Monica Selby - 5/16 - Serious Startups

Jim McKelvey, Paul Singh + 6 More New Speakers Added to #EETN Lineup

Everywhere Else Tennessee is right around the corner, y’all. We’re measuring the venue, scheduling the parties, and ordering the BBQ.

With tickets already on sale, we’re also signing up some exciting new speakers. Tickets are $150 right now, but the early adopter discount is ending very, very soon. This will be a can’t-miss event for entrepreneurs, investors, and creatives outside Silicon Valley.

Jim McKelvey

Jim is a General Partner at Cultivation Capital. In 2009, Jim co-founded Square, one of the fastest growing technology companies in the US, which enables anyone to take credit card payments anywhere using their mobile device. Jim now sits on the board of directors of Square. Jim’s first venture was co-founding Mira Digital Publishing in 1990, which is a leader in electronic publishing for scientific conferences. Jim is an advisor to several startups including Kabbage and LockerDome.

In addition to his business ventures, Jim is a published author and glassblowing artist, and has published several books. He is a graduate of Washington University in St. Louis.

Paul Singh

Paul is the founder of Disruption Corporation which provides tools, research and advisory services to corporations, angel investors and venture capital firms.

Previously, he was a Partner at 500 Startups, a 4 year old “super angel” fund headquartered in Mountain View, CA and has overseen the investments in 500+ companies across 35+ countries. He is currently serving as an Entrepreneur in Residence with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and DHS/USCIS.

Prior to Disruption Corporation and 500, Paul was the founder of a few other startups (two successful exits and a number of failures in between) and spent some time at PBworks, AOL and Symantec. He can be reached at twitter.com/paulsingh

Nicole Glaros

Nicole got her entrepreneurial start in the 4th grade, orchestrating cousins into theatrical plays and charging neighbors admission. From there, she founded three startups which resulted in one win and 2 losses. Since then, she’s spent over a decade mentoring and funding early-stage web software companies. Most recently, Nicole is a Managing Director at Techstars, a startup accelerator based out of Boulder, Colorado.

She’s been with Techstars since it’s early days in 2009, has run 6 programs and has close to 70 companies in her portfolio.

She was named one of the “Coolest People in New York Tech” and an Extraordinary Woman in New York Tech by Business Insider in 2013, Marie Claire named her one of the “NewGuard”, and Entrepreneur Magazine named her One of the Most 7 Powerful Women to Watch.

Nait Jones

Naithan “Nait” Jones created the AgLocal in late 2011. His dream: to match independent and family meat farms to the wholesale and retail buyers who want to buy their meat directly. Because he is from a family of chefs and farmers, he understands the trials of raising and cooking delicious food. Nait’s professional career is in enterprise technology and technology start-ups including successful stints at Sprint Corporate, Gartner Research and the well- regarded Kauffman Foundation.

We’re also excited to welcome these speakers:

Josh Hix, Cofounder, Plated
Kevin Lavelle–CEO/Cofounder, Mizzen and Main
Tony Montleone–Manager at PERQ
Kevin Chick-Dockery–CEO/Founder, Yoddlem

You can see the full list of speakers here, and there are still more to come.

StartupBus Builds Startup Community Everywhere Else

“You know what yous should do?” Nick said to me one Thursday night. “You should volunteer to be press on the Nashville StartupBus.”

2 days later I found myself up at 6:30 AM (for crying out loud!) and heading to the Nashville Entrepreneur Center to catch the bus. This bus, to be exact:

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67 hours later, 2 ice stops, and 1 almost-mental breakdown later, we pulled into the hotel in San Antonio. I may or may not have had some colorful things to call Nick at this point.

Still, riding the Nashville bus was awesome. I met some great people, learned a lot on the mentoring team, and got to see some pretty cool companies built. But none of that prepared me for the amazing experience the 2 days at Rackspace headquarters would be.

This is the second year Rackspace has hosted the competition at the end of the StartupBus ride. If you haven’t heard, Rackspace bought an old mall and turned it into office space. It’s pretty awesome.

