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Wisconsin Startup Bad Donkey Creates A New Hybrid Text Language

Bad Donkey, a startup in Madison Wisconsin with a really funky name, has created a new hybrid cyber language of sorts. “Enriched Text Content” or ETC for short combines personal digital imagery with traditional alpha numeric text to create a new and fun way of sending text messages. To break it down for you, this new “Enriched Text Content”, mixes letters with emoticons and images for a fun new way to text.

Interesting is probably the first word that comes to mind when diving into Bad Donkey’s ETC cyber language. The product seems like it would appeal to the youngest set of texters. Older more affluent texters are constantly looking for the fastest and easiest way to send text messages. However, the combination of pictures, images and text may make it easier to get a point across than traditional texting.

Alongside their “ETC” cyber language, Bad Donkey has created an app and closed social network that supports the technology. BuzzMsg is a messaging platform that takes advantage of the hybrid language. The messages within BuzzMsg are called BuzzMarks and are organized in easy to read and understand lifestyle folders.

We got a chance to talk to Bad Donkey’s head jack ass Bill Towell about his new startup and cyber language. Check out the interview below.

San Diego Startup Expeerience Crowdsourced Event Photos For Everyone

There are a few startups out there vying for the position to be the platform that allows people at an event to all upload photos from the same event. San Diego startup Expeerience is one of those companies.

Expeerience allows users to share videos and photos at events. When individual Expeerience users upload their photos at any particular event they are put together with all of the photos and videos from other users at the same event. Essentially, Expeerience is crowdsourcing photos and videos from their users at events, creating one big gallery of event photos.

With many of the other photo sharing apps available today people take photos and videos and upload them to their existing social networks. If they’re at a big event there’s a good chance time lines will be filled with similar photos. However, as co-founder Stephen Boyd explains in an interview with nibletz, after the event everyone goes their separate ways. Social networks begin filling with the next big event.

Expeerience keeps an ongoing record in a “collection” with all the photos from the same event that users can go back to over and over again. Expeerience users can also save event photos from other users. At a small event like a wedding, users can easily save the bouquet toss and dancing photos from other users. They can do the same thing at a football game for big plays and touch downs.

Boyd compares Expeerience to a “Pinterest style Twitter”.

Check out our interview with Boyd below.

TECH Fort Worth Startup Ampcare Gets FDA 510K Approval For Technology To Improve Swallowing

Russ Campbell, President & CEO of Fort Worth startup Ampcare

Last month we brought you a story about Memphis startup Handminder and what they are doing for stroke victims. Handminder has a technology that re-teaches the brain to interact with the hands of stroke victims so they can relearn motor skills. Handminder was part of Memphis’ Zeroto510 accelerator that prepares medical device companies for their 510K FDA approval.

Last week it was announced that TECH ForthWorth startup Ampcare just received their 510K approval from the FDA for their technology that also helps stroke victims.

Ampcare’s Rx3E series of electrodes applies external stimulation to the muscles needed for swallowing. This is also a technology that directly impacts the lives of stroke victims, and those suffering from Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ALD (Lou Gehrig’s Disease) and Muscular Dystrophy.

Russ Campbell, Rick McAdoo and Ronda Polansky, the three therapists that founded Ampcare, envisioned the device as a treatment option to treat swallowing problems.

“At Ampcare, we understand that eating and drinking affect quality of life. This product will offer healthcare professionals, specifically speech language pathologists, a technologically advanced treatment approach to address swallowing difficulties,” said Russ Campbell, President & CEO.

Dysphagia, or difficulty with swallowing, affects 18 million people in the U.S. Without proper management, dysphagia can lead to choking, malnutrition, dehydration, weight loss, muscle attrition, aspiration pneumonia, increased rate of infection and death.

“For example, people with strokes often lose their ability to protect their airway when eating and drinking,” McAdoo said. “Our device rehabilitates the muscles that move the airway to keep it protected during swallowing.”

