Startups Archives - Page 133 of 144

Austin Startup: RxNetwork Launches Website To Find Best Local Prices On Prescriptions, App To Come

Austin based pharmatech startup RxNetwork has officially launched their consumer facing website designed to help people find the best possible prices on prescription drugs in their area. The site serves up both online and brick & mortar pharmacies by zipcode.

All you have to do is enter the prescription name, choose the right dosage and enter your zipcode. Once that information is entered RxNetwork searches local pharmacies whether they be stand alone or in big department stores like WalMart and Target, to find the best possible price for your prescription. Where applicable it also shows you the availability of a generic version of that particular prescription and the cost.

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Austin Named Best City For Small Business For Third Year In A Row

The Business Journals, you know the local tabloid sized weekly business newspapers, have selected Austin Texas as the best city for small business for the third year in a row. Raleigh NC, Oklahoma City OK, Houston Texas and Salt Lake City UT followed behind Austin this year.

Sure Austin is home to two mega festivals every year with South By Southwest (SXSW) and Austin City Limits, but it’s their year round support for local small businesses that has earned Austin this title, yet again. The actual scoring factors by the Business Journals were; growth in population, private sector jobs, per capita concentration of small businesses and the number of small businesses. The Business Journals declared a small business having 100 employees or less.

Austin’s strong number of startups of course contributed to this winning. Website austinstartuplist.com has found over 1400 companies that are in their startup stages and call Austin TX home.

Every year hundreds of startups flock to Austin’s SXSW Interactive festival hoping to get the buzz that Twitter, and Foursquare once garnered. Startups like Zaarly (2011), Highlight and Glancee have pulled traction out of the Austin festival but not the way Foursquare and Twitter have.

Austin is also a hot bed of acquihires the most notable being Facebook’s purchase and relocation of Gowalla from Austin to Paolo Alto.

We’ve spoken with several Austin based startups who sometimes feel like Austin’s startup scene is hot only in March. They’ve got some great companies, startups and events, all that we’ll be covering here at Nibletz as the voice for startups everywhere else. As for not being hot year round, Business Journals obviously thinks they are.

source: Inc

Leesburg VA Based Startup: Time Razor Promises You’ll Never Miss Out

Time Razor, a Leesburg VA based startup just recently took their project out of stealth mode. The company is venture backed and puts a new spin on events, and time management. TimeRazor was founded by Barry White (no relation to the R&B singer), who has a mixed background mostly in real estate development. However in the hustle bustle world of the DC suburbs we’re sure a developer knows a thing or two about time management.

What TimeRazor ultimately does is cut out the noise from other similar event recommendation apps. Through their proprietary software and algorithms TimeRazor combs through over 300,000 events a day and serves up suggestions and updates for events that the user would actually like to attend. They call this technology the “distillery”.

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Chicago Startup: iFindit Takes On Real Social Discovery

We’ve heard about hundreds of social discovery apps. You’re familiar with the type, punch in your account info for Foursquare, Twitter or Facebook and find people near you. That’s what we are used to when it comes to “social discovery”. Well there’s a relatively new startup out of Chicago that helps users connect with real their real “social” environment.

We’re not talking about finding new people who share the same interests as you. We’re talking about things like food, shelter and medical care.

Here’s how the founders of iFindit describe themselves on their web page:

The application aims to assist social workers, case managers, providers and residents. iFindit was built to serve Chicagoans by providing quick information regarding access to food, shelter and medical care in their area.

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Facebook’s Other Acquisition This Week: Tagtile

Now that we’ve all heard that Instagram’s $500 million valuation drove Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg into a frenzy because he had to have Instagram, it’s time to check out Facebook’s other acquisition this week. While Instagram looks like a pretty solid acquisition into the Facebook family, their other acquisition, Tagtile, may fit better with the Facebook business.

Tagtile is a company that allows you to walk into a store, and tap your phone against a special cube. When you do that, your phone shakes hands with the business. The business gives you discounts and special offers and your phone shares the information you allow it to, back to Tagtile, like your contact information, and a little more if you let it.