The teams started preliminary pitches around 9 AM, even though many of the buses got in at 1 or later. Preliminary pitches were done in front of panel of StartupBus judges, while in another room teams prepped for their turn. Lots of pacing, lots of coffee, and lots of people randomly talking to themselves under their breath. Basically, it was startup heaven.

Sixteen teams went on to semifinals, and from there 8 more teams were chosen for the finals (Including Nashville’s On the List). Finals judges included Guy Kawasaki and Robert Scoble, among others, and they didn’t hold back in their criticisms and advice for the teams. Ultimately Mexico’s SmartHost came out on top.

The competition was fun, but the real story of StartupBus happened after the fact when several people migrated to SXSW. As the weekend wore on, the folks from various buses found themselves together again and again. The annual GroupMe chat had repeatedly have the limit raised because more and more people wanted to be involved.

“It’s like everywhere we go, it’s half StartupBus people,” Roxanne Spielvogel told me. “We just can’t get enough of hanging out!”

That kind of community is no accident or serendipity. The team at StartupBus see it as their number one goal, beyond the competition and the companies built on the buses.

StartupBus National Director Jon Gottfried put it to me this way:

Our community is actually the primary focus of StartupBus. In many ways, the competition is just the induction into that community. So the strength of our group at SxSW is truly our goal – and it has nothing to do with the conference. Those bonds and that support network are permanent. We frequently see Buspreneurs working together, founding companies together, and becoming great friends long after the competition ends. For me, the StartupBus community has had an immense impact on both my personal and professional life in New York tech.

Want to be involved in StartupBus? Check out the website and follow them on Twitter. You won’t regret it.

PS–I would be remiss if I didn’t say thanks to the amazing sponsors both of StartupBus national and of the Nashville bus. Rackspace was a great host, and companies like Elance, SendGrid, and Twilio made the whole thing a great time. For the Nashville bus, thanks to the Crunchfire team for riding along and being great mentors. JumpStart Foundry and LaunchTN were also huge sponsors that provided so much for the trip.

Caktus Wants to Make Music Discovery Social Again

It seems like everything’s going social these days. Just last week we wrote about Startup Bus company TrustVino, who is trying to put your friends’ favorite wine recommendations on your phone.

The new music app Caktus launched on Sunday at SXSW, and they’re essentially doing the same thing with music.

You sign up through Facebook or Twitter (on your iPhone or iPad). In the app, pins are dropped on a map to show where your friends are listening to music. You can see the song they’re listening to by hovering over the pin, and play a sample or buy the track from iTunes. If you already have the song on your phone, you can listen to it in the app.

The company ran a 6 week beta with 50 users, mostly in the Indianapolis area. In that time, they saw 10,000 plays through the app. That kind of traction got them an invitation to launch and SXSW.

“The app came about because my brother always got to the bands first,” cofounder Dane Regnier told me when we talked at SXSW last weekend. “Once we moved away from each other, it just wasn’t easy to share what music we were listening to anymore. Caktus makes that a lot easier.”

Obviously passionate about what he’s built, Regnier was bouncing and talking fast, quick to explain features and data points from the app.

“We’re social-first,” he said when I asked about Spotify’s stream. “No one else did it that way.”

Most social apps bank on building a huge user base they can then market to. Caktus is going a different way by jumping on the Apple affliate program to bring in revenue.

Despite being “social-first” Caktus will have an uphill fight to battle other discovery methods like Spotify, Pandora, or basic word of mouth. Still, the app is beautifully designed, and like a lot of new music startups, independent artists and bands are a big focus for them. Those little guys can often get lost (or screwed) on the bigger platforms.

Check out Caktus on their website.

On The List Brings Exclusive Concert Experiences to Regular People

Startup Bus is rolling on along, and companies are talking, coding, and pitching fast.

On the Tennessee Startup Bus, On the List dominates the back seats. Even on little sleep, the team is hyped up and excited about their product.

Imagine you’ve gotten tickets to the hottest show coming to town this month. Most likely, you bought your ticket on a platform that charged outrageous fees, and you’ll be far from the stage or squashed in a crowd. That’s how concerts have always been, and it’s what we’ve come to expect.