Ampcare’s technology is just as important for comfort as it is for patient safety.

Ampcare is a startup resident at the TECH Fort Worth Incubator in Texas.

“Since May, when Ampcare won our Impact Award, the team has been pressing hard for this next milestone, the clearance of its product for the market,” said Darlene Ryan, Executive Director of TECH Fort Worth. “The Ampcare founders have their heart in this product. Their motivation is the patients who will have a higher quality of life because of their work. It is clients like this that inspire me to do everything I can to help them and others continue to bring new products to market that really matter.”

Linkage:

Check out Ampcare here

TECH Fort Worth here

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Denver Startup Appit Ventures Wins $50,000 In Business Plan Competition

There are a fair amount of quality startups out there who’s purpose is to help startups. Take nibletz.com for instance. As the “voice of startups everywhere else” we’re providing news coverage and traction to startups across the nation and around the world that they may not otherwise get.

Appit Ventures, a Denver startup, is another great startup that fits in that category. Appit Ventures helps entrepreneurs write business plans, grow their business and get access to funding. They also build custom mobile applications through a revenue sharing model. They also provide strategic consulting and post launch strategies.

The startup won $50,000 in Denver’s first ever JumpStart Biz Plan Awards. In addition to the cash AppIt Ventures also receives free office space for a year at Galvanize a new hub/incubator for startups. Professional legal services provided by Polsinelli Shughart and tax services from Deloitte were part of the prize package as well.

Appit Ventures will also receive 60 hours of strategic marketing services fromDovetail Solutions, social media consulting from WideFoc.us, and entrepreneurship mentoring from TiE Rockies.

“The quality of business plans presented in this inaugural program has been truly inspiring,” Denver Mayor Michael Hancock said in a statement. “Each of these entries further illustrates the strength and vitality of Denver’s small business climate. Our city has no shortage of promising entrepreneurial gems, and we are committed to helping our businesses grow and stay right here in our world-class city.”

Other JumpStart Biz Plan finalists were Big Mountain Robotics, Choozle, Fresh Takes Kitchen, Guerilla Gravity, Ibotta, One World Labs, Presm, The Uber Sausage and VertiFresh.

“Starting with over 150 companies and being selected to the top 10, we were honored,” said Jeff Macco co-founder of Appit Ventures. “Getting to the top three, we were humbled.”

Linkage:

Check out Appit Ventures here

Source: Denver Post

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Israeli Startup Walkme Raises $5.5 Million

Less than two weeks ago we brought you an interview with Israeli startup Walkme. Walkme is the easiest way for companies, startups and anyone on the web to create walk-thru’s for your readers and end users.

No matter how easy or complex your task is, WalkMe wants to provide you with the tool to create an easy step-by-step “Walk thru” guide to everything. Walkme is a simple to use plugin.

Once you have it installed you just move about your screen in the natural steps it takes to do whatever process you want to teach. As you begin to complete each step you write what the step is, how to do it and add your text balloon and move on to the next step. You can easily create “walk thru” instructions while you’re creating your WalkMe walk thru. Anything from how to complete an order, to how to change your password, can easily be explained using Walkme. If you want to show someone an easy to use trick on your own website, you can create a WalkMe “walk thru”.

Basically if you can do the task you want to teach, and if you can use a mouse, than you’re in business.

Walkme’s $5.5 million dollar series B round was led by Gemini Israeli Ventures. Mangrove Capital Partners and Giza Venture Capital also participated. Mangrove Capital Partners provided an undisclosed amount of capital back in April for Walkme.

“Using online services is a necessity for everyone. However, businesses are struggling with ineffective and costly solutions to make sure their users are able to use their offerings,” said Eran Wagner, General Partner at Gemini Israel Ventures. “WalkMe is a disruptive system that can fundamentally change the way online services engage with their users online. WalkMe’s ability to increase visitor clarity, satisfaction and conversion while dramatically reducing help-desk costs, makes it a no-brainer for a business of any size. We look forward to seeing WalkMe maintain its explosive growth and become an industry standard for guidance by replacing video-tutorials and help sections on websites – just as GPS systems have become a standard replacement for maps.”

