Interviews Archives - Page 55 of 57

Boston Startup: DailyFeats, Achieve Your Goals For Health & Well Being INTERVIEW

Sure everyone sets a New Years resolution and typically within a few weeks (if not shorter) the resolution is all but thrown out the window. You’re intentions may be great but the drive, and motivation isn’t there. The same can hold true when you set a goal, like losing weight to fit into a swim suit or quitting smoking.

Well a very cool startup in Boston called DailyFeats is here to help you stay on track, and motivate yourself to achieve your goals and it’s working.

DailyFeats is a reward based habit tracker. It takes your big goals like, quitting smoking and helps reduce them into smaller, more achievable goals, like baby steps. Maybe you need to decrease your cigarette intake or, cut back on the bars you go to where you tend to smoke more. Perhaps you need to eliminate a small stress trigger that signals you to smoke a cigarette. If you can achieve these smaller goals, you can ultimately conquer your bigger goals.

DailyFeats offers a two-fold reward system. The user can request what they’d like to receive for achieving their goal or they can earn points which can be converted to actual dollars and then donated to charity, essentially paying it forward.

DailyFeats was co-founder by two brothers Veer Gidwaney and Vinay Gidwaney along with their science advisor Meghan Searl.

We got a chance to talk with DailyFeats about the startup and how they can help people achieve their goals for health and well being.

Check out the interview, after the break
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Bethlehem PA Startup: Weather Trades Video Interview

Rarely have I found a company that deals with a force that disrupts more lives than any other issue. Weather. We’ve all watched the local meteorologist completely drop the ball and get it wrong. Weather Trades, a spin-off from Weather Trends International, has a product that could change the way you live. Seriously.

Here in the United States the typical yearly vacation time is an extremely limited two weeks. We take huge risks when we book our travel for that short period of time. Have you ever been to an outdoor wedding that ended up inside? Have you ever wondered if you should keep those winter clothes out for another 6 weeks? I have been directly or indirectly affected by each of these scenarios. If you could see a weather forecast for the next year – worldwide – with an accuracy of 80% or better how would your life be different?

Imagine you are the largest retailer in the world, and you have to decide to purchase air conditioners from the manufacturers but cannot decide whether or not to buy all of the stock or a third of it. Walmart had to make that decision:

“We bought all of the home center’s uncommitted air circulation orders from the manufacturers and had a great year. Our sell through was 98% compared to 85% last year based solely on a huge decision we made using your year-ahead summer forecast. A $130,000,000 win in one category.” Gordon Erickson, Senior Vice President Merchandising-Hardlines

Commodities Traders:

WTI is the ONLY company in the world that provides YEAR-AHEAD forecasts that can be integrated into trading models and other business applications. WTI provides a complete suite of products and services for commodity traders, energy traders, and the entire agricultural industry. This includes typical short range-forecasting services along with proprietary year-ahead global forecasts and analytical assessments for grains, sugar, energy, and other weather driven commodity markets across the globe.

Travel Sites: After approaching the more popular travel sites on the internet and being turned down Weather Trades turned their sites on TechCrunch Disrupt to hopefully find developers, startups, and investors who can build upon the unique tools that they’ve created. In all honesty this is the startup that had me most excited. To see a little more check out the interview by Kyle below. I will also be reviewing their wt360 Pro app in the coming days. It’s available in the App Store and Google Play

Find out more about Weather Trades here

Check out more of our TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2012 coverage here

We’re on a sneaker strapped, nationwide, startup road trip, for more on that (and to support our cause) click here

Israeli Startup: iTimdi A Social Network For Interests Founded By A 15 Year Old

15 year old Tal Hoffman is the Israeli founder of new social network iTimdi

Last month we brought you the story of 15 year old Jackson Gariety who’s startup #hashtraffic debuted at Startup Weekend Portland.

Now we’ve got the story of another 15 year old entrepreneur, Tal Hoffmen thousand of miles away in Israel. In his own words he describes his startup as: “iTimdi is an interests based social network. That means it lets you both create new social connections based on your interests & keep your previous ones”.

This is actually Hoffman’s second startup. His first was a new media reviews site which he did “just for fun”.