Meanwhile, a brand–say Heineken–has spent $50,000 on sponsoring the event. That means their name is branded along the event and probably plastered all over the venue. Unfortunately, because we’re all used to branding at this point, you may not even notice the signs.

On the List solves both of these problems. As a fan, you pay the same amount for tickets, but brands sponsor add-ons that make your experience exponentially better. Forget signs or hats. What if Heineken sponsored your beer during the show? My guess is you’d remember Heineken fondly after that, and it’ll probably cost them as much or less than the “big” sponsorship.

The idea was originally pitched by Jack McCann. As a concert promoter in Nashville, McCann had first hand experience in the gap between brand sponsorship and audience engagement.

“When I was a kid I played a lot of Connect the Dots,” McCann told me when I asked about his initial inspiration. (Forgive him. We’ve been up for many, many hours.)

“The idea of throwing money at the big picture and hoping for a halo effect seems like that’s just not effective anymore,” he said once we got serious. “Brands needed a better value proposition. I thought it would be innovative and disruptive to allow them to directly connect with the fans. It gives brands an agile opportunity to curate the fan experience.”

A team of guys coalesced around it and got to work. And by got to work, I mean got to work. During our crazy trip, the team has validated their concept, built their service, and signed up users. One team member made 50 phone calls yesterday, pacing the bus and recruiting users. On the List is smoking through this Startup Bus thing.

You can go ahead and sign up on their website.

Feeling Left Out of the Startup Bus? Play the Game!

San Antonio or Bust

Startup Buses around the country are making their way to San Antonio, ice and border patrol be damned.

There’s so much happening on the buses. We’ve been traveling with the Tennessee Startup Bus, which I’ve gotten pretty partial to. But, there are also buses winding their way from Washington state, New York, Guadalajara, Tennessee, Florida, Missouri, and California. Every bus has encountered some issues along the way. (Last we heard, the Mexico bus kept getting stopped at the border.)

But that’s not slowing down the teams.

Every bus has 4-5 teams coding away, building businesses regardless of obstacles. Don’t believe me? Check out the game.

The Startup Bus Game allows you to get to know all the teams and watch their milestones as they travel. You can also pick your favorite (as long as it’s a Tennessee team) and invest in their company.

“The game exists because Startup Bus has a limited number of spots, but people wanted to be involved and know how they could support the teams,” said Jonathan Gottfried, National Director of StartupBus. “So we created the game to give them a way to be more involved and help local entrepreneurs.”

Each team’s performance in the game also affects the final judging. If the judges are on the fence about a team in the qualifying round, a great showing in the Startup Bus Game will help push them into the semifinals.

Don’t miss out on the fun anymore. Head on over to the Startup Bus Game and start investing.

TrustVino Helps You Find the Best Wine Around

My favorite startups are the ones I that make me say, “I want that!”

When I heard the pitch for TrustVino, I wasn’t too impressed. Untapped for wine. Eh, cool, I guess, but not ultimately exciting.

Then the TrustVino team kept talking. Their tagline is Wine, Socially. Similar to a social network, they utilize “friends” and a stream (or, “pour” if you will). Users download the app and have access to the company’s wine database. From there they can start finding friends, recommend wines, and add their own favorite wines. Then, the next time they’re at the wine store, they can pull up the web app and get a recommendation from their friends about the next wine to try.

TrustVino can be used by wine snobs and wine newbs alike. More knowledgeable wine drinkers can expand their expertise, but they can also accumulate a “following” of people looking for great wines. People just getting into wine, who are overwhelmed by the options, vintages, and flavors, can get quality recommendations as they explore the wine world.

Most social media models rely on huge user bases to monetize through ads. TrustVino is shooting for revenue out the gate, with an affiliate model that allows people to click through to Wine.com to buy the recommended wine. They have some interesting ideas for other revenue streams that can implemented when the user base grows.

Oh, yeah. This awesome app I’m already anxiously awaiting is being built on the Tennessee Startup Bus.