Dan Adika, CEO of WalkMe, said, “the demand for our online guidance solution is growing exponentially and we sought funding to support this growth. We now have thousands of registered businesses that are utilizing WalkMe’s revolutionary technology to better guide their users online. With this round, we’ve found investors who shared our vision of creating a company that changes the way people use the web.”

Linkage:

Check out Walkme here

Here’s our interview with Walkme

Source: GigaOM

You’ve got your ticket right?

DC Startup Quad 2 Quad Offering Halloween Treat To College Bound Teens

Last month we brought you the story of two DC area women who are old enough to be Mark Zuckerberg’s mom, and have launched a startup based on the pains they faced as parents during the college bound process. If you’ve been to college, or have a student planning on attending college than you know how rigorous planning a bunch of college visits can be.

You’re probably already juggling soccer practice, drama club, glee club, the student newspaper, karate and 16 other extra curricular activities. Add to that needing to go out of town to a strange city full of college students and you’ve got a recipe for a huge headache. Pushing through the visit process, you know that the ultimate goal is for your kid to make you proud at whatever college they select.

Well Susan Jones (68) and Elizabeth Van Sant, feel your pain. That’s why they’ve created Quad 2 Quad a mobile app for parents and students taking college visits. The app serves as your own virtual tour guide in your pocket with a directory of services, hours of operation, local food spots and other things you need to know, but don’t often think about ahead of time.

When you think of entrepreneurs launching startups you don’t typically of women Van Sant and Jones’ age, you think of their fresh out of college age children (and for the record we joke about their age all the time via email in fact Jones is typically the one who starts the joking).

Between the two of them they’ve got some serious college visit experience. Their two families have visited over 30 different campuses as they put their kids through high school and then college.

Quad 2 Quad is now available for sale and if you’ve been down this road before you know all too well that Halloween is almost a time marker for when the visits start. With that and mind, and to spread some halloween loving, Quad 2 Quad is on sale in the iTunes store for just $2.99 from October 30th-31st (next Tuesday and Wednesday)

Linkage:

Check out Quad 2 Quad here

Download it from the app store here

Come see Jones and Van Sant at “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” click here

Philadelphia The Founder City, To Invest $3.5 Million In Startups

Philadelphia Mayor Michael A Nutter announced today that the city of Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation has created a joint two-tiered investment and grant making initiative called “Startup PHL”. Philadelphia is looking to spur more innovation and encourage startups to move to the city of brotherly love.

In a video Nutter talks about Philadelphia being home to the most important startup of all , the United States of America. Now 200 years later Nutter is looking to attract more founders to the city.

To do this Philadelphia is issuing an RFP for a private investment firm to match and manage a $3 million dollar investment from the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation to establish the Startup PHL Seed Fund. The RFP deadline is December 7th. Those startups receiving investment from the Startup PHL seed fund will either need to be in Philadelphia or relocate to Philadelphia to meet a yet to be established residency requirement.

The other $500,000 will come in the form of grants. For that, the City’s commerce department has put out a call for ideas. They’re looking for “innovative, exciting proposals for ideas and programs that support startups and entrepreneurs of all stripes in Philadelphia” In a release they said: “the goal of this fund is to make grants to proposals that enhance collaboration in the startup community; attract new entrepreneurs from both within and outside the city; foster networks for entrepreneurs to collaborate with each other, mentors, talent and investors and ultimately lead to more business and job creation in Philadelphia.”

In the government/private partnership for the Startup PHL seed fund the private firm will handle all of the investment decisions. Longtime Nutter aide Luke Butler says he hopes that the seed fund will start making it’s first investments as early as summer 2013.

It’s obvious that this is a “startup community” initiative as much as it is a technology investment initiative. It’s evident that Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh’s “Return of Community” is starting to pop up in other cities.