Business Insider suggests that the Tagtile deal was an acqui-hire. A posting on Tagtile’s website suggests that Tagtile won’t continue the way it has been once they join Facebook. This is similar to the Gowalla deal, not the Instagram deal. Zuckerberg quickly let people know that Instagram would function as is, for now. Gowalla on the other hand officially shut down during SXSW as the founders and team relocated to Palo Alto to work on Team Facebook.

Tagtile hasn’t said how many merchants they have using the Tagtile cube or how many users have downloaded the app however they did say that Tagtile will continue to work the way it has, again for now…

source: SAI

Philly Startup: Lokalty Combines Local Loyalty Reward Cards With The Power Of One

Three University of Pennsylvania graduates, Balu Chandrasekaran, Philip Tribe and Bipen Sasi created a startup last October that puts an entire new spin on recommendation, reward and loyalty at the retail level. We’ve often suggested that the recommendation/reward space is going to become hotter than daily deals as merchants focus on retaining and growing their customer base through loyalty. While Lokalty is only available in Philadelphia at the moment, these three entrepreneurs get that.

According to their website Lokalty was born in February 2011 out of an idea that the three had at a Rittenhouse gym. They started working on the project seven months ago and went live just five months ago. As we suggested above, they were growing tired of daily deals and wanted to find something more effective for both the merchant and the customer.

The idea behind Lokalty has been tricky as Chandrasekaran told FlyingKitemedia:

“Growing the company has been tricky”, says Chandrasekaran, who says he and his partners have taken on a difficult task, marketing to businesses and consumers at the same time. “It’s the classic chicken and egg problem.” While Lokalty means marketing for retailers, “most small business owners would rather hear sales pitches that address the cost side instead of the revenue side.”

After the trio gets over this hurdle, the benefits to a platform like Lokalty are easy to see. A customer in the Lokalty program, like may of us, has a key ring full of rewards cards. With Lokalty you get one card for all the network merchants. Lokalty makes it so if you buy enough coffee from Elixr you can get free bagels from Spread Bagelry . You can use points from one merchant in the network with any other merchant in the network. So not only is the Lokalty program encouraging repeat business at one merchant, but they’re encouraging discovery and repeat business at all the other merchants in the network as well.

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New Zealand Social Startup For Kids, MiniMonos, Announces Funding As They Approach 1M Members

The New Zealand based social network startup for kids MiniMonos is taking off like wild-fire. CEO and Founder, Melissa Clark-Reynolds, has reported that the company has just received $1.3 million dollars in funding and they are quickly approaching 1 million users.

MiniMonos allows kids to sign up for their social network using a monkey avatar. From there they can play free games and interact with other kids on the network. There is also a premium based subscription which opens up a world of virtual currency and other features. Clark-Reynolds has also teamed up with Buy1Give1 so that for every subscription membership purchased the company then purchases clean water for a child in India.

Currently MiniMonos is converting about 3% of their users from free membership to paid membership however Clark-Reynolds has reported that the 3% of paid memberships are driving 90% of their revenue. They are quickly approaching 1 million members, their current member tally is about 840,000 members with more than half being in the UK.

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Phoenix Arizona Has New Angels

Phoenix, Scottsdale and surrounding areas have a new group of angels in town ready to invest in the latest and greatest tech startups in the region. The Biltmore Angels was founded by a local group of Arizona State University Alumni. The group plans on investing in high potential startups and early stage companies in the immediate Phoenix area as well as the rest of the state. The Biltmore Angels will also work closely with ASU to provide investment opportunities to ASU spinouts and select companies for the Venture Catalyst program.

“Lack of access to early stage capital has been an age-old problem in Arizona for most of our home-grown start-ups”, said Charlie Lewis, founding principal of Biltmore Angels. “We look forward to providing a new venue for our State’s most promising companies to showcase their wares in front of active Arizona investors”.