“Initially we thought this would be a cool app to build on a bus about wine,” cofounder Roxanne Spielvogel told me. “But when we started telling people about it we realized that this was actually a real need in the market.”

The idea was pitched by Boaz Reynolds on the first leg of the trip. By the time we got back on the bus in Chattanooga, the team was formed and they were ready to go.

“Ultimately this is something I wanted to use, something I wanted to have. It’s selfishly mine,” Boaz Reynolds, cofounder of TrustVino. “The team gravitated to the idea in Chattanooga, and it just kind of organically happened.”

You can follow TrustVino on Twitter, and they’ll let you know when the app is ready.

There are some amazing companies being built on the Tennessee Startup Bus, and the other buses crisscrossing the country. But TrustVino is the first one I’ve heard of that I’m wishing was a thing right this minute.

Because, hey, we’re stuck in Baton Rouge, LA thanks to ice, and I need a drink.

Ice Doesn’t Slow Down the Tennessee Startup Bus

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What do you do when you have a bus full of entrepreneurs, ready to work…and stuck?

The Tennessee Startup Bus is finding that out in Memphis this morning. The sleet and ice started coming down last night on the way in from Birmingham, and by the time we pulled up to the hotel in Memphis, we were walking through ice.

But that’s nothing. This morning the door of the bus was frozen shut. Forget the bad roads or sleet still coming down. We couldn’t even get on the bus!

So, we headed down the street to the beautiful new Start Co building and made ourselves at home.

The teams got right down to work, and the momentum is beautiful to behold. One team is even talking about the users they’ll have signed up by the end of the day.

Because the Tennessee Startup Bus is killing it.

(Note: I totally get that I’m breaking by journalistic integrity by being so biased. But I dare any of you to ride along with a group of amazing entrepreneurs from anywhere and not start cheering for them.)

The awesome thing about our being stranded in Memphis, besides the proximity to our amazing conference venue, is that we’re also close to the new Start Co offices. After moving this weekend, we are the first entrepreneurs to fill the space, which was only a short walk from our hotel.

“We’re excited to host and be able to provide hospitality for a longer period of time,” Start Co founder and CEO Eric Mathews told me. “We believe serendipity is a huge part of entrepreneurship, and we’re glad we were downtown and able to bring the Startup Bus to our space.”

It’s getting crazy on the Startup Bus, y’all. Follow us on @nibletztweets for all the updates. You can also follow the teams to get their perspective:

@yourscavengrhunt

@trustvino

@onthelistapp

Tennessee Startup Bus Knows How to Travel in Style

“We’re not taking a Greyhound,” Steve Repetti told me Saturday night at the orientation for the Tennessee Startup Bus. Well, that was an understatement.

Currently wrapped in the logos of sponsors LaunchTN, Jumpstart Foundry, and Crunchfire, the bus is regularly employed as a tour bus for rock stars and politicians. So, basically, it’s the perfect bus to host the building of the next hot startup.

I’ve never been on the Startup Bus before. The first day was an amazing experience.There’s something unique about a bus full of incredibly smart people, pulled out of their comfort zones and on course to a huge competition.

Like the team who came back to the mentoring session with a half-baked that the investor mentors tore apart.

Like all startup pitch/hackathon events, we started the trip with people pitching their ideas and the crowd picking the ones they wanted to work on. Those of us on the outside were a little surprised by this one idea–an anti-social network social network–being picked. But, hey, the crowd picked it, and the team assembled, so maybe it would work.

It wouldn’t.

All the other mentoring sessions took about 30 minutes. We helped the teams refine their ideas, think through monetization, and identify next steps. An hour into the meeting with this one team, we were still going round-and-round about what the idea even was exactly. Everyone was cramped, tired, and stressed, and we were getting nowhere with this awesome team. At this point, it’s about 8:15, and thanks to the weather, we’re running an hour behind getting into Memphis. Things looked very, very bleak.

This about the time Startup Bus magic happened.

After ascertaining that everyone was at an impasse, with no way to make this project work and no new ideas to pursue, Repetti pulled them to the front of the bus and announced to all the buspreneurs that the team needed help back at square one.

