Comments Off on Interview With New Jersey Startup: Clipix, Pinterest For Everything0LikeLike 3,818
Bookmarklets are nothing new, however Pinterest turned the concept of bookmarkletting into a world wide phenomenon. Pinterest has turned itself into a company with an astronomical valuation and no direct revenue, by simply bookmarkletting “Pinning” photos on interest boards. Heck even President Obama and Mitt Romney are doing it.
But what if you wanted to go beyond just pictures. What if you wanted to pin websites, articles, heck even word documents and pdfs? Well you would turn to Fort Lee, NJ based startup Clipix. The company, founded earlier this year has already attracted the attention of both TechCrunch and Mashable and now we’ve had the chance to interview them.
For starters they’re very very feature rich and the features don’t just sound great they work great. One of their most popular features is “Price Drop”. Clipix knows when you’ve clipped something that’s from a retail website and notifies you at set variables when they price either drops by percentage or to a certain dollar amount. Sure there are other services that do this but it’s all in one.
The other big feature is the ability to clip things from documents and pdf’s which can come in handy later on. Then you can view the items you’ve clipped via mobile device. It’s actually rather amazing.
You’ll see in the interview below, why Clipix is considered the “Pinterest for the real world”.
Comments Off on Interview With Turkish Startup: Count.ly0LikeLike 2,691
New Turkish startup Count.ly has introduced a new analytics platform for mobile apps. Count.ly offers simple easy to understand analytics for game studios, marketeers, agencies, operators and anyone with a mobile app trying to track engagement and loyalty.
Countl.y is a real-time, open source mobile analytics application. It collects data from mobile phones, and visualizes this information to analyse mobile application usage and end-user behaviour. We opened up shop with a deep belief that even boring-looking analytics can be fun to learn, use and experience, without compromising great features.
Count.ly’s dashboard is easy to read but robust and provides a lot of information to any sized mobile app developer.
They’re entering into a crowded space but Count.ly seems to know what they’re doing and ready to take on the big boys. Check out the interview below:
Comments Off on StampedeCon Big Data Conference In St.Louis Next Week, Interview Here0LikeLike 2,621
We’re very glad to be involved with next week’s StampedeCon Big Data conference in fact Nibletz.com is the official national media sponsor of the event that happens August 1st in St.Louis.
The StampedeCon Big Data Conference will feature a whole day of great speakers about one of the fastest growing segments of technology, big data.
StampedeCon founder Gary Stiehr, has put together a great program featuring ReadWriteWeb’s David Storm, Rob Peglar of EMC/Isilon, Bill Eldredge of Nokia, Frank Cotignola of Kraft Foods, Eric Hochmuth of Monsanto, Scott Fines of NISC, Alex Miller of Revelytix, and Jim Duey of Lonocloud.
In addition to the content packed feature speakers there will be a vendor exhibit area and a ton of great people to network with. People are coming from across the country to participate in the first ever StampedeCon and Stiehr tells us he hopes to do more of them. We got to talk to Stiehr in the interview below:
Comments Off on California Startup: nfinitu.de Helping Legacies Live On Through Social Media0LikeLike 2,209
Back in March we were the first site in the world to report on UK startup Deadsoci.al. This unique startup allows people to let their social media channels live on after death. After someone passes away, messages that they set up in advance can continue to inspire (or haunt) those they knew through social media and in real life. Mortality is an issue that more and more people are facing and that was actually the motivation behind deadsoci.al. As we found out at South By Southwest, the founder of deadsoci.al is dead serious about the startup.
Many don’t like to bring up tragedies but if you take a look back at the tragic incident at Columbine high school in 1999 and compare it to the recent tragedy in Aurora Colorado this past week, you may have noticed how much technology has changed in the previous 12 years. While social networks were just blossoming in the late 90’s today through social media many of the Aurora victims have Facebook tribute pages set up, walls with thousands of pages of comments, Twitter feeds with thousands of Tweets and more. In fact some of the survivors of the Columbine massacre have reached out to the victims of the Aurora tragedy via, you guessed it social media.