We got a few minutes between classes, and building his startup to talk with Hoffman about an interest focused social network and how a 15 year old launches a startup.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

Unfortunately, I’m the only founder, though I’m looking for one more technical co-founder. My name is Tal Hoffman, 15 y/o from Haifa, Israel. I’m a WEB programmer in PHP, and know a bit ASP & C sharp.

So you’re 15 years old? How does a 15 year old up and decide to start a social network?

Well, as a tech lover and programmer I thought about new ideas for new possible big websites. The fact I started to get bored of Facebook just accelerated all of this. At this point, I started to think about gaps Facebook and its competitors don’t cover and came up with this.

What do your parents think of this startup of yours?

My parents support my, though they aren’t really tech guys. The costs aren’t big so far, and the fact I do programming work for someone gives me some money to cover these little costs.

Is this your first startup?

This is my first startup, though I once built a reviews site from zero for fun matters.

So describe for our readers how an interest based social network works?

Well, interests based social network, specifically – iTimdi – lets you choose your interests.
Then, you’ll be able to post updates, share collections, create events, search for friends, etc on each interest’s page. This way, you’ll get the best opportunity to make new connections & manage them successfully.

You’re based in Israel, will itimdi come out in Israel first or are you targeting the US first?

Even though I’m based in Israel, iTimdi, from the very first day, targets to the international market, specifically, to the US. With Israel being the “startup nation”, it has some of the world’s best startups and entrepreneurship scene. The problem is that Israel is a very small country with only 7 million citizens. Therefore, iTimdi is targeted to the international community.

What problem does iTimdi solve?

Although the main social networks today provide their users ways to preserve their general connections, they don’t offer any efficient ways to get to know new ones. iTimdi does both due to a simple interface.

What is your secret sauce?

iTimdi’s secret sauce is the combination of meeting new friends, preserving old-general connections & customizable privacy preferences.

What other interests do you have outside of developing itimdi?

Besides programming I love rock music (including the best: RHCP, Eric Clapton & Led Zeppelin), drums (I’m a drummer…) and playing basketball.

What’s your plan for after high school?

My biggest plan is to keep being involved in iTimdi and making it to one of the biggest social websites players in the field.

What’s next for itimdi?

Hopefully, after releasing the Beta – release the final version to the public and work on making it the leader in helping people really manage great, interesting social life.

How can people find out more about you and itimdi?

At the official website: http://www.itimdi.com.
For any more questions feel free to email to contact@itimdi.com.

Linkage:

Nibletz is the voice of startups “everywhere else” check out more stories from “everywhere else” here

We’re on a sneaker-strapped nationwide startup road trip, find out more about it here

NY Startup MyStream: Share Your Music From Device To Device VIDEO INTERVIEW

NY startup MyStream is an app that allows you to share your music from device to device by simply using wifi or Bluetooth. Sounds basic enough right? Well the app comes packed with a lot of exciting features, and best of all it’s free.

When two friends have the MyStream app downloaded to their iPhones they can now share any music in their library with each other in a couple of different ways.

First, they can share over their choice of a wifi or bluetooth network.

They can also share the song one person is listening to in real time, with the other person. Or connected devices can browse each other’s libraries and listen to whatever songs they want off the library. Now this is a streaming share so you can’t copy the song form one device to another. However, if you like the song MyStream has a buy button that will connect you to where you can download the song directly to your device.

Now you don’t have to worry about sharing headphones and bumping heads or having to cuddle close to listen to the same iPhone speaker. MyStream eliminates all of that hassle.

Record labels aren’t put off by real estate agent turned tech startup founder Richard Zelson’s app because it encourages purchasing your own music. In an interview with our good friends at TechCocktail Zelson said: “We’re making it more valuable to have your own copy of music again,”

The buy button is the piece that keeps the industry folks happy. We’re sure you’re familiar with the scenario “Dude you need to hear this song”, well when the other user wants the song, they just go and buy it from their own device.

