Startups Archives - Page 5 of 144

E-Mist Innovations Raises Seed Round to Protect You from Disease

When talking about startups outside Silicon Valley, the discussion often revolves around Xtech: fintech, cleantech, adtech, edtech, etc.

Healthcare is another big industry everywhere else, and there are companies all over the country solving thousands of different problems related both to our actual health and to the administration of healthcare.

One of the companies if Fort Worth moved a little closer this week when they announced a $150k seed round from local investors, Cowtown Angels.

E-Mist Innovations has developed a new technology for distributing disinfectants. The electrostatic mister allows the disinfectant to cling to every inch of a surface, whether it’s smooth, porous, or textured. The technology they’ve patented allows for less time spent disinfecting, but surfaces stay protected longer.

Now, the use case in your home may not seem obvious. It doesn’t take that long to wipe a counter. Instead, E-Mist is focusing instead on places with lots of people and limited amount of time between turnover: hospitals, offices, nursing homes, day cares, libraries, locker rooms, and various public transit services like buses and subways.

Local angel group Cowtown Angels facilitated the investment, with several members investing individually. Cowtown Angel investor George Robertson is joining the company as CEO.

“This is a very exciting story of a family from Goldthwaite, TX, coming to us for help,” Darlene Ryan, executive director of the local incubator TechFW, said in a statement. “E-Mist was one of our Impact Award finalists in the Health category last year while going through our incubation program, which got them the opportunity to pitch to the Cowtown Angels as well as other support from the community. Now the company is getting the money it needs to succeed and an experienced CEO. The company will be continuing with TechFW in our acceleration program. It’s a great example of how we help businesses get their technology to market.”

Find out more about E-Mist Innovations at their website.

Israeli Startup Oktopost Simplifies Social Media for Businesses

Everyone knows that businesses have to be social now. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+…wherever your customers are, there you should be, too.

But, social media marketing can be very time consuming, and it’s hard to prove the ROI on it. It’s always been more of a warm fuzzy attached to your brand than something that’s easily measurable.

But, with a recent $800k seed round in the bank, Israel’s Oktopost is looking to change that. Check out our Q&A with Oktopost below:

What is your startup called?

Oktopost

What’s the story behind your idea?

Prior to launching the company, Co-Founder Daniel Kushner was Head of World Wide Marketing at Nolio ( Purchase by Computer Associates for $40 Million in 2013). During his time at Nolio, he realized that social media marketing for a B2B was time-consuming and its effectiveness could not be proven. He reached out to fellow Co-Founder to work on a solution that has become what we now know as Oktopost.

Oktopost is a social media marketing platform, designed for the unique needs of B2B. The platform allows for the distribution of social content on a large scale, particularly capitalizing on LinkedIn discussion groups. Oktopost also lets marketers see the actual ROI of their social media activities.

Who are the founders, and what are their backgrounds?

Daniel Kushner Co-founder and CEO

Daniel Kushner is a marketing expert and social media guru. As the former VP of Marketing at innovative high-tech company Nolio, Daniel doubled sales growth year over year. Daniel has been in the field for more than a decade and has successfully led the online marketing departments of various global organizations.

Liad Guez Co-founder and VP Product

Liad is a talented web professional who led his own web agency for seven years, in which he has provided interface design, social marketing and web development services for high profile companies on dozens of successful projects.

Where are you based?

Yokneam, Israel

What’s the startup scene like where you are based?

Israel is known as the “Startup Nation” – There is really nowhere in the world that has as exciting of a startup scene as we do. Israeli founders have a healthy dose of what we call “Hutzpah” and are willing to take risks in order to pursue technologies they believe in.

What problem do you solve?

B2B marketers face 2 main problems when it comes to social media:

Being able to distribute content on a very large-scale across the social web
Being able to prove the actual ROI of social media

Oktopost solves both of these problems, and for the first time lets B2B marketers take full advantage of social media as a marketing tool.

Why now?

There is no one that does what we do. There are large social media marketing platforms, but most focus exclusively on B2C. No other solution has the capabilities with LinkedIn posting that we have, and no other platform can let you see the actual ROI of social media in the detail that we do.

The real question is: Why NOT now?

What are some of the milestones your startup has already reached?