Combine things like that, with the tragedies surrounding mortality that we face all the time and it’s no wonder that Mario Horvath the founder of SplashHead LLC has created nfinitu.de.
While Hovarth is simultaneously launching nfinitu.de and another startup called Mindbl.am at the same time, nfinitu.de is what he focuses on in our interview.
Taking mortality into consideration and the way that people cope with tragedy nfinitu.de actually makes a lot of sense. A few years ago some may think the concept is morbid but not anymore.
With nfinitu.de people can create social media pages for those recently deceased in a tribute fashion. Often reminiscing, even if it’s just in the online context, can help people cope with the loss of a friend or loved one, whether they died of natural causes, fighting an illness or some other tragedy.
People sometimes don’t know what to do to cope with the feelings that come up after someone passes away and nfinitu.de actually helps them harness those feelings.
Comments Off on Miami Startup: CleanTie Makes Laundry A Cinch0LikeLike 1,850
A new startup in Miami is looking to take the pain away from laundry. Forget making time in your busy schedule to take your laundry to the laundromat, and forget having to fold baskets of clothes. CleanTie, a new startup in Miami has taken laundry referral to the web.
That’s not all though, CleanTie will help you find a laundry service that picks up and delivers from your home. That means you can make your laundry appointment wearing that last clean pair of boxers, from your iPad or laptop. CleanTie is adding to the growing list of services that have been able to generate business via the internet.
CleanTie is all about convenience for the customer. The search engine part of the site matches you with your closest laundry service and then you can drill down to the one you want to use from the available laundry services that pick up and deliver from either your home or office. Some of the laundry services even offer same day service.
“This is a great way for brick and mortar laundry services to reach an untapped market of busy people searching the internet for help with their laundry. Better yet, they can take advantage of the CleanTie marketing platform, without spending money or time on internet marketing themselves.” said Blair Nastasi PR Director at CleanTie.
The new startup reports that they plan on running tv commercials in their first market, of course Miami. They are also working on an official mobile app which will allow you to easily schedule your laundry pick up and delivery from your smartphone.
Interior decorating can be a pain in the ass. You normally have to go from store to store and showroom to showroom. Not to mention the fact that you’ve got to deal with a pushy sales person at each showroom and each store. It’s more of a pain than it’s worth. That’s why so many interior decorating and interior design projects get put on hold. Or worse, people spend thousands of dollars on something they don’t necessarily like, just to get the process over with.
That’s where Toronto, Ontario and New York based startup RemoteStylist comes in. With RemoteStylist you simply sign up for your own free profile and then you can coordinate your style for your interior project with one of RemoteStylists’ interior designers.
As you work with your stylist from RemoteStylist you’ll see your rooms come together right before your eyes. If something doesn’t look right on the screen you can simply send your stylist back to the drawing board and they’ll continue to work, change and revise until you have the room you’re looking for.
Once the painful part is over, you’ll be completely satisfied with what you selected. Then the second magic part happens. Everything you liked is purchased for less than retail prices and then delivered and installed in your home. Yes 99% of this entire process can happen at your desk, in bed or at the kitchen table. RemoteStylist founder Kelly Fallis and her team have made sure that the interior design process is simple, and easy and that in the end the customers are happy.
We got a chance to interview the folks at RemoteStylist check out the interview below:
I was just telling StoryMark founder Dana McIntyre the story about when my mom turned 60 five years ago how all the kids got her one of those groovy digital photo frames that allowed 30 second narration on each photo. It was a cute idea and we were able to get photos from each couple in our family and the grandkids. We were then able to narrate what the photo was about.
Well, the reason we are writing about another photo sharing app is because StoryMark does virtually the same thing, but now instead of a clunky novelty digital photo frame, it’s on your iPhone or Android device where it will be way better utilized. In fact this year in September we are getting my mom an iPhone (yes she’s ready) and StoryMark will definitely have a place on her phone.
StoryMark allows you to take photos and then add up to 30 seconds of audio to send with the photo. It’s great for pictures that tell a story. Say you go on vacation you can send those loved ones back home a great photo and an audible description. Maybe your son or daughter is just laughing away, now with StoryMark you can audibly annotate the photo for years to come.