The partners in The Biltmore Angels have a wide range of business experience in the areas of investment, finance, business development and law. Tom Connelly is President and Chief Investment Officer for Versant Capital Management. Charlie Lewis is Vice President of Venture Development for Arizona Technology Enterprises. The third member, Michael Hool is the Managing Partner at the Hool Law Group.

Nibletz spoke with Biltmore Angel Michael Hool who told us that they are offering mentorship through their partnership with TiE Arizona and Venture Catalyst and that they are looking to offer mentorship as part of the Biltmore Angels in the coming months.

“We look forward to engaging investors who have not previously been involved in organized angel investing processes.” said Hool in a release. “The idea of the Biltmore Angels is to provide another forum to connect not-previously engaged investors with each other and to the other state and regional angel groups for collaborative investments”.

“The formation of the Biltmore Angels is an incredible opportunity for startups in Arizona,” said Gordon McConnell, Executive Director of ASU Venture Catalyst, an early partner of the Biltmore Angels group. “Every client that the Venture Catalyst team works with needs assistance with finding and accessing funding and by partnering with the Biltmore Angels we will be able to provide those needed angel investment opportunities for our startups. That is an incredible value-add to the startup scene in Arizona.”

Arizona was recently named one of the fastest growing states in the country for startups.

Omaha Couple Launches Fertility Awareness Startup: Ova Ova

The first thing we thought when we heard about Ova Ova is that the fertility space is extremely crowded. One quick look in both the Google Play Store and the iTunes App Store revealed hundreds of apps for tracking fertility, and this couple still isn’t mobile, however they are putting a different spin on fertility tracking.

Omaha, Nebraska based Ova Ova was founded by 24-year-old Amanda Kohler and her husband Kevin. They set out to take fertility tracking sites out of the 80’s with their spreadsheets and line graphs and make the process a lot more aesthetically pleasing. The Kohler’s felt that other sites on the market now were not up to date with technology.

In an interview with SiliconPrairie Kohler said she had always wanted to start her own business but it wasn’t until an awkward encounter with a cattle rancher on an airplane that gave her the idea for Ova Ova. Kohler told Silicon Prairie that she was on a plane and asking the rancher if he used anything organic on his ranch. He said he didn’t. He then turned to her and asked if she used birth control. The rancher made the point that taking birth control and ingesting synthetic hormones daily was on a much more direct scale than eating commercially raised beef.

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Los Angeles Startup PayDragon Launches: Simple, No Frills Order Your Food & Pay App

A new startup has entered the mobile payment arena called PayDragon. PayDragon was founded by Hamilton Chang who also serves as the startups CEO. Chang and his team were also behind the QR code pioneer Paperlinks.

Chang soft launched the PayDragon app in Austin Texas at South By Southwest and decided to do its full launch in LA where the company is based. Chang has eliminated a lot of intense restaurant focused graphics and superfluous extras in the UI to offer an easy order, pay, get receipt transaction system on the mobile phone.

Customers who use PayDragon will order their food from the participating restaurant of their choice, pay for the food, and then get notified by push notification when the food is ready to be picked up. They can also elect to get a receipt sent back to their mobile phone. Chang elected to keep PayDragon as simple as possible and his feedback thus far has proven that point.

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Baltimore Get Ready For TechCocktail’s Mixer Event May 2nd

Last night we brought you the story that Technically Philly is expanding and adding Technically Baltimore this summer. If you can’t wait until the summer to mingle with Baltimore’s tech influencers, entrepreneurs and startups don’t worry TechCocktail has you covered.

TechCocktail is holding another one of their infamous mixers on May 2nd at Mother’s Federal Hill Grille from 6:30pm-9pm on May 2, 2012. If you’re a startup founder, entrepreneur, tech nut or tech enthusiast head out to Mother’s and get your geek on.

If you want to sign up for a free demo spot or just to attend the event head over to techcocktail.com and sign up now.

See you there!

Rawporter Roadshow: We Stop In Chattanooga, TN To Talk Gig City And Gig Tank

Chattanooga TN is quickly becoming know for a lot more than just their “Choo Choo”, there is a tech scene forming in their close-knit community that plans to disrupt the rest of the U.S. One of the backbones to their tech scene is “the gig”. That’s how the Chattanoogians refer to their 1gb fiber optic internet that already covers 150,000 homes and businesses and 600 square miles. It’s big and it’s fast.