“We have broader goals than a return on investment, but we’re hoping to leverage a relatively small public investment that generates more private capital that highlights this important sector and conveys momentum here,” Butler said. “The tech sector is an important part of our economy in that it’s going to be a driver of job creation and is [a way of] keeping college grads here,”

New York, Boston, Austin, Seattle and Baltimore all have government/private partnerships in one form or another to drive early stage investments in startups and keep them in their cities. Las Vegas has a $350 million dollar private initiative from Hsieh to revitalize the downtown area through startups, tech, education and real estate to make downtown Las Vegas a more serendipitous place for entrepreneurs and recently relocated Zappos employees.

Local startup investor and supporter Brad Dennenberg of Seed Philly told nibletz in regards to today’s announcement:

“Today’s announcement marks a significant step towards putting Philadelphia’s startup ecosystem on the national map. Philly is now one of just a few cities in the country with city-backed funding, proving the area’s dedication to growing and retaining high growth (and high paying) companies. With the cost of launching a minimum viable product now lower than ever before, this fund should make a significant impact in a short period of time. I couldn’t be more excited! “

While technology is typically the focus in startup initiatives like this Butler says they want to hear everything.

“If you have an idea, an organization or individual, that supports growing business, jobs in the city, we want to hear it, whatever it is,” he added Technically Philly Reported.

Linkage:

Startup PHL is here

Startup PHL’s call for ideas is here

Everywhereelse is here

Take A Look At St.Louis’ Thriving Tech And Startup Scene INFOGRAPHIC

St. Louis’ Information Technology Entrepreneur Network released a great infographic on Tuesday highlighting the goings on in St.Louis. This was just ahead of the Startup Connections conference that happened in St. Louis yesterday.

Although we’re not based there we do consider St. Louis one of our second startup and technology homes and even spotlight their tech scene, sometimes more than their own local sites. St. Louis is ripe for startups and entrepreneurs. In fact when looking at St. Louis from the outside, all of Brad Feld’s “Boulder Thesis” is in place in St. Louis.

Aside from that though, the infographic put together by iTen tells a great story. Take a look at some of these factoids.

New York’s cost of living is 145% higher than St. Louis
Seattle, Silicon Valley, Boston and Austin also have higher costs of living than St. Louis
Washington University (St. Louis) Entrepreneurship Program is ranked 6th in the nation
Missouri ranked top 10 (6th) in the Kauffman Foundation’s Entrepreneurship Index
St. Louis has 9 strong investor firms
St. Louis startups have raised nearly half a billion dollars

We’ve covered some great startups in St. Louis. Lockerdome is a big success story in St. Louis, one that founder Gabe Lozano hopes to keep in St. Louis. In fact Lozano is speaking at “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference and App Fest” There are a lot of reasons to pay attention to the things going on in St. Louis. See for yourself, check out the infographic below:

Yahoo’s First Mayer Acquisition, New York Startup Stamped

Last April we brought you the profile of New York startup Stamped. Stamped, which is made up of a team of 11 with five being Xooglers, created a recommendation platform that allowed users to put their “stamp of approval” on their favorite places and things.

Stamped offers a unique value proposition by having a quick, easy to understand way of providing recommendations without having to read 1500 word reviews. It’s the recommendation platform for those on the go.

Stamped marks the first Yahoo acquisition under the leadership of new CEO Marissa Mayer who took over the helm at Yahoo six weeks ago after a thirteen year stint at Google.

Prior to this announced acquisition, Stamped had already attracted the attention and investment from Bain Capital Ventures and Google Ventures. Their first round of funding was $1.5 million dollars. They also have rockstar advisors like Instagram founder Kevin Systrom and food personality Mario Batail.

Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. Mayer made it clear that acquisitions were part of Yahoo’s strategy going forward, in her first quarterly earnings call earlier this week. Several tech and startup focused sites have been speculating on some of the other possible target startups in Mayers cross hairs.