StoryMark has so many use cases it’s absolutely ridiculous (in a good way) McIntyre tells us in the interview below you can use it for those family moments, doctors can use it to get advice and collaborate with other doctors, even the know it all leader of your neighborhood organization can use it to audibly talk about how your grass is a smidgeon too high. Teenagers could use it to pitch their parents on that must have shirt, sweater, or video game at the mall. Again this is one of those ideas so good you think, “why didn’t I think of that” well that’s because McIntyre did.
Comments Off on Florida Startup: Sprigster, Crowdfunding For Veterans Looking To Start Franchise Businesses0LikeLike 3,740
There’s an alarming statistic when it comes to unemployment in our country and that is the fact that veterans who have moved from military to civilian life are one of the highest groups that are unemployed. That’s one of the reasons that TechStars just concluded their Patriot bootcamp to help and inspire veterans with ideas for startups to get started on their plans.
Sprigster, is a startup we actually heard about first back in April. Sprigster is a crowdfunding startup where several people can come together (as with any crowdfunding model) and support a franchise or business project for veterans.
CEO Mark Mohler likens crowdfunding to “Barn Raising”, back in the day towns would rally around their neighbors if one of their neighbors lost a building or had some other need. The townspeople would have a fundraiser in a barn to give money to the community member. With crowdfunding this is all done online and meant to help our military neighbors.
Ideally the platform is meant for former military who are now civilians who would like to hire themselves as the owner of a franchise business. Mohler explains why franchising is a better model for this platform than traditional startups in the interview below.
Comments Off on Startup Weekend Memphis: And The Winner Is…. CoachSpeak0LikeLike 2,074
Startup Weekend Memphis saw some great ideas formulated from the Friday pitches. The four finalist teams were: BuyersUnite,Capta Vita (Legacy Interview), RightNowPal (Event Czar) and CoachSpeak. After Saturday evenings gut check all four finalist teams and the three individual entrepreneurs that would pitch on Sunday started to hunker down and focus on the prize at the end of the weekend. Three startups would walk away with $1000 cash, 9 hours of legal services and 9 hours of accounting services. One team would walk away victorious as the winners of Startup Weekend Memphis 2012.
By 10pm Saturday night the 7 presenting startups had pivoted a total of 24 times (seriously). The mentors had been in for hours on Saturday and everyone was scrambling. Around nine PM I checked in with Derek Chapman and Joseph Dees the two guys behind CoachSpeak and they were in an intense debate on several different key issues. We put in a call to a good friend of Nibletz.com Gabe Lozana the founder of St. Louis startup LockerDome who agreed to a quick by phone mentoring session.
That late night phone call sure paid off as CoachSpeak came in first place with the judges on Sunday evening.
Chapman walked the judges through the concept, the revenue and the execution of CoachSpeak which is a social network for professional coaches and athletic personnel from the high school level on up.
Chapman, who is the founder of CoachSpeak, demonstrated a great use case for when coaches change jobs and cities and need to fill coaching team positions very quickly. Startup Weekend Memphis judge, and entrepreneur, Ekundayo Bandele threw Chapman a curve ball asking what happens if a collegiate coach moves his whole team from one school to another, doesn’t that make the service irrelevant.
Simple answer, that never ever happens, but more so Chapman was able to explain how if that did happen that would leave openings to fill at the school the coach came from. More important than that though is that CoachSpeak is already up and running and has 120 professional coaches in their network.
The network isn’t just about filling jobs, it’s about sharing information, camaraderie between coaches, sharing scouting information, job hunting, vendor placement and more.
Dees, who is a financial advisor at Regions Bank in Birmingham Alabama had come into Memphis for his first Startup Weekend. Since graduating from UAB Dees had always had a knack for creating business plans and has actually consulted on several successful business plan. He was the perfect partner for Chapman who had ironed out the entire concept except for the revenue streams and subscriber base.
Obviously the judges liked the collaborative effort between the two!
Chapman plans on continuing to build out CoachSpeak and will probably go to some of the judges who are local entrepreneurs eager to invest in the latest tech startups brewing from Memphis.