The “Gig” gives Chattanooga a one up over many other areas. In fact San Francisco doesn’t even have 1gb internet yet.

That’s why they’ve formed “The Gig City” and this summer they are hosting the “Gig Tank”. The Gig Tank is part summer camp, part startup contest and it’s open to entrepreneurs and students. There are two tracks and cash prizes for both.

Last month we wrote about the Gig Tank here on Nibletz. Check out the video, we talk with Brian who sits on the Gig Tank committee and is planning on a great event. Nibletz will be on hand for the kick-off of the Gig Tank and then we’ll check in with participants halfway through and the wrap up demo day event at the end of the session.

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Boulder Mobile Food Startup: Splick-It Adds Meal Ticket For Charity

Splick-it a mobile app startup based in Boulder Colorado has added a community minded touch to its app that allows customers to skip long lines and order ahead at area restaurants.

Customers who use the Splick-it app to order their favorite food can now round their order up to the nearest dollar which will in turn benefit Community Food Share. It’s a very easy process. Customers using the Splick-it app can change their donation settings in the settings menu and then forget about it. It’s that easy.

Splick-it is available on Android and iOS.

“Community Food Share can distribute four meals for every dollar donated,” said Jim Baldwin, chief executive officer for the 31-year-old charity. It distributes more than 7.5 million meals annually through a network of more than 50 member agencies and two direct service programs which target specific at-risk populations in Boulder and Broomfield counties.

Splick-It was founded by Trish Groom and Rob Taylor after Groom, who at the time owned a coffee shop, found that there was a giant obstruction in the form of a 10 foot beam that blocked the entrance to her shop and the counter. Groom found that she was missing customers. Taylor, a regular at Groom’s establishment, suggesting taking text-based orders and allowing those people to fly past the line and just pick up their order.

After the all too familiar bad experience with outsourcing development for their new app to Indian developers, Taylor and Groom happened into Adam Rosenthal from New York who eventually became their third co-founder and co-CTO. Today Splick-it has an Android app, iOS app and hundreds of area businesses participating in their community. It’s only fitting that they are trying to make giving back to the Boulder community an easy experience for their users.

source: Boulder County Business Report

Philadelphia’s appRenaissance Raises $1.5 Million In Seed Funding

appRenaissance a Philadelphia based mobile app developer and mobile infrastructure company has received $1.5 million in seed funding from Firstmark Capital and other Philadelphia angel investors.

The company private labels apps for other businesses. Some of their clients include; Ticketfly, BizEquity, AllFranz, Radian and Interact a Geo-social startup. appRenaissance also has a mobile application development platform called “Unifeed” that speeds up and simplifies development time and integration with enterprise services.

appRenaissance was founded by Scott Wasserman and CEO Bob Maul. The company has announced that they plan on using the funding to make a number of key hires and accelerate development of their Unifeed platform.

This isn’t the first time that Firstmark has teamed up with Maul. Firstmark was also in an investor in Maul’s company called Boomi a company that specializes in on demand integration technology. Like appRenaissance Boomi also has a proprietary platform. Theirs is called AtomSphere and connects providers and consumers of SaaS (Software as a service) applications via a pure SaaS integration platform.

“Backing a successful repeat entrepreneur like Bob is an easy decision,” said Amish Jani, Managing Director at FirstMark Capital. “Mobile computing is the next great wave of technology innovation and we look forward to working with Bob and founder Scott Wasserman to build a major player in the mobile apps and infrastructure space.”

“It’s great to be working with Amish and the guys from FirstMark Capital again as they were a major factor in our success with Boomi,” said Moul. “The mobile space is massive, it is still early, and ripe for innovation. And Philadelphia is the perfect home for the venture given the extensive mobile talent and thought leadership in the region.”

appRenaissance is located in Philadelphia’s Old City neighborhood and was founded in 2010.