Check out the video below:

Linkage:

Find out more about MyStream here

More of our TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2012 coverage can be found here

We’re on a nationwide sneaker-strapped startup roadtrip, find out more here

There Are Good Fitness Startups Everywhere Else Like Canada’s Pumpup.co INTERVIEW

For the second time since their launch new Silicon Valley startup website Pando Daily has had blinders on to great startups. As you know earlier this year they missed the memo on the whole Chicago startup scene. Apparently they couldn’t find any good fitness startups either according to Pando Daily Founder Sarah Lacy.

Well we actually went digging for good fitness startups last week and low and behold on the open public forum we all know and love called Twitter we found Waterloo based startup pumpup.co. That proves two things actually, that great fitness startups exist everywhere else and that there is more to Waterloo than Blackberry.

What makes pumpup.co so great a number of things. For starters the three founders behind pumpup.co know their roles and do them well. In an industry that can run a little top heavy on the ego side they have the entrepreneurial founder, the sales, marketing and bizdev founder and of course the athletic trainer founder. You couldn’t have a fitness startup without one.

Phil Jacobson is the sales, marketing and bizdev founder, but he calls himself the hustler founder. We got a chance to talk to him aboat (lol) this great Canadian startup.

What is PumpUp?

PumpUp is a mobile and web application that allows users to build totally personalized, trainer-quality workouts. On top of the amazing workouts, PumpUp tracks your progress over time and provides users with coaching and reminders to improve their fitness and keep them motivated.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

Garrett Gottlieb: Garrett is the Hacker of PumpUp. He is a current Bachelor of Computer Science candidate at the University of Waterloo. He has held co-op positions at numerous software companies, including RIM and TribeHR.

Phil Jacobson: Phil is the Hustler of PumpUp. He is a current Bachelor of Business Administration candidate at Wilfrid Laurier University. He has held co-op positions at a variety of fortune 500 companies, including Unilever, PepsiCo, and ConAgra Foods.

Ben Pickard: Ben is the Trainer of PumpUp. He is a current Bachelor of Kinesiology student at the University of Waterloo and a certified Personal Trainer. He is the current President of the Strength and Conditioning club at his University.

Where are you based?

We are based out of Waterloo, Ontario in Canada. We have been awarded space in the Velocity Garage (a startup hub managed by the University of Waterloo).

What problem does PumpUp solve?

PumpUp solves 3 key problems. First off, there are many people who are unsure of what to do when working out, are repeating the same workout, or just choose to not workout at all. Secondly, personal trainers are expensive and finding a good one is difficult. Lastly, there is no current solution that provides users with a trainer-quality workout that is personalized just for them.

There are a few fitness platforms and apps out there now, what is your secret sauce?

Our secret sauce is providing our users with a trainer-quality, personalized workout in a beautifully designed web and mobile application, all for free.

Who is your target user?

Our target users are 18-30 year-old males and females who consider themselves at the beginner or intermediate level of working out. They either currently workout or are interested in starting to workout, but need more direction on what to do.

What’s one lesson you’ve learned in the startup process?

The best lesson that we’ve learned during the startup process so far is that is it crucial to focus on the core product and ensure you build a beautiful experience that adds value for your customers. It is easy to get lost while endlessly adding features to the application. It is essential to build a high-quality product. We believe that quality is essential in keeping our customers satisfied and coming back.

When are you launching?

We are launching our Alpha version on the web within the next two weeks. Following our Alpha web launch, we will be releasing our mobile application as quickly as possible – we are aiming for mid-end of June. Sign up for access to our Alpha launch at http://PumpUp.co.

What’s next for PumpUp?

As mentioned, our next step is launching our mobile version as soon as we can. Following our mobile application, we plan on adding additional social features to enhance the appeal of the application.

Linkage:

Check out pumpup.co at their website here

Nibletz is the voice of startups “everywhere else” see what we mean by reading these stories

Nibletz is on a sneaker-strapped nationwide startup road-trip find out more about it here

Video Interview With Diego Saez Gil Founder Of wehostels.com (formerly inbed.me)

Back in March we reported on a world traveler turned entrepreneur, Diego Saez Gil and his startup inbed.me. Inbed.me is a service that connects travelers to hostels across the world. In addition for finding, booking and discovering hostels, it has a back bone social network that helps users recommend hostels, suggest things to do and meet up while traveling.

