Andreessen Horowitz & More Back DC 500 Startups Company Spinnakr

Spinnakr, DC Startup, 500 Startups, Andreessen Horowitz, Startup Funding

We’ve been in DC meeting startups from 1776 DC, hearing Mayor Vince Gray speak, attending a party for Speek, and also attending AngelHack. And, there’s other big news.

This morning Spinnakr announced a substantial seed round led by iconic Silicon Valley venture firm Andreesen Horowitzh. Co-founder Michael Maynerick wouldn’t comment on the exact amount, but he told Nibletz that the round was “substantial.” It also included 500 Startups, Point Nine Capital, Sand Hill Angels, and others.

Last year the Washington, DC company was chosen for the 500 Startups accelerator program in Silicon Valley. While the team moved across the country (and is still out there), Mayernick is still firmly planted in the DC Tech scene. He’s one of the organizers for the DC Tech Meetup, the curator for Startup Digest DC, and was named a Tech Titan by Washingtonian Magazine in 2011.

Back in March when we visited 500 Startups, we spoke to Mayernick, who talked about how important it was to lay foundational roots in Washington DC before trekking out to 500 Startups. Dave McClure, the founder and Managing Partner at 500 startups, grew up and went to college not too far from Washington, DC. Paul Singh, a 500 startups partner who has now ventured out on his own, is also from the DC area.  Markerly, founded by Sarah Ware and Justin Kline, is also a DC startup that went out to 500 Startups for the 2013 winter session.

For the past year, the company has quietly been working on a novel approach to web optimization. “We found it intolerable that users should have to do all this work to extract any value from their analytics,” noted Spinnakr co-founder Adam Bonnifield in a statement. “We saw a future of analytics where insights are simply delivered to you, alongside actionable recommendations that you can deploy instantly.”

Here’s how it works: Spinnakr’s novel real-time insight engines analyze the endless stream of visitor data the instant a visitor arrives to a site. These insight engines can detect changes and trends on the fly, such as the arrival of a certain type of visitor, a spike in a set of search terms, or a surge of traffic from an article. Site owners are notified immediately of the event and are empowered to “respond” to these events by changing their site or adding custom messaging targeted to that visitor segment. These changes can be made directly in the Spinnakr application, sent from an email, or crafted using Spinnakr’s on-site editor. Once the changes are made, this custom messaging is shown to arriving the visitor segment. Over time, this leads to a powerful and complete personalization of a site owner’s content.

Spinnakr’s real leg up on the competition: traditional analytics products require you to analyze meaning by working through charts and graphs, a process that takes time and expertise. “Spinnakr automatically discovers these insights in real-time, and tells you exactly what you need to do to benefit from that intelligence, closing the loop as quickly as the data comes in,” Maynerick said.

Bonnifield adds, “All of our evented insights contain actionable recommendations to boost signups and sales for our users. They can choose to accept the recommendation, and if they like, deploy custom, targeted messaging to their site to respond to the traffic event directly from the app.”

Notably, Spinnakr has found so far that this approach to website optimization produces strong and immediate improvements in conversions that significantly outperform existing approaches. Spinnakr users frequently see over 100% conversion lift on messaging compared to the 10 – 30% typical of traditional web optimization methods like A/B testing.

Spinnakr’s founders believe this represents a new web analytics paradigm for the big data era. “When people think about website optimization they think of a slow-moving, marginal process,” said Mayernick. “But the world is filling up with data, creating an endless stream of opportunities. The real winner is the person who can discover them instantly and react in moments. We see a future where analytics will work this way, and we believe we’re building the product that will help define it.”

Spinnakr currently serves SMB, ecommerce, and emerging enterprise customers, while currently optimizing 10 million page views per month.

Spinnakr founders Mayernick and Bonnifield had previously built some of the first online targeting systems used in politics, working with Congressional, Senatorial and gubernatorial campaigns while setting fundraising records in 2006 and 2008. Spinnakr was previously awarded the top startup at both the Data 2.0 Summit and the Founders Showcase.

Check out Spinnakr here.

 

See what DC Mayor Vince Gray had to say about DC Tech this week!

Check out this must attend conference early bird deals are almost up!

 

DC Mayor Vincent Gray Celebrates, Speek, DC Tech and 1776

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“I think I’ve been here every week since it opened,” DC Mayor Vincent Gray told a standing room only crowd at the Speek launch and thank you party held at 1776DC on Friday evening. Gray and Newark Mayor Cory Booker are two politicians very friendly to startups.

Gray and his constituents working on DC’s economic development were instrumental in helping 1776DC secure their prime real estate at 1133 15th Street in Northwest Washington. The center, directed by Donna Harris and Evan Burfield, is the epicenter of startups in DC and the go-to place for some great startup events and parties. “1776 sure knows how to throw a party,” Gray told the audience.

“We’ve got it down to a science,” Burfield told us in regards to flipping the space from mega co-working to a great place to party. Walls, desks, and even mock windows are all on wheels which makes the space customizable for anything from hackathons (Angel Hack is being held there this weekend) to small strategy meetings, to parties with upwards of 500.