We have recently raised our seed round of $800,000
After less than 9 months out of beta, we have hundreds of paid customers
Our customer base includes several publicly traded companies
We recently launched a campaign where we are offering access to our platform for free to early stage startups. Click here for more info

What are your next milestones?

Building our customer base so that every B2B company, everywhere, can finally take full advantage of social media.

We are putting extra focus on providing our solution for B2B marketing agencies, as we believe we can provide them with the best possible tool for running their clients’ social media marketing.

Where can people find out more? Any social media links you want to share?

People can check out our website – we offer a 14-day free trial of our platform.

Our blog is a great place to read valuable information on content marketing, social media and all things B2B marketing.

Our social channels:

Facebook

Twitter

Google+

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’ve released the early adopter tickets, and they’re going fast. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

Ro-buddy Bridges the Gap Between Raspberry Pi and All Out Hacking

The concept of robots has fascinated humans for a long time, even as far back as ancient Greek myths.

But, now, as technology advances rapidly, there are lots of people who think a robotic future is just around the corner.

The founders of Australian startup Robological fall in that camp. And they’re doing their part to usher in that future by creating Ro-buddy, a motherboard/Android app that will allow kids to quickly create their own robots, no coding required (for now).

The team is in the final days of their Indiegogo campaign. Check out our Q&A with the founder Damith Herath below.

What is your startup called?

Robological

What’s the story behind your idea?

The foundation of what would become the software framework for Ro-buddy was laid as early as 2010 when the founders worked on an Australian government (Australian Research Council) funded research program called the Thinking Head Project.

However, the Eureka moment came when we volunteered to teach robotics to primary school kids at a few local schools. In brief, the story goes like this – having been academics for sometime and partly forgotten our own childhood, we’ve gravely underestimated the creative and tech prowess of the 10 year olds we were teaching robotics – setting the bar so low, they surprised us by coming up with creative ideas for robots and wanting to create sophisticated robots of their own. Only armed with toy robots at the time, we quickly realized that these kids need something more sophisticated as a starting point, but at the same time not too complicated to dishearten them. Working on this challenge over the last year or so we realized that combining the software framework we’ve already developed (which was used by artists for creating interactive art/robot projects) in an Android App with a tightly integrated hardware platform would achieve this end goal.

The combination of an App and the hardware enables anyone to build custom control interfaces using a drag-n-drop interface on an Android device without writing a single line of code. In addition our hardware could directly interface with the Raspberry Pi enabling users to make use of additional computing power and wireless connectivity provided by the Pi.

We’ve seen a lot of parents purchasing Raspberry Pis for their kids in the hope they’d get hooked on to programming and hacking. But most get discouraged by the steep learning curve at the beginning. Ro-buddy bridges this gap by enabling easy connectivity and providing an out of the box experiences for these kids so they’re not discouraged at the beginning of the computing journey.

In a nutshell, Ro-buddy helps you to concentrate on your creative idea rather than the hardware/software needed to realize it.

Who are the founders, and what are their backgrounds?

Damith Herath – A roboticist with a PhD in Robotics

Christian Kroos – A cognitive scientist with a PhD in Linguistics

Zhengzhi Zhang – A software engineer with an MSc in Engineering.

Where are you based?

We’re based in Sydney, Australia

What’s the startup scene like where you are based?

There’s a fairly vibrant startup community in Sydney and it is quite active and growing at the moment. However, investors are still hedging their bets mainly on traditional industries such as mining. In particular, there’s very little enthusiasmfor high tech startups that involve hardware like ours.

How do you see people using Ro-buddy once it’s developed?

As mentioned earlier, Ro-buddy is a great way to build robots and other things with minimal programming effort – for example someone who bought a Raspberry Pi and then never really managed to use it to build something because of the initial learning curve – Ro-buddy provides a great entry point.

It is a great way to combine your Android device and hardware to create robots, toys, school projects etc. Having a tightly integrated hardware/software system enables people to concentrate on their creative side rather than the software/hardware aspects, which are usually the realms of geeks.

Another great way to use Ro-buddy is to give a new lease of life for your old RC toys. You could easily replace your old RC toy car’s electronics with a Ro-buddy board and start controlling it with an Android device! In combination with a Raspberry Pi you could even turn it into a spy bot or a semi-autonomous vehicle using the Python API that comes with Ro-buddy.