Inbed.me was Diego’s second startup. His first startup was called Off Track Planet, the ultimate backpackers online guide to travel.

Diego recently changed the name of inbed.me to we hostels.com because it’s a little more politically correct. Inbed.me has some risky connotations.

Wehostels.com is exhibiting in Startup Alley at TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2012 check out our video interview below:

London Startup: Kebuki Is A Team Management Tool For Managers To Inspire

It’s been a while since I worked at Best Buy, but when I did during the very late 90’s and early part of the 2000s we used to have team meetings in the “hub” every day. Anyone who has worked at Best Buy probably remembers these meetings. Everyday as a department head and then sales lead we would go in the meeting with the team and have all the Best Buy notes, stock quotes, and store information.

Our regional manager at the time, now former Best Buy CEO, Brian Dunn, also had his stores add in key dates for employees, birthdays, maybe anniversaries or if we’d get reliable info about maybe a kids achievement at school, or maybe they just finished paying off their car. We would recognize that employee in that quick meeting. As silly as that sounds it made the employee feel good for the day and morale at our store was pretty good.

That kind of rubbed off during my radio career as well when I became “management”. Although I had much smaller teams, taking an employee out for a beer on their birthday when they had no idea you knew it was their birthday goes a long way.

This “soft” management style is the heart around London startup Kebuki. Kebuki is a team management mobile tool that can be managed on any web connected device, an iPad or iPhone. Basically you load a data set (that gets encrypted) into Kebuki consisting of employees name, position, salary and incentive package, husband, wife and kids names, personal anniversary dates and important work related dates revolving around the employee.

The app (platform) then puts all of these things in a timeline for the manager. The manager can then make public recognition for the employee via the company, or even through social media channels. According to research done by Kebuki and other management consultants, these little “pats on the back” go a long way.

Imagine how thrilled your employees will be that you remember their birthdays or when they call you to tell you their spouse is sick you can tell them you hope that their spouse feels better, by name.

But how do you really know? Well in addition to the team management platform Kebuki sends out an email to the employees on your team monthly, with one simple question, “On a scale of 0-10 how would you rate me as a manager”. This feedback is great for the manager, and it further reiterates that some “soft” management tactics can go a long way.

We got to talking with Charlie Cowan, the founder of Kebuki about his management inspiring startup, and why, despite the fact that Kebuki is based in the UK, they are launching in the US first.

Check out the interview, after the break
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Ohio Startup: Whotever, A New Social Website To Discover Whotever You Want

After South By Southwest in Austin Texas earlier this year, the last thing people want to hear about is a new “discovery” app or platform. It seems everyday another startup is launching to help discover people socially. Well this startup, based in Ohio, called Whotever is hoping to fix that problem.

As more and more social discovery sites pop up, actually using the web or your mobile to discover information on the things you actually want to know about gets harder in harder. Even with basic search engines like Google, the results you get today are much more polluted than the results of say a 2005 Google search.

That problem became evident to Timi Azeez and the other co-founders of Ohio based startup Whotever, 8 years ago. Azeez told nibletz.com:

“About 8 years ago, the three of us were in a heated debate and it prompted us to confirm our facts/findings on the internet. During the research online, we discovered that we could not find exactly the information we needed for our debate. Instead, we spent hours sifting through the data page by page defeating the purpose of the discussion. We realized the internet experience was more hectic than fun and this precluded us to start Whotever.com. It was the first step to improving the users’ experience on the internet.”

That’s the foundation for this new startup that they hope to launch later this year. We got a chance to talk a little more in-depth with Azeez about whatever.

More after the break
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London Based Startup: StoryBricks Lets You Create Your Own MMO Stories

I’m sure after reading the headline some of you are thinking making your own MMO story would kick ass, and it does. Thanks to the folks at new startup StoryBricks MMO fans can create their own characters and stories to share with friends in a simple to use, but feature packed interface.

