

Who are your mentors and role models?

Mark Cuban, Marc Benioff, Larry Ellison, Jeffrey Immelt, Steve Jobs, Steven Covey

What are some of the advantages/disadvantages growing your startup outside of Silicon Valley?

Advantages: Top talent is extremely attracted to the San Diego area, both because of the city’s reputation and the natural beauty of the destination. Top talent in sales and marketing can also be found at extremely discounted prices in this area as opposed to L.A., New York, etc. There is also a large base of VC and angel investors, along with retired businessmen, in the San Diego area – so the region also helped with fund-raising as well. San Diego also offers an interested array of strategic business partners and marketing boutique-type resources.

Disadvantages: Finding good development resources is definitely a challenge – this might apply to a lot of places, it’s probably something you her somewhat frequently, but it’s very hard to know what you’re going to get and also get good work back for your dollar. Through everything, we have ended up with a very talented dev team that we’re able to work with very closely. Another great advantage of being in the Silicon Valley area is access to input from a wide array of technology companies – however, at ForwardMetrics we have had access to great input from professional strategic planning professionals and received extremely positive feedback even very recently.

What’s next for your startup?

The way we reach the market is very unique: Instead of going after companies, we work with consultants, executive coaches and strategic planners – who introduce the technology to their clients and continue to work with them to create and execute plans that achieve goals.

From there, we launch FM University to train and certify our partner coaches and consultants on the use of FM Navigator and our other cloud-based tools, and conduct extensive trainings and virtual events – along with a massive PR blitz! We will also be hiring on more staff including a much larger, more robust sales team and more in-house marketing resources, heck, maybe even an HR person!

Where can people find out more, and what is your Twitter username?

To find out more, please visit www.forwardmetrics.com or visit our social: Our Twitter is @ForwardMetrics, our Facebook is facebook.com/ForwardMetrics and our LinkedIn page is http://www.linkedin.com/company/2537683.

Now check out Recruiting for Success: Tapping into Your Local University

New York Startup InBetweenJobs Is For People Who, You Guessed It, Are InBetweenJobs

Finding yourself in between jobs can be one of the scariest things on earth. Some people are lucky, and they know when they might have to start looking for work. Most people, on the other hand, have no idea that they are about to get laid off or that a company is shutting down. For anyone out of work though, uncertainty can be a very scary thing.

Not knowing where the next paycheck is coming from is typically the biggest threat in between jobs, but other things like health insurance, other employee benefits, taxes and resources can become overwhelming.

Big companies usually help out displaced workers through third party companies. These companies, chronicled in the George Clooney movie Up In The Air, connect people to job placement services, resume companies, skill builders and other resources. For the rest of us though, navigating in between jobs can be the hardest job of all.

InBetweenJobs is a New York startup that sets out to simplify and enrich the process of being in between jobs. The company offers access to resources for things like polishing your cover letter, updating your resume, improving your skills, researching trends and companies in your field and of course hunting for jobs. They’re also hoping to offer interviewing tips, information about COBRA insurance and anything that anyone in between jobs could need.

InBetweenJobs incentivizes the time between jobs by offering points for real life rewards. When a user participates in an activity like taking a quick online course in cover letters they earn points. Points can then be redeemed for things like metrocards and free coffee, which when you’re saving every dime you have, can come in quite handy.

Not only do the points come in handy because they provide value to the job seeker, they can also serve as even the smallest little morale booster which people often times need when they are out of work.

Check out our video interview below with CEO and founder Diego Orofino and to sign up to be notified when InBetweenJobs opens, head over to inbetweenjobs.com.

Check out over 50 startup stories from TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013 here at nibletz.com

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You can find out more at recovers.org

In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, Paul Graham turned to Watsi, and then joined their board.

See the mobile email startup we like better than mailbox.

Find the SpeakEasy here Denver’s message to friends and family here Information on health insurance for entrepreneurs available through Startup America here

Now check out Recruiting for Success: Tapping into Your Local University

Check out over 50 startup stories from TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013 here at nibletz.com

Find the SpeakEasy here
Denver’s message to friends and family here
Information on health insurance for entrepreneurs available through Startup America here