Where do you see the field of robotics going in the next 10 years?

We’re heading for a very interesting decade of robotics.

We personally believe that this period is similar in nature to the beginnings of the PC revolution. We’ve seen new companies like Re-think bringing robotic manufacturing to a new level and many other successful startups appearing on the map. There’s also crowd funded robotic projects like Romo. Mind you we were engaged in a similar project slightly before Romo that used the software framework mentioned earlier – A project in collaboration with a renowned artist – Stlearc

Increasingly we’ll see human friendly robots entering the day-to-day use in unconstrained public environments. They’ll be in different shapes, sizes and form but would be fairly ubiquitous. Also, the Internet of Things will play a major role in this period.

What are some of the milestones your startup has already reached?

Ro-buddy is only the beginning for us. We are committed bringing the knowledge gained from working on the Thinking Head project and turning it into useful and commerciallyviable robotic products. So far, we have been able to assemble a great team to develop critical software and hardware. We’ve also been able garner the help of a few key industry/academic leaders in Australia to act as our mentors.

For example, Prof Chris Drane who is a serial entrepreneur on his own right is one of our mentors.

What are your next milestones?

First priority is to complete the Ro-buddy project and deliver on our promises to our backers. In tandem we’re working on another robotic project – which is in stealth mood at the moment.

Also, we’re exploring the possibility of using Ro-buddy on industrial strength applications.

Once we have these working prototypes, we’ll be looking at potential partnerships, funding and/or investment opportunities.

Where can people find out more? Any social media links you want to share?

Web: http://ro-buddy.com

Twitter: @RobologicalCo (https://twitter.com/robologicalco)

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Robological

Boston-based CoPiloted Ends Investing Stress

Post-recession Americans don’t think as much about retirement as we did before 2008. Most of us realize we’ll be working hard for a long, long time.

Still, every little bit helps, and for those of us lucky enough to still have 401(k)s, making them work for us is only a good thing. Unfortunately, since most of us also aren’t day traders, that means we pay almost no attention to those quarterly statements we get.

Enter CoPiloted. Founded in 2013, this Boston-based startup helps you figure out how to maximize your 401(k). They have an algorithm that matches your risk capacity, goals, and life stage to the funds you should be investing in. They work like a professional money manager, but at a fraction of the cost.

Check out our Q&A with the CoPiloted team below, and let us (and them!) know what you think.

What is your startup called?

CoPiloted

What’s the story behind your idea?

We actually wrote a blog post about this! Initially, we were designing tools for high net worth individuals and investors to use to manage a wide variety of accounts. Over time, we realized that the techniques we were developing could be applied to the retirement accounts of ‘regular’ investors. So rather than build a little business designed to help a few rich people get even richer, we decided to build a service that would benefit a much larger group, namely all Americans who are saving for retirement. And in doing so, be able to make a meaningful difference to their quality of life while saving up for, and during their retirement years.

Who are the founders, and what are their backgrounds?

Jeremy De Bonet is our CEO. He’s led a number of tech startups including Skyward Mobile, MobiTV, and Assemble Media. He’s got a BS in Applied Mathematics from Columbia, and a MS in Computer Science from MIT.

Michael Bolotski is our CIO and, as an SEC registered Investment Advisor Representative, has fiduciary responsibility for all CoPiloted clients. He holds a number of patents, and has held positioning at MicroDisplay, Human Capital Fund, Skyward Mobile, and Evri. He earned his PhD from MIT.

Tina Bronkhorst is our CMO and is responsible for marketing communications. She’s held past positioning at Rue La La, Digitas, and Razorfish, and has a BS from Bridgewater State University and an MBA from Suffolk University

Where are you based?

Tina and Jeremy are based in Boston. Michael is located in Seattle.

What problem do you solve?

From research we conducted last year, we know that people don’t manage their retirement plans properly — or at all. It’s due to a combination of factors: lack of expertise, general inertia, lack of time, and the prohibitively high cost of professional assistance. Regardless of the root cause, the effect is the same: retirement accounts get neglected, and don’t grow anywhere near as much as they should. The potential growth over lifetimes of savings is simply lost.

CoPiloted fixes this with a completely turn-key solution.