StoryBricks is based in London and California and was founded by serial entrepreneur Rodolfo Rosini, Brian “Psychochild” Green and Buck Wilson. While Rosini is the experienced entrepreneur Green and Wilson are the MMO, gaming and RPG nuts.

As you’ll see form our interview with Rosini and Green the platform has really taken off in just days. 555 stories were created in just 72 hours, and that’s before the team could publish a tutorial on how to harness the power of the unique interface.

Let’s dive right in and find out more about this unique startup.

Tell us, what is storybricks?

Storybricks is a technology that allows users to create their own stories within games without any programming knowledge. It combines an easy-to-use visual editing system and a sophisticated and patent-pending intelligence layer to create a system that gives characters in a video game the illusion of life. We plan to put Storybricks into massively multiplayer online (MMO) games and let users have control over their play experience.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

The team is Rodolfo (a serial tech entrepreneur, 2x VC backed), Brian ‘Psychochild’ Green (an MMO developer that ran the legendary Meridian 59 MMO), Stéphane Bura (a game designer with a background in AI and tabletop RPG) and Buck Wilson (a designer that sold his previous startup and his apps got featured in Apple commercials)

Our advisor board include Don Bluth and Gary Goldman (the legendary Disney animators), Richard Bartle – the inventor or MMOs (back when they were called MUDs) and Chris Avellone (Wasteland 2, Planescape) who is the Chief Creative Officer of Obsidian

Where are you based?

The company is based in the SF Bay Area and we have an office in London

More after the break
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Atlanta Startup: LaunchTable, Find & Collaborate With The Ultimate Team

One of our favorite startups is Cleveland based Foundersync which links founders with each other without the stuffy, snobbery of sites like Founderdating. Foundersync has an excellent back end that will continue to grow over the next few months with an intelligence layer that will yield great results connecting likeminded co-founder teams.

Atlanta startup Launch Table takes over and helps find the rest of the team. Whether you’re a coder with a great idea and you’re looking for a marketing guru, an entrepreneur, and a mobile expert, LaunchTable is a place to find them all.

LaunchTable is obviously a play on lunch table, can you remember the conversations you had about taking over the world at the school lunch table? The best practical jokes, collaborative assignments and parties were planned around the lunch table. One person had all the friends, the other had the parents going out of town, while one person new where to get the extra-curriculars. Little did you know, those collaboration skills would come in handy down the road.

In fact, LaunchTable founder Ian Jones told us in an interview that LaunchTable is for startups looking for that next great business idea or students working on a project. When we attended the Duke University startup challenge earlier this spring we found that several of the startups in the contest had just one or two co-founders based at Duke, others were at Stanford, Princeton, M.I.T., UT and other schools across the country. Had LaunchTable been around earlier they could have taken advantage of it.

LaunchTable shouldn’t be confused with a social network. You’re not there to pick up as many friends as you can. The purpose is to build, create and innovate together. If you’re familiar with Dustin Moskovitz’ new startup Asana, Launch Table is more similar to Asana then Facebook. Now for a minute imagine that you don’t necessarily know the people you’re collaborating with yet. Say you want to meet them and then dive into a project. That’s the back bone to LaunchTable.

We’re really excited for Ian and what he’s building in Atlanta. Like the Nibletz team he’s out running all over the east coast getting people excited about creating at the LaunchTable.

Check out our interview after the break
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Providence Startup: JumpOffCampus Connects Students To Off Campus Housing

JumpOffCampus is a Massachusetts startup designed to connect college students and landlords with off campus properties. While it’s a useful service for students, it’s just as useful for landlords who are looking to rent rooms, and apartments to students.

The startup was developed after two friends Mark Abramowicz and Kyle Nichols-Schmolze struggled with finding a good place to live off campus while they were attending Tufts University. There was a lack of resources to find good housing. If you’ve been a college student then you are well aware of the problems with signs on the side of the road and posted on bulletin boards. Come August all the places are rented and everyone forgets to take their signs down.

Out of this need Abramowicz and Nichols-Schmolze became co-founders of JumpOffCampus. Their goal is to solve the off campus housing issue faced by every student in the US.

We got a chance to talk with Abramowicz about JumpOffCampus.

Briefly tell us what JumpOffCampus is.