And that’s exactly what happened Friday evening.

As for Gray, the very active mayor arrived early and stayed late, making sure to speak with anyone who wanted his attention. Gray, who proudly sported a 1776 DC Tshirt at SXSW earlier this year, was enthusiastic about everything having to do with DC startups.

“There were 75 startups knocking at the door when 1776 opened,” Gray told the crowd during his official remarks. Burfield quickly piped up to announce that the final number of startups at launch, a little over a month ago, was actually 103.

Gray said that for DC to continue in the right direction they need to reinvent the economy and startups play a big part of that. Gray said that over 600,000 people live in the district and he wants more to live, play, and work in our nation’s capital.

Gray was very enthusiastic about Speek, the gamechanging technology that is making conference calls easier. Gray told Nibletz that his job dictates that he’s always on conference calls. In our informal conversation Gray was able to cite details about 1776 and startups (by name) without a crib sheet. Gray also mentioned the dedication of DC entrepreneurs to their companies and their city, laughing about the dedication of Speek’s co-founders and this tattoo stunt from SXSW.

As you’ll see in the video, the Mayor of DC is also the Mayor of DCTech and as such, a very enthusiastic cheerleader for all DC startups.

Entrepreneur Magazine Trying To Rain On Nashville Entrepreneur Center’s Parade

Nashville Entrepreneur Center, Entrepreneur Magazine, Michael Burcham, Nashville startupWe are two weeks from the grand opening of Nashville’s new multi million dollar 22,000 square foot Entrepreneur Center. The effort, pioneered by Nashville’s startup community and Nashville Entrepreneur Center CEO Michael Burcham, is attracting bigwigs like TN Governor Haslam and Scott Case, the Interim President of UpGlobal and Founding CTO of Priceline.com.

Two days of festivities slated for later this month will christen the new space that will house startups, startups, and more startups. The facility features educational space, space for accelerators, and space for startups at all stages.

In a private walk through back in April, Burcham was gleaming from ear to ear highlighting the vision that the entire Nashville startup community has partaken in. Community contributors will be recognized in cloud-like structures in the ceiling of the new facility and in big round plaques in the floor.

But, it’s not all rosy in Nashville. The Tennesseean reported Tuesday that there is one California company hoping to rain on their parade. Apparently, Entrepreneur Media Inc bought the trademark rights to the word “entrepreneur” over two decades ago and has sued the Entrepreneur Center to force them to change their name.

Burcham, who was recently called Nashville’s Rocket Man by the Nashville Business Journal, doesn’t have time for this nonsense ahead of such a critical event for Nashville entrepreneurs (there sue me too). To comply, The Tennesseean reports that they’ve added “Nashville” to the name of the facility and organization, effectively calling it “Nashville Entrepreneur Center”.

EMI, which owns Entrepreneur Magazine, has prevailed in many cases when it’s taken someone to court, even though they say they don’t “own the word”

“We don’t claim we own the word. We have limited trademark rights on it,” Mark Finkelstein, attorney for the company told The Tennesseean. “If the company goes national, could it cause confusion? Could it dilute the brand?”

The argument itself comes down to the fact that entrepreneur is such a common word. We use it all the time, and there are several entrepreneurial organizations that use the word in their name.

The Tennesseean spoke to Daniel Gervais a law professor at Vanderbilt who specializes in trademark battles. He pointed out that it would be one thing if we were talking about a word like Kleenex or Xerox, proper nouns. However “entrepreneur” is different.

“This would be a good example of trademark law used to limit speech,” Gervais said. “It looks like they’re trying to own the word, but how far do they have to go to police the use of a word that is otherwise common?”

Both Burcham and the Nashville Entrepreneur Center have been featured within the pages of Entrepreneur magazine and their website. While the lawsuit is evaluated and a judge considers where a trial would occur, it’s full steam ahead for the new nonprofit.

The Nashville Entrepreneur Center will hold their grand opening in two weeks, next week, this big startup event will occur on June 12th and 13th, in Nashville.

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OMGPOP Employees Party Like It’s 2012 After Getting Laid Off

OMGPOP,Zynga, New York Startup, Dan Porter

We’ve chronicled the rise and fall of OMGPOP, the creators of Draw Something. Before their huge hit with Draw Something, they had produced dozens of mobile games that didn’t hit it big. Draw Something hit the app store though, lives changed, and quickly.

Draw Something shot up to the top of the app charts. They amassed over 240 million users who were playing all the time. In just about a month’s time, they went from “another game studio” in New York City, to being acquired by–at the time–social gaming powerhouse Zynga back in March of 2012. Zynga didn’t disclose the financial details of the transaction but word on the street was that the deal was between $180 and $200 million. Around the same time this year, Zynga reported taking a $95 million dollar write down on the OMGPOP deal.

Porter, who had worked on events at Pimlico in