CoPiloted measures a user’s risk level, selects appropriate investments, determines when to buy, sell and rebalance their accounts, and can actually make the transactions on their behalf.

What are some of the milestones your startup has already reached?

We launched our free service in August, 2013, and on January 1, 2014 launched our Managed Accounts service, which not only provides users with recommendations of which funds they should own, but makes those trades for them inside of their account.

What are your next milestones?

In the first quarter of 2014, we hope to…

* grow our client base

* understand their issues and what more we can do to help them

* continue to eliminate friction in the enrollment process

* provide great financial advice

* help a lot of people

Where can people find out more? Any social media links you want to share?

You can find us on Facebook and we regularly share our thoughts (and the thoughts of others) via Twitter @CoPiloted

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’re releasing the first 50 tickets for 50% off exclusively to our newsletter subscribers on Jan 14th. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

Sock 101 Brings You Another “Of the Month” Club

Kansas City-based Sock 101 has had a big first year.

They figured out how to make professional, high quality $7 socks, launched as a side project, completed a Kickstarter campaign, and finished a huge holiday season. With a big 2013 behind them, they are looking grow even more during 2014.

The company already had a sock of the month club, but with new designs and colors, they’re ready to expand the offering. For $9/month (which includes shipping) customers get a pair socks delivered to their door. Each design will be appropriate to the month: Mardi Gras in February, green in March, Christmas-y in December, etc.

Sock 101 isn’t the only sock of the month club. Sock Club offers a similar service, but at a $12 price point.

Sock 101 cofounder Jason Grills sees two big differentiators besides price, though:

Sock 101 manufactures their own socks instead of sourcing them from other manufacturers. This is important because it lets the company fully control the sock quality.
While the Sock Club has some fun styles, Sock 101 focuses on being fun, but professional. These are socks you can wear to the office. “Socks are the new tie,” Grills told me over the phone.

Besides their sock of the month club, though, Sock 101 is also focusing on growing through corporate clients. It turns out, having matching socks is a thing. Local organizations like the Kansas City Convention and Visitors Bureau placed a huge order and sells the socks to tourists as well as wearing them to work. National startups like Influence & Co also joined in the fun, ordering matching socks for the whole team.

Grills told me they were also in talks with several multi-million dollar national corporations, but he wouldn’t disclose their names just yet.

The thing thing that has surprise Grills the most is the enthusiasm customers have, the excitement they display over their socks. He says the company regularly gets pictures of customers and their socks posted to Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

“It’s a fun company,” Grills said. “We’re not creating a new technology that’s going to change the world, but we’re bringing smiles to people’s faces.”

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’re releasing the first 50 tickets for 50% off exclusively to our newsletter subscribers on Jan 13th. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

New York’s Aereo Raises $34 Million Series C, Faces Supreme Court

TV streaming company Aereo announced this week that it had raised an additional $34 million in funding. Current investor IAC led the round, with participation from Gordon Crawford, Himalayan Capital Management, and others.

Aereo operates by setting up a data center in each of its cities, equipped with tiny antennae that receive and record free broadcast TV signals. Users essentially license an antennae, paying $8-12/month to stream free TV shows to any of their devices.

“Aereo experienced tremendous growth in 2013, and we expect 2014 to be another blockbuster year,” CEO Chet Konojia said in a statement. “Last year at this time, Aereo was launched in only New York City. Today Aereo is available in 10 markets and will grow to 15 by the end of the quarter…Aereo has scaled very quickly in 365 days and this additional funding will allow us to maintain this rapid pace of growth. We are thrilled to have a world-class group of investors who believe innovative, cloud-based technologies, like Aereo, are the future.”

It’s true that Aereo has scaled pretty quickly for a company that’s basically charging people for free TV. They’re in major cities all over the country, including Miami, Atlanta, Boston, and Denver.

They’re also having a hard time staying out of the courts.

It turns out that broadcasters don’t like having their signals stored in another company’s centers and redistributed via the cloud. Aereo gets around this by housing thousands of tiny antennae in its data centers and “licensing” them to individual users. In essence, it works just like a DVR, but in the cloud and to any device you have.

So far, the courts have ruled in favor of Aereo, but on Friday the Supreme Court will hear the case broadcasters are bringing against them.

$34 million on Monday. Supreme Court on Friday.