JumpOffCampus is an online resource for university students, facilitating their off-campus housing search. In addition to a map-based apartment search, we also have added functionality like the ability to share progress with friends and family, as well as a roommate finder, marketplace, and the ability to post and search for sublets.

How did you come up with the idea, are their other founders involved?

The idea for JumpOffCampus was born out of a general frustration with the process of finding an apartment while we were sophomores at Tufts University. We couldn’t believe that there was no resource and so we sought to make one, using our own experiences – and those of our friends – as inspiration.

More after the break
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Toledo Startup: Buyvite Launches Group Payment Platform INTERVIEW

Do you have a big family? Have you ever pulled money together from your entire family to buy grandma and grandpa a cruise, a vacation or other gift? Well pulling all the money together, checking off the payments and then writing one big check or paying by credit card can be a huge hassle. Sure these days you can have most of your family Paypal you but there’s still those few that don’t have a Paypal account. This is just one of the scenarios that Toledo OH based startup Buyvite is looking to solve.

Another easy scenario is times when maybe you and a bunch of friends have wanted to pull together money to buy tickets to a concert or a basketball game. One person typically shells out all the money and waits to get paid back. No more of that thanks to Buyvite.

Buyvite members will have the ability to create a Buyvite by inviting friends and family to a group purchase. Once the requested amount is achieved, the group purchase organizer has the ability to trigger a Buyvite Code, that functions like a gift card code, that is worth the requested amount and can be used to make the purchase on any site that integrates the Buyvite API. Group purchase organizers also have the flexibility of sending the collected funds directly to any U.S. bank account for free.

We got a chance to talk to Brandi Wimberly the woman entrepreneur behind Buyvite

Interview after the break
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Santa Barbara Startup: Talentwire Connect To Mentors Who Do What You Do INTERVIEW

Do you like what you do? Are you looking for like minded people? Do you feel like you could offer someone who does what you do advice? Would you like to learn more about the profession you’re in? These are just some of the questions that will be answered when you join the new talentwire.me platform.

Talentwire is a platform that connects professionals to each other and allows mentorship, sharing and more. Users can share via simply writing about what they do, asking and answering questions and even doing how to videos. Talentwire integrates with Facebook for quick logins.

Once you’re in the Talentwire site at talentwire.me you can select your profession, or “what you do” and then drill down even more. For instance I found a category for news media after clicking through media and arts. There’s categories for every profession under the sun from healthcare to actors, computer coders to fashion, and the platform is still building.

Talentwire founder Sam Sperling has been hard at work promoting his new startup. They debuted at South By Southwest in Austin Texas this past March and then went on to TheNextWeb conference in Amsterdam. At SXSW Sperling was flanked by scouts from other social networks in the professional space like LinkedIn, BraveNewTalent and Dice.

We got a chance to speak with Sperling.

Interview after the break
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Toronto Startup: IppinKa Is A Crowd Buy Store For Beautiful Products

A new startup out of Toronto called IppinKa is recruiting tastemakers and lovers of beautiful products. In the tech world these people are commonly referred to as early adopters. However if you have a keen eye for beautiful things than you should pay attention to what this startup is doing in the crowdbuying space.

IppinKa is also recruiting designers of great products. Are you a sculptor? Have you made a unique home accessory? Are you a contemporary furniture designer? IppinKa is looking for you. They hope to match those tastemakers with designers of fine quality products.

As their website suggests they are starting a movement for functional and well made products.

We got a chance to talk with one of the co-founders of IppinKa before their upcoming launch.

Who are the founders and what are their backgrounds?

Jerry Chang is a sucker for Japanese products. Educated in Engineering and Product Design, his role model is Dieter Rams.

Fran Rawlings is a social media maven and a world traveller who loves finding great products from different corners of the world.

Alan Soong, with an education in Engineering, is a product designer by day and seasoned online shopper by night.

Where are you located?

We are located in Toronto, Ontario.

Where does the name IppinKa come from?

“Ippin” is the Japanese word for great products. “Ka” means house. We came up with the name after seeing a picture of a house with beautiful products displayed in it.

More after the break
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