“This isn’t failure,” he said. “You only fail when you decide to quit. This is how the process is supposed to work.”

All of the teams willingly put their own tasks aside to help the 4th team brainstorm new ideas. There was lots of hilarity and very few real ideas, but as the time passed, you could see the team go from defeated to hopeful again. Just the act of being back out with their fellow entrepreneurs, being encouraged, and laughing brought their spirits back up.

Finally someone said, “What about the emergency alert app that was pitched earlier?”

Lightbulbs went off.

The team reconvened with the mentors and talked through the logistics of the idea. The guy with the original idea, who was already on a different team, willingly agreed to let the team build out his idea and consult for them as they went.

Honestly, it was an agonizing 2 1/2 hours. You think stress is bad in a normal room, where you can walk away for a minute to think? Try it on a bus, where there’s nowhere to go.

There’s a lot of time left on this crazy trip. Sundays’s stresses ended well, and the team is re-energized and focused on building the best product they can.

But will Monday end as well?

Israel-based Samba Videos the Reactions to Your Videos

We’re big Snapchat users in my house.

No, no sexting over here. Around here Snapchat is mostly used for us to receive videos of college athletes doing stupid stuff like tackling each other over a video game controller. (My husband’s a coach, and for some reason the athletes think we want to see this stuff.)

I have to admit, though, the guys’ Snapchat videos are pretty funny. More than once I thought they’d love to see Coach’s reaction as he watched yet another one.

With that in mind, I was really excited to see Samba’s release last week. The iPhone app lets you send video to your friend and records their reaction as they watch. Then, it plays the video back to you, with your friend’s reaction playing in a little circle screen. Check out the video:

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Obviously, right now the company is targeting college and high school students (and their coaches). Those are hot markets that everyone wants to capture. But, the app could be used for more poignant moments, too. Grandparents witnessing a special moment or loved ones announcing big news from far away. Unlike Snapchat, the videos don’t disappear. So, you can replay that sweet (or hilarious) moment over and over again.

Samba was founded in Tel Aviv by Barak Hachamov, Shay Erlichmen, Ronel Mor, and Oren Meiri. They do have competition from apps like Gigglemail and Dumbstruck, but Hachamov isn’t sweating it.

“We want to win the world in this category. It’s not going to replace anything,” he told Inc. “There is always room or a gap between services to give you an opportunity to bring something new that mimics human behavior.”

Samba had the great luck of debuting last week during the WhatsApp frenzy. With everyone looking for the new next thing, they seem to have gotten a nice boost in what could have been an otherwise normal launch day.

The company was also accepted to the SXSW Acclerator and will present on March 8th or 9th to the crowd at the annual festival.

Bourbon & Boots Brings Southern Culture to Your Doorstep

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I’m from the South.

I know. Y’all are so surprised, right?

In college a guy told me, “You guys [he wasn’t from the South] are the only people in the country who make a big deal about the South and North.”

Well, whether that’s true or not, these days Southern culture seems to be having a day in the sun. And those of us who grew up sippin’ sweet tea and swimmin’ in the creek understand why.

Bourbon & Boots is a company in Little Rock, AR that definitely understands it. They’re building a whole business off of Southern culture: Southern crafts, Southern clothes, Southern food–you name it and Bourbon & Boots has an artisan producing it.

Founder Matt Price says it best:

“Southern is a state of mind.”

Bourbon & Boots recruits artisans from all over the country that create products that fit the unique brand they’ve built. They range from kitschy bullet earrings to vintage cowboy boots and everywhere in between.

My personal favorite category is “Food and Booze,” where you can find a whole range of Southern-inspired food and utensils.

Bourbon & Boots isn’t merely an e-commerce company, though. Alongside the products they sell, they’re also developing a content company that showcases the best of Southern living. Of course, it has a little more edge than the magazine of that name. With articles like “Smooth Talk About Kentucky’s Speakeasy Bourbon” and “Tonic Syrup Nearly Ruined My Social Life,” this ain’t your grandmama’s Southern Living.