That’s one hell of a week.

Not that legal troubles seem to slow growth for many ambitious startups. Airbnb and Uber have both had their share of legal woes, but nobody can deny the explosive popularity of both services. Founders of disruptive startups take court appearances as a matter of course, and it often provides good media coverage for them. Aereo’s Konojia is no different.

No, legal issues aren’t the biggest hurdle Aereo needs that $34 million to jump. With Apple TV, Chromecast, AIRTAME, Hulu, Netflix and even direct competitor Nimble TV all trying to reinvent the way we watch TV, there is plenty of competition out there.

Not that healthy competition ever stopped a determined entrepreneur either.

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’re releasing the first 50 tickets for 50% off exclusively to our newsletter subscribers on Jan 13th. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

Brandery Alum REPP Raises $250k from CincyTech

Cincinnati-based REPP announced this week that they’ve raised $250,000 from public/private seed stage investment group CincyTech. The funds are part of a larger round the company is still working on.

REPP is a digital background and information verification service that helps users manage their profiles. Using various checks like identity and social media verification, background checks, and a sexual offender check, REPP helps you put people that you might meet online at ease.

One use case is for Craigslist sellers. With a REPP account attached to your profile, you might put potential customers at ease and increase the likelihood of a sale. Same goes for Airbnb leasers. A REPP profile for an online date will guarantee that the person you have your eye on is who they really say they are.

REPP users have full control over their profile, allowing them to grant access only to the people they choose and for the length of time they choose.

The benefit of REPP is that our relationships are rarely classified as “online” and “offline” anymore. It’s no longer taboo to meet someone you only know virtually in real life, but that doesn’t actually make it safer. REPP provides you the opportunity to assure people that you are who you say you are.

“REPP is a product that should exist in the market,” CincyTech principal Justin Thompson said in a statement. “REPP is creating a layer of transparency and accountability to interactions we have online and those that naturally move offline. We believe the REPP team has a good opportunity to make a company that has a massive impact.”

The most recent announcement brings REPP’s total amount raised to $415k, and they plan to grow their team and expand marketing efforts with the capital infusion. The company is also offers enterprise support for businesses and is working on several partnerships that will increase usage of the service.

For a limited time, REPP is offering free profiles to new users.

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’re releasing the first 50 tickets for 50% off exclusively to our newsletter subscribers on Jan 13th. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

Plated Raises $5 Million Series A to Bring You Dinner

New York-based startup Plated has raised $5 million in a Series A to expand their dinner delivery system. According to Crunchbase, the round was led by ff Venture Capital with participation from Lerer Ventures, Founder Collective, and Great Oaks Venture Capital. ff Venture Capital and Founder Collective both participated in the company’s $1.4 million seed round last year.

Plated also participated in the Techstars New York 2013 class.

Founded in 2012 by Nick Taranto and Josh Hix, Plated doesn’t just send you a box of food. Each week the site offers 7 chef-designed recipes. Pick your recipe(s), and Plated ships to you on your region’s delivery day. All food is as locally sourced as possible, so some recipes vary by region. When you get your box, the ingredients are ready to go with recipe cards that outline the cooking process.

Users can order as many or as few recipes as they’d like each week. You can buy a la carte, for $15 a plate, or join for a monthly fee plus $12 a plate. When you select a recipe, the page tells you what will come in your box, what you need to have at home, and what pots/pans you need to use. It also alerts you to any potential allergies or intolerances.

The beauty of Plated is that it provides fresh, sustainable food, but it also seeks to teach people how to cook. But, if you’re already a pro in the kitchen, the recipes sent right to your door take some of the pressure out of experimenting with new things. For busy founders and entrepreneurs who want to stay healthy, Plated offers the option–at least a few nights a week.

At the moment Plated already delivers to 80% of the continental US. (I was ecstatic to see it delivers in Nashville! The husband will be so excited to see something besides alfredo on our next date night.) While current plans for the capital weren’t announced, you can imagine continued expansion in delivery locations is in the works.

Plated isn’t the only New York startup delivering dinner in a box. In-town rival Blue Apron has raised $8 million and offers a similar service via a weekly subscription model.

The Series A brings Plated’s total funds raised to $7 million.