LaunchMemphis/SeedHatchery’s Elizabeth Lemmonds was on-site Sunday evening for the final pitches and actually enjoying attending an event that she didn’t have to organize. Prior to her taking a position with Launch Your City (Launch Memphis/Seed Hatcher’s parent) Lemmonds would attend entrepreneurial events in Memphis.
As we reported on Friday, this Startup Weekend was organized by local entrepreneurs James Ruffer and Chris Przybyszewski who are not affiliated with any other organization. The two of them organized this Startup Weekend as a fun and laid back way to spur more startups and entrepreneurship in Memphis. Ruffer, Przybszewski and Lemmonds let all of the finalists know along with any attendees that the resources of Launch Your City, Launch Memphis (and if they apply) Seed Hatchery are all available to these new startups and entrepreneurs at Emerge Memphis.
The LaunchPad free drop in co-working space and Launch Memphis were sponsors of Nibletz coverage of this Startup Weekend.
Comments Off on Disgraced Yahoo CEO,Scott Thompson, Now CEO At Pennsylvania Startup ShopRunner0LikeLike 1,955
Last week Yahoo announced the ultimate in poaching executives attracting longtime Google Executive,Marissa Mayer to the open CEO position. Yahoo had been looking for a CEO to replace Scott Thompson after he was ousted for fabricating a Computer Science degree on his resume.
After leaving Yahoo it was unclear what he would do next. Today, several news sites including siliconvalley.com have reported that Thompson is now the CEO of Pennsylvania startup ShopRunner.
ShopRunner is based in Conshohocken Pennsylvania with a satellite office in Silicon Valley’s Meno Park. Thompson will most likely spend a lot of time at the Menlo Park location. He has been based in the Valley throughout a large portion of his career. Prior to the Yahoo appointment, Thompson was a high ranking executive at EBay owned PayPal.
eBay also owns a portion of ShopRunner, a service that provides shopping perks to a number of paid subscribers at various website e-commerce partners.
With Thompson’s experience at PayPal he should do very well at ShopRunner.
“Joining ShopRunner is a tremendous opportunity to build on the strong foundation that the company has already established. While PayPal and ShopRunner are fundamentally different businesses, there are similarities in each of their success,” Thompson said in the company’s news release.
Siliconvalley.com did notice that the news release announcing Thompson’s hiring made no reference about his educational background. It’s obvious that ShopRunner is not concerned about it.
“We are thrilled that Scott has taken us up on our offer to lead ShopRunner’s continued growth,” ShopRunner co-founder and its current CEO Mike Golden said in Monday’s news release. Golden will continue as president of the company.
Comments Off on St. Louis Startup Event Attracts Sports Stars And Sharks0LikeLike 2,416
Former NFL football player for the San Francisco 49ers, St.Louis Rams and the apittsburgh Steelers, Brandon Williams is a native of St. Louis and passionate about the entrepreneurship and startup movement brewing in the city.
Williams alongside his business partner, Lance McCarthy, have organized a two day startup and entrepreneurship showcase, exhibition and pitch event called the Venture Draft Conference. The conference will be held at St. Louis University August 10th and 11th.
The tickets are $300, however in the world of startup and tech events thats a slim price t pay for the exposure to the resources that both Williams and McCarthy have assembled.
Williams has invited some of his professional sports colleague who are also interested in entrepreneurship as well as some local angels and venture capitalists.
One of the main attractions though will be the keynote provided by Daymond John the founder of FUBU and a shark investor on ABC’s Shark Tank. John is passionate about entrepreneurship. He recently spoke at Black Enterprise Magazine’s Entrepreneur’s Conference In Chicago. John also recently held a hangout on Google+ for high school age business students across the country.
The Business Journal reports that 10 lucky startups will pitch in front of a panel of judges including John in a similar manner to the way that contestant entrepreneurs pitch on Shark Tank. 15 notable sports figures and venture capitalists will be at the event which is sponsored by St. Louis University, the Information Technology Entrepreneur Network (iTen) and the Missouri Venture Forum.