Of course, marrying content and commerce isn’t always the easiest feat. Refinery29 closed down its commerce branch last year and raised money to double down on content.

When I asked Bourbon & Boots’ Price about this, he chuckled.

“E-commerce is hard. Content is really hard. Trying to nail them both is impossible,” he admitted.

But, nailing them they are. More than 2 years after launch, Bourbon & Boots continues to grow, adding new vendors and freelance writers to the ranks. They’re also looking to create their own products in 2014, a move that could stretch their resources but also provide huge benefit in growing their brand.

Personality-driven commerce sites are a thing right now. Just look at Fab, Warby-Parker, JustFab, and NastyGal for proof. Bourbon & Boots plays into that trend with a delightful business that could only be built in the South.

And, yes. They do drink bourbon and wear boots.

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Draft Makes the Writing Life Easier–One Feature At A Time

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I’ve been a writer for most of my life, since second grade, actually. Back then my tools of choice were a #2 and a yellow steno pad.

Since then, I’ve tried every writing trick and tool in the world. (Because that’s what writers do. We test out writing software in order to soothe our not-writing consciences.)

Even though I liked all the software I’ve used, nothing stuck.

Then I tried Draft.

Founded by YC alum Nathan Kontny, Draft is a simple web app that allows you to, in their words, “write better.”

Well, I say it’s simple. But, honestly, the feature list is a thing to be admired:

Version control
Hemingway mode (to kill the inner editor)
Commenting
Collaboration
Rest API
Image hosting
“Publishing” that sends the draft to various platforms

Actually, I’ll stop there, but the list goes on. There’s even a “Ask a Pro” feature, which allows you to get feedback on your writing when there’s no one else you can con–er, ask to help.

Launched a little over a year ago, Draft is one of those rare lovely things that is a true labor of love as well as a business. On the heels of Cityposh, his YC company that was winding down, Kontny did a lot of writing. Like any hacker, he soon found things he didn’t like about his current options and started thinking about how to fix them.

“Everything you see in Draft was a personal itch in my own writing,” he told me over the phone.

In the year since launch, Draft has accumulated “tens of thousands” of users and brings in revenue from subscriptions and the “Ask a Pro” feature. I asked Kontny about raising money, but he shrugged it off.

“I want to use Draft forever,” he explained to me. Although he has a little YC funding left over, he knows that raising a large round of VC would make him beholden to investors, which could kill the organic growth he’s seeing.

“There’s no time bomb,” he said. “If it doesn’t explode in a year, I’ll still have time to work on it.”

In so many ways, Kontny is the opposite of what we hear startups should be. He’s a single founder, mainly bootstrapping by choice, and focused on revenue over growth. Yet, the slow organic strategy could be just the thing that keeps Draft going for years to come.

Marc Andreesen: High Functioning Businesses Aren’t Disneyland

We’re all familiar with the stories of founder relationships gone sour. It’s a common tale:

Founders arrive on the scene with a hot new product. Raise crazy amounts of money. See enormous traction and get tons of hype from the press and their peers.

Then, out of the blue (it seems), there’s division and strife. One founder leaves, or is ousted. Lawsuits, hard feelings, drama.

It would be easy to chalk this up to the youth culture of startup land, and Silicon Valley in general. It would be easy to say that if founders were more mature when they were handed millions of dollars of venture capital this wouldn’t be such a common story.

Maybe there’s truth there, but according to Marc Andreesen’s latest tweetstorm, dysfunction in the highest levels of any business is normal. We like to think of building businesses as dispassionate, analytical endeavors: figure out what makes money and do that.

But what if there are fundamental differences in how the founders see themselves making money? Suddenly, even the smartest, most analytical people are at a stalemate. Throw in the passion for their companies that most founders have, and it’s no wonder there are hard feelings.

According to Andreesen, that’s okay.

Moral? Business is stressful.There’s constant conflict, emotion, even anger. Building a company is an intense experience, period. Harnessed properly, this is the crucible out of which high performance and great results emerge. Satisfaction of overcoming challenges.