The “Must-Attend Conference for Entrepreneurs” Everywhere Else Tennessee is headed back to Memphis this Spring. We’re releasing the first 50 tickets for 50% off exclusively to our newsletter subscribers on Jan 13th. Don’t miss your shot by signing up here!

Glympse Partners with Chevy to Make Your Car More Connected

Yesterday at the Consumer Electronics Show Chevrolet announced the launch of their new AppShop, which will include Seattle-based Glympse.

Glympse also announced a partnership with Jaguar Land Rover. The company already partners with Mercedes-Benz.

The Glympse app allows users to share their location with friends in real time for a short period. Have a coffee with a good friend, but afraid you’re going to be late? You can choose to let them track your progress, so they know how far away you are. The company is backed by Menlo Ventures and Ignition Partners and has raised $7.5 million.

While the app itself is a simple idea, and one many people could dismiss, as we move into an “Internet of Things,” Glympse is well-positioned. As our tendency to use our phones while driving rises, so do deaths at the hands of distracted drivers. Many car companies are moving in the same direction as General Motors. In theory, a car connected with our favorite music, news, and location apps will keep the cell phone put away and our hands on the wheel.

“We listen to our customers, and they want more choices like they have with their smartphones,” Alan Beaty, senior vice president of Global Chevrolet, said in a statement. “They’re telling us they want more integration, more options, and more control in a safe manner.”

That’s great news for Glympse, which has been busy adding partners in the last year. Verizon, Samsung, Mini Cooper, BMW, Ford, and Garmin (among others) are already partners with access to the Glympse platform.

Along with Glympse, Chevrolet announced 9 others apps in their AppShop:

iHeartRadio
Priceline.com
The Weather Channel
NPR
Slacker Radio
Tune In Radio
Kaliki
Cityseeker
Eventseeker

Glympse is the only location-sharing app included in the Chevrolet AppShop.

peerTransfer Raises $6.2 Million to Make Paying for College Easier

peerTransfer is a prime example of a startup from everywhere else. The Boston company solves a problem most of us didn’t realize was a problem: it’s difficult and expensive for international college students to transfer money to pay their tuition.

Earlier this week, peerTransfer announced a $6.2 million Series B-1 from current investors Spark Capital, QED Investors, Devonshire Investors, and Kibo Ventures. The most recent round brings its total fundraising to $21.2 million. Their seed round in 2010 included Spark Capital and Dave McClure’s 500 Hats.

The idea for the company came from a problem its founder experienced firsthand. In 2008 Iker Marcaide was admitted to graduate school at MIT, but when he arrived on campus he discovered his tuition payment was lost somewhere between Spain and Massachusetts. The process of transferring money from a student’s home currency to American dollars was already expensive and time-consuming. When it’s thousands of dollars for tuition payments–and it gets lost along the way–the problem obviously becomes a big one.

The peerTransfer team has partnered with universities to provide international payments. Students transfer their tuition payment to peerTransfer, who combines it with the payments of other students. They can then negotiate a better exchange rate for everyone. Then, peerTransfer sends the money to the respective colleges. An online dashboard lets students track where their payment is in the process, and the money is guaranteed to be delivered quickly and in the right amount.

Before peerTransfer, students would deal with their local bank, which didn’t always give the best exchange rate. They also added hidden fees, and if the money made it to the right university, it was often in the wrong amount.

In November, it was reported that the number of international students coming to America had grown to a record 820,000. With that many students needing to pay their tuition, peerTransfer has found a big market that has been serviced by outdated technology and systems. The challenge is signing up universities. They do already have 350 schools in the system, including Penn State, University of Massachusetts, and–the founder’s alma mater–MIT and the platform is free, but things move slowly in education.

Teamstory is the Social Network for Enterpreneurs

“But what I do know is this startup journey is long, hard as f#!@ and lonely.”

Teamstory founder Kevin D.H Kim found himself looking around for community in the startup world. The way he sees it, even though we spend a lot of time on Twitter, Facebook, and blogs, there’s very little “real” community. We share the good things or give advice on the easy stuff, but when things really get hard a lot of founders find themselves kinda lonely.

With that problem in mind, Kim and his cofounders are building Teamstory as a place for just that kind of interaction.