Comments Off on Startup Interview With Chicago Startup: The Plastic Bag Solution0LikeLike 2,505
The Plastic Bag Solution is a green startup located in Chicago IL where the issue of plastic bags is actually becoming a hot button topic among residents, environmentalists and government officials. In fact 1st Ward Alderman Proco Joe Moreno introduced a ban in 2011 of single use plastic bags. The legislation is still waiting to be heard in the Health and Environment Committee. If the legislation is passed Chicago will be the largest city in the country to enact such legislation.
Plastic bags clog sewers,drains,cause animals to suffocate, and take hundreds of years to decompose. The Plastic Bag Solution provides an alternative to the plastic bag that is 100% compostable and great for the environment.
The Plastic Bag solution provides their compostable bags at a fraction of the cost as traditional plastic bags and also educates consumers, business owners and government officials on the use and benefits of their solution to plastic bags.
We got a chance to talk with Coleman Franklin, Co-Founder and Vice President of The Plastic Bag Solution about what their startup is all about and what they’re doing in Chicago.
Comments Off on Nashville Startup: InQuicker Gets You In The ER, Well Quicker, INTERVIEW0LikeLike 2,181
If it’s the weekend and you break your arm, or your toe, perhaps your nose or have some semi-emergency that requires you visit the ER but isn’t life threatening than I’m sure you’ve experienced the extremely long wait time that is the ER waiting room. Whatever the reason you’re in the ER, I’m sure you’re experiencing some kind of discomfort and ER waiting rooms are far from comfortable. What if you could use a web app to speed up the ER waiting process.
Well Nashville startup InQuicker is here to help. InQuicker is an online waiting room. In conjunction with their hospital partners someone who needs the emergency room services and is not in a life threatening emergency can sign in at the InQuicker online waiting room. InQuicker gives the patient a projected wait time. When the patient arrives at the hospital or clinic they are greeted by a healthcare provider.
InQuicker reports that eight out of ten patients that use InQuicker get seen within ten to fifteen minutes of the time they arrive. For just a rough idea on the value of InQuicker, they recently ran a study with their ER partners and found that patients can wait up to 208 minutes to get into the ER to see a doctor. That’s a lot of time you could be nursing your injury or ailment in the comfort of your own home.
InQuicker is very beneficial in the emergency room, but they also work with doctors offices as well.
We got a chance to interview InQuicker. Check out that interview below:
Comments Off on Interview With Austin Startup: NOOM, Next One’s On Me0LikeLike 2,549
Late last week we brought you the story about Baltimore startup BeerGivr which allows people to buy their friends beer using their mobile phone from a remote location, at participating beers. The concept is easy, if you can’t join your friends at the bar you can still pick up a round or buy the birthday girl/boy a shot or beer. You sign into the app, and let it know how many beers and voila its done. BeerGivr has partnered with bars in their hometown for testing. If you buy a friend a beer and they’re not at a participating bar or restaurant they can have that beer converted into Paypal dollars.
Well an Austin startup has taken a similar concept and expanded it to a wide variety of offerings primarily in the under $10 arena. With NOOM (Next One’s On Me), you can buy a gift for a friend using your mobile phone. Ideas include cupcakes,coffee, beers, lunch etc. You simply send your friend a virtual gift certificate through NOOM and they actually get the gift.
NOOM co-founder Sara Rodell gives us a great use case example in our interview below. Say you just met a great new friend or business colleague, it would be very awkward to shake hands and give them $5 or $10 and say “hey the next coffee is on me”, but with NOOM it’s a gesture appreciated, and used.
Right now NOOM is available in the Apple iTunes store and exclusively for Austin area merchants however they are expanding quickly and plan on bringing Houston on in the very near future. NOOM currently has 20 Austin area merchants participating including bakeries, ice cream shops, coffee shops, restaurants and bars.
Kyle
Bookmarklets are nothing new, however Pinterest turned the concept of bookmarkletting into a world wide phenomenon. Pinterest has turned itself into a company with an astronomical valuation and no direct revenue, by simply bookmarkletting “Pinning” photos on interest boards. Heck even President Obama and Mitt Romney are doing it.