To quote Jim Barksdale, “This isn’t a family, and I ain’t your daddy.” But together we can build great things & make our grandkids proud.

Are you building great things? Then it’s time to take a deep breath and expect some drama.

The 20 Greatest Startups of All Time [Infographic]

What makes a startup truly great?

Is it how quickly (or for how much) you sell? Is it profits? Number of users? Social or cultural impact?

Well, yes.

Our friends at Verge Startups put together an infogrpahic that outlines the top 20 startups of all time. They took into consideration economic factors like market cap and bottom line revenue, but they also considered the cultural impact the company has made.

You’ll see the obvious on the list: Apple, Google, Facebook. But they aren’t the only companies that have affected the digital landscape.

China’s Startup Giants

Chinese companies like Tencent and Baidu are also on the list. We may only hear about them occasionally in the United States, but they have huge followings in Asia. Tencent–established 6 years before Facebook–brings social media, games, and other products to China. While they offer several digital products, including chat app WeChat, their real money is made in virtual goods, a market Facebook hasn’t seemed to be able to break into.

Baidu is China’s answer to Google, bringing search to the largest populace in the world. Obviously smaller than the American giant, Baidu still holds an impressive amount of power in China.

The Original Founders

When we think of startups, we usually think “new” and “innovative.” But there had to be someone who started it all, right?

Hewlett-Packard was founded in 1939, and its founders Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard are symbolically credited with “founding” Silicon Valley. HP is #10 on the list, with a $52.87 billion. Not the largest, but not the smallest either. Without a doubt, HP had a cultural impact that continues to affect us all.

The Not-So-Certain Successes

The thing about startups is that even when you’re successful you could still fail.

Yahoo, eBay, Groupon, and Zynga all made the top 20 greatest startups of all time, yet many question the stability of any of these companies. Oh, they’re all hanging in there, and no one should count them out yet. But each of these companies has big obstacles to ensure ultimate success.

Yet, like HP, few would argue the impact each has had on culture, and that coupled with still-high market caps–puts them on the list.

Who’s Missing?

So, what do you think? Is this list of the 20 greatest startups of all time accurate? Who did we miss, or who shouldn’t be on there?

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Glympse Continues to Spread Real Time Location Tracking Gospel

location sharing

Today at the Mobile World Congress, Seattle startup Glympse announced a partnership with Samsung’s ChatON app. The two companies will integrate Glympse’s real-time, temporary location into the chat app that comes pre-installed on most Samsung phones. The app also crosses platforms, allowing chat from Android, Apple, Blackberry and feature phones.

The two companies feel that ChatON’s cross-platform approach and Glympse’s ability to share location with anyone at any time are a good fit together.

“There are great synergies between Samsung’s ChatON and Glympse, and we’re excited to give the app’s global user base access to real-time location sharing,” said Bryan Trussel, co-founder and CEO of Glympse. “We believe location technology should be ubiquitous and incredibly easy to use, and by putting it directly into an SMS conversation, we’re providing a rich and immediate way for people to share where they are.”

ChatON reportedly has 180 million users. It’s no WhatsApp, but 100+ million users in 200 countries isn’t anything to sneeze at, either.

The partnership allows Glympse to spread its real time, temporary location technology across still more platforms. The app is already integrated into several cars, navigation apps, and on the Samsung smart watch, Galaxy Gear.

The recent flurry of partnership announcements is a new trend for Glympse, and one the company has long hoped for. Founded in 2009, a mere 2 years after the debut of the iPhone, Glympse has always felt like the underdog.

“The conventional wisdom was, ‘How would I use that?'” Trussel told me. “It’s really nice to come into our own.”

The company has 19 employees now and has only raised $7.5 million. They aren’t profitable yet, but as they continue to license their technology to high profile partners, the future is looking bright.

“We always strive to provide our users with the best, most innovative technologies to enhance their mobile conversations and, we hope, to make their lives easier,” said Jay Park, vice president, Samsung Electronics. “Real-time location sharing was at the top of our list, and we are excited to partner with Glympse to offer their technology to ChatON users around the globe.”

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