They’ll be up against some real competition, of course. Facebook, Twitter, and email work pretty well for a lot of entrepreneurs, and some surprisingly real conversations can happen in those forums. And, of course, there’s that “killing it” thing we all have. It will take a real paradigm shift to convince founders to open up and admit their struggles, when so much is riding on confidence in their business.

Check out the Q&A with the Teamstory team below and let them know what you think.

What is your startup called?

Our startup is called Teamstory – A Community for Entrepreneurs and Startups.

What’s the story behind your idea?

As an entrepreneur and a founder myself , I’ve always felt the disconnect within the startup community. Even though there are platforms like AngelList, Gust and F6S, there was no ‘real’ communication between the entrepreneurs and startups. It was all about what’s on the tip of the iceberg – Idea, pitch, fundraising etc. , all the fluff and the good stuff. Then I began to wonder… what about the other side? the good, the ugly, and the bad about your journey, your moments throughout your journey. I kept searching for a ‘real community’ for startups and entrepreneurs but haven’t be able to find one. So we decided to create Teamstory. A picture-based community where entrepreneurs and startups can capture, share and discover the moments in their journey with like-minded people.

Who are the founders, and what are their backgrounds?

Kevin D.H Kim (24) / Tobok Lee (24) / Freddy Hidalgo-Monchez (25) We’re all entrepreneurs, builders and designers who has experience in multiple startups and tech-companies. We are from Waterloo, Toronto, and Montreal.

Where are you based?

We are based in Toronto, Canada

What’s the startup scene like where you are based?

It is a growing tech-hub of Canada alongside with Kitchener-Waterloo. There are big and successful startups in the scene: Shopify, 500px and Bitstrips etc. And it’s beginning to grow more and more with talents.

What problem do you solve?

Teamstory is trying to solve the disconnect within the community by making interactions and discovery effortless and more transparent

We think that it’s actually a bit late that someone is trying to create a community around the startups. But it’s time to shift the thinking to more of a collaborative community to accelerate startup environment globally.Why now?

What are some of the milestones your startup has already reached?

We’ve just surpassed 200 beta signups and gathered interests from business partners within a month. We’re seeing some great interest from the entrepreneurs and startups around the world.

What are your next milestones?

Our next milestone is the closed-beta which will launch in late February. We want to make the product better with our early adopters and fully launch with a great product in the spring 2014.

Where can people find out more? Any social media links you want to share?

http://teamstoryapp.com

http://twitter.com/teamstoryapp

http://angel.co/teamstory

Shopify Kicks Off 2014 by Going Mobile

Yesterday Canada-based Shopify announced the launch of Shopify Mobile.

The new app allows merchants to manage their store from their phone. From posting products through the app to completing the sale, the idea is to allow merchants to manage their store from anywhere.

The app isn’t just for small merchants, either. It’s fully integrated with Shopify POS, which allows physical stores to use the service. The new Shopify Mobile will give retailers the ability to modify descriptions and inventory in-store, as well as become a second register on busy days.

“With Shopify Mobile we’ve completely overhauled our popular iOS app and baked in some exciting new features that are going to help you increase sales–right from the palm of your hand,” the company says on its blog. “This is an important step forwards toward creating a commerce platform that enables our merchants to sell their products anywhere, whether it’s online, in the store, or on the go.”

(For those who are interested, the Android app is coming soon.)

Shopify already powers thousands of online stores, allowing merchants access to all the tools they need to design and market their digital storefront. The platform can be used by small at-home businesses or large companies looking to go online. Merchants can choose from a variety of plans, starting at $14/month for someone who is just exploring e-commerce. Some of Shopify’s largest customers include Tesla Motors, Gatorade, and Amnesty International.

This blending of small sellers and big commerce is what makes Shopify such a valuable company. And, investors definitely see the benefits. Last month they announced a $100 million Series C round, which added OMERS Ventures and Insight Venture Partners to previous investors Bessemer Venture Partners, FirstMark Capital, Georgian Partners, and Felicis Ventures.

The growth of mobile is all the buzz, but there hasn’t been much evidence that startups are actually developing for the platform. With startups like Shopify launching big on mobile now, the move from desktop may actually becoming more of a reality.

Ghost Announces Launch of “Just a Blogging Platform”

On December 23 London-based Ghost announced the opening of their hosted blogging platform to the public.