On Tuesday we brought you the story about the hot and heavy rumor that Yahoo may be looking to acquire Baltimore mobile ad startup Millennial Media.

Like Millennial Media, Stamped is a natural fit for Yahoo who hasn’t had a good review product, much less a mobile product for reviews. Mayer also said that mobile was one of the key focuses for Yahoo going forward as well.

Yahoo Senior Vice President Adam Cahan told the Associated Press that Stamped would be “a great asset as we expand Yahoo’s mobile efforts and build a world-class mobile development organization.”

Stamped issued a statement on their website today that said:

“We’re excited to start work again on something big, mobile, and new — but we can’t discuss the details just yet. And we’re really stoked to be able to hire lots of talented engineers and designers for this new project.”

Linkage:

Stamped is here

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SXSW Bringing Startup Event To Vegas Baby: SXSWV2V

The SXSWi or South By Southwest Interactive show, as part of the annual South By Southwest festival held in March every year, continues to grow. This year all hotel rooms in the immediate vicinity are already sold out. Last year, despite torrential downpours for three days SXSWi had it’s biggest year ever.

SXSWi has been the birth place to many great startups that we use today. Twitter, FourSquare, and Zaarly are just a few of the startups that successfully launched out of SXSW. Glancee (acquired by Facbeook), Highlight and Banjo were the talk of the town last year during the festival.

Thousands and thousands of entrepreneurs flock to Austin Texas to see and take part in the latest startups brewing across the country. In fact, there are even buses that head down to SXSW where startups are building “startup weekend style” along the way. There are many startups that set aside a great chunk of their marketing budget to participate in the SXSW festivities. Other startups use it as both a customer acquisition point and a launch pad.

SXSWi Director Hugh Forrest has seen how SXSWi has grown and taken off and now he wants to expand the property and brand outside the realm of downtown Austin. Forrest has announced V2V August 11-14 2013 at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas.

While the strip is still a short distance away from Zappos founder Tony Hsieh’s Downtown Project, the 4 day SXSW conference is a welcome event among all of Las Vegas’ tech community.

Forrest hasn’t decided what “V2V” means just yet but told the Austin Chronicle “Well, the idea there is that it is somewhat of a meaningless term, but if you really want to think of a meaning there, it could be visionary to visionary, or voice to voice, or voice to visionary, or visionaries to Vegas. We like that it’s an open palette and will afford us some room to grow and develop into whatever this event becomes.”

While the Downtown Project continues to grow and the Vegas tech scene is on fire we’re pretty confident that V2V will catch on just as quickly. If it doesn’t though, Forrest isn’t worried. He’s used to building things slowly and organically.

” I think that we can bring a lot of skill and expertise to the Las Vegas venture. On the other hand, one of the reasons SXSW is where it’s at now is it that it was allowed to grow somewhat slowly and organically. We were afforded the luxury of making mistakes on a fairly small stage and then learning from those mistakes and growing after it, growing better. It’d be great if the Las Vegas thing draws a big crowd the first year but at the same time, I don’t want to grow that too fast. I’m very much a believer of the slow, organic growth idea as a way to figure out exactly what you’re doing” Forrest said in the Austin Chronicle interview.

“With the growth and popularity of the startup-related programming across the SXSW family of events, it is clear that there is enough momentum to create a wholly unique and independent event focused on entrepreneurs,” said SXSW V2V Producer Christine Auten said in a statement. “SXSW V2V will follow the same general strategy we have followed with other SXSW experiences. It is about turning creative ideas into reality — bringing visionaries to Vegas.”