Back in April, Ghost CEO John O’Nolan launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund the creation of a new blogging platform. They reached their goal in 12 hours and ended up raising $300,ooo during the 30 day campaign. (We’ll call it a crowdfunding success.)

O’Nolan and development lead Hannah Wolfe got to work, and in October they launched the platform.

So, what is Ghost, and why do we need another blogging platform, exactly?

According to O’Nolan, who was a former WordPress employee, most blogging platforms have gotten away from their original purpose: publishing. In the quest to optimize for every kind of content, systems like WordPress are confusing and difficult to use. They interrupt the flow of a writer’s work and make it harder to do the things many writers already struggle with (like inserting graphics).

Ghost isn’t like that. With a two-column presentation, you can type in the markdown column and see how it looks in the preview column as you go. The dashboard is gorgeous and allows you to see all the analytics that matter to you in one place. “Free. Open. Simple.” it says on the Ghost about page.

The blogging platform released in October, and hosts like Rackspace soon had plugins that made it easy-ish to get up and running. But, the team at Ghost wanted it to be even simpler, and behind the scenes they were working on a Ghost hosting platform that will make the whole process of getting a blog on the Internet super simple.

Last week saw the public release of that hosting platform as a premium service.

Wait…premium? Didn’t the website say it was “free”?

So, here’s the interesting thing about Ghost: they’re a nonprofit. They don’t have millions in the bank, and they aren’t taking investor meetings. They don’t plan to exit and profit in the billion dollar range. They’re just building a blogging platform.

(I know, it’s shocking. Take a deep breath. It’ll be okay.)

The Ghost team will use proceeds from the hosting platform to fund the rest of the project. And, in return, users get a simple system that makes blogging easy again.

“Do we want to make millions and sell to Facebook? Or do we want to make something that’s genuinely good and serves its users, not its investors and shareholders,” O’Nolan says in the Kickstarter video.

However, while they claim to focused on users, it’s only possible to type your posts in markdown, making it more developer-user friendly than writer-user friendly. And, as far as I can see, they don’t offer a cheat sheet for those of us that aren’t familiar with writing in markdown.

Still, that’s an easy fix, if they choose to make it. The platform is beautiful, and Ghost will be a fun project to watch in 2014. The future of big journalism may be unknown, but the fate of bloggers looks pretty good.

ThinkVine Proves Software Is Eating the World

Earlier this month, Cincinnati-based ThinkVine announced the release of their DIY marketing mix optimization platform.

If you’re like me and didn’t know what marketing mix optimization was, Wikipedia defines it like this:

Marketing mix modeling (MMM) is a term of art for the use of statistical analysis such as multivariate regressions on sales and marketing time series data to estimate the impact of various marketing tactics (marketing mix) on sales and then forecast the impact of future sets of tactics. It is often used to optimize advertising mix and promotional tactics with respect to sales revenue or profit.

So, basically, marketing professionals can plug certain factors into a simulated system and predict what will produce the best results. Before ThinkVine’s release, that usually meant expensive consultants and time-consuming simulations. With the ThinkVine software, companies can do a lot of the work themselves.

“Marketing planning and optimization are undergoing a transformation as brands turn to automation and real-time data to become more agile,” ThinkVine CEO Mark Battaglia said in a statement. “Old-fashioned econometric models can’t keep up with consumers in the age of social and mobile. With this software update, ThinkVine gives marketers the information they need to respond immediately to ever-changing markets.”

Subscription to the software includes lots of customer support from the ThinkVine team, but if your company has a full time data scientist just hanging around, the new updates allow for the DIY option, too.

ThinkVine’s software is the kind of unsexy B2B product that startups outside of Silicon Valley are so good at. Steady businesses meeting needs may not get the press attention of flashy consumer-facing Internet companies, but that’s not stopping them from making money. The software doesn’t meet the needs of the average consumer, but ThinkVine’s customers–including PepsiCo, MillerCoors, Sara Lee, The Hershey Company, Coca-Cola, Pfizer, Georgia-Pacific, and Valvoline–find that kind of data and predictive ability invaluable.

Companies like ThinkVine are the playing out of Marc Andreesen’s prophetic quote about software eating the world. With their experience handling real world problems, startups outside of Silicon Valley are poised to lead that charge.