SXSW V2V will take place at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas — a deluxe urban resort in the heart of the Vegas Strip — from Sunday, August 11 through Wednesday, August 14. SXSW V2V registration will include three days of programming, an opening reception, welcome dinner and an eclectic mix of evening and networking events. Register now at the discounted rate of $695 through December 14, 2012

Linkage:

Looking to participate,speak or volunteer at V2V click here

Want to pitch at V2V click here

Maybe you should warm up your pitch at “everywhereelse.co” click here

Boston TechStars Startup: Saverr Offers Coupons From Receipts, You Know The Things You Actually Buy

The intuitiveness of the algorithms used to deliver Google adsense and Amazon suggestions can seem eerily close to home, but even as good as they are they still sometimes miss grasping what you are really looking for and what you really want to buy. Proximity based coupon apps are great but unless they are generic in nature it’s hard to say what you’re going to buy.

That’s why Boston startup, and Techstars alum, Saverr offers the best couponing proposition to the coupon user. Saverr gives you coupons based on what you actually buy based on what you actually bought using your receipt.

You know those machines that set next to the register tape at Target and the grocery store? You know the ones that spit out the coupons at the end of your visit? Well Saverr is giving you that machine, inside your phone. Pretty bad ass huh?

Saverr uses your actual receipt, the entire receipt, to give you coupons on the items that you just bought. Most likely you are going to buy them again right?

The idea came about when the Israeli team was trying to create a shopping discovery app of sorts. What they quickly found wasn’t that the world needed another discovery app, but the world needed a money saving app. Their proprietary receipt scanning technology is the back bone of their app.

The best part for the consumer is since Saverr is working on the manufacturer coupon side of the world, you can get coupons based on receipts from all types of stores. You’re not relegated to the store that you’re currently shopping in.

We got a chance to talk to the Saverr team which relocated to Boston for Techstars and is staying around for a while. Check out the interview below:

New York TechStars Startup Condition One Raises $2.35M From Mark Cuban And More

New York Techstars alum Condition One has just closed a seed round at $2.35 million. The round was led by Dallas Maverick’s owner and billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban as well as Manilla CEO George Kilavkoff and more. Cuban initially invested $500,000 in the immersive video startup earlier this summer.

Academy award nominated photographer and videographer Danfung Dennis has seen his work in Newsweek and the New York Times. He’s been hailed for shooting some of the best war footage ever seen. That’s in part because Dennis has found a new way to capture more of what we see in video.

Humans actually see a wide range of things in their peripheral vision and then adjust based on what’s interesting in their range of vision. Video isn’t that way. Video can actually see what’s shot straight on, but then, because of the way us humans see, it doesn’t feel as natural.

Dennis has created Condition One to capture and share things that typical video misses and includes a 180 field of vision. Condition One is software that takes that warped 180 degree footage shot with a fisheye lens and then translates it back into a clear flat image that we see. It’s somewhat like the Lytro that lets you shoot out of focus photos now and focuses them in later.

Even with Shark Tank, people know that Mark Cuban isn’t typically an investor at seed stages of the game. However, in addition to the Maverick’s Cuban’s other large business is HDTV which was just rebranded as AXS TV. This is where Condition One makes a lot of sense. Cuban’s AXS TV is known for it’s live concerts and events. Condition One’s technology is perfect for capturing events and putting them into a better viewing perspective.

“Our technology is going to enable some amazing new concert experiences where the user can pan back and forth between the stage and the crowd, between the drummer and guitarist, or between the action onstage and what’s going on backstage,” Condition One COO Andrew Chang told The Verge.

Condition One allows viewers to take videos of concerts, and sporting events and then pan back to the action that they really want to see, bringing into focus the parts that are most important to them.

“My work has been an evolution from still images to video and now into immersive experiences,” said Dennis. “Yet, I’m still motivated by the same idea: that the future of storytelling will be driven by technology.”

Linkage:

Check out Condition One here

Source: TC Verge

Huh a Startup Conference where we can exhibit for less than $400?

North Carolina Startup: BuyStand Introduces Name Your Price Goods Buying

Name your price was a concept introduced and revolutionized by the negotiator, William Shatner, in his ever so popular commercials for Priceline.com. Typically when talking about Priceline.com these days in regards to startups, it’s mentioning Scott Case the founding CTO of Priceline.com, and now the CEO of Startup America. Well we’re talking about Priceline.com because of that infamous name your price concept and a new startup in the Raleigh area of North Carolina called BuyStand.

BuyStand is the latest startup from North Carolina serial entrepreneur Joe Davy. His most recent startup EvoApp failed, of course as any good founder and entrepreneur knows failure leads to success. Failing fast is just one of the methodologies entrepreneurs in 2012 live by.

BuyStand is completely different than Davy’s previous startup.

For concept demonstration purposes Davy used one vertical market, outdoors. Obviously the platform will work for any retail good but outdoors was a great place to start.

As you can probably imagine, reading this far, BuyStand takes the “name your price” concept and applies it to outdoor goods. Whether you’re looking for the latest running shoes or the best all terrain jacket or back pack, you’ll find it at BuyStand. But you won’t find a typical priced out click through e-commerce portal.

With BuyStand the user selects the item that they want, names the price they’re willing to pay and then BuyStand sets that payment aside. Once a buyer has named a price, the BuyStand system lets the buyer know they have a taker and from there the “bid” is either accepted or rejected. If the “bid” (price) is accepted than BuyStand pays the vendor and the buyers product is shipped to their home.

It’s a two click process, name your price and click.

Davy says the need for BuyStand arises from the fact that buyers waiting for items and buying them second hand, used or “off the truck” at sites like e-Bay and Craigslist account for $200 billion dollars in lost profit.

“BUYSTAND solves this problem by eliminating the price and creating an open, efficient, free market.” Davy told the CED Start Something blog.

BuyStand is open in an limited Beta at the moment and you can sign up for a beta invite by visiting the link below.

Linkage:

Source: CED Start Something Blog

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Vegas Tech Fund Startup Romotive Lands $5 Million Dollar Round, Prepares 3rd Generation Robot

Many of you are familiar with the story of Romotive. This was the company that was building iPhone controlled robots in a mini assembly line in the founders’ apartment at the Ogden in Las Vegas. Of course if you’re familiar with Tony Hsieh’s Downtown Project or the Vegas Tech Fund you know that the Ogden building is entrepreneur and founder central.

Romotive has been making all the right moves. In the summer of 2011 the then three person company participated in the TechStars Seattle cohort. After that they launched a Kickstarter campaign to get their robots into the hands of backers.

It was that Kickstarter campaign that caught Hsieh’s eye. The story goes that Hsieh received the weekly email from Kickstarter highlighting some of the projects raising money at the time and Romotive was one of them. Hsieh reportedly liked their three minute video and actually knew a friend of theirs who was staying on his couch.

Hsieh is big on referrals in fact you can’t get a meeting with Hsieh or the Vegas Tech Fund without having a referral from inside the network. But like other tight knit organizations, once you’re in you’re in.

After Hsieh participated in a $1.5 million dollar round in December of last year the team relocated to their current home at the Ogden building. Business Insider reports that the team has grown to 18 and they are all living, playing and building robots together.

That’s all going to change now though as Romotive has just closed a $5 million dollar Series-A round. With that round the company plans on adding a few more employees and shifting production to a factory in China. According to Geekwire, the round was led by Sequoia Capita with CrunchFund and SV Angels participating among others.

On top of the $5 million dollar round Romotive has gone back to Kickstarter to raise another $100,000 from the community. As they report in their Kickstarter pitch they are looking to broaden the robot by creating more apps and the $100,000 will be used to start that development program.

Romotive isn’t the first smartphone controlled robot startup to catch the eyes of David Cohen and the TechStars team. Orbotix, the Boulder based creator of the “Sphero” ball, accelerated at TechStars Boulder and had Brad Feld as one of their main mentors. Feld went on to participate in Orbotix seed round via his Foundry Group. Orbotix has grown up big time as well. They recently announced a partnership for distribution in 1200 Target stores just in time for the holidays.

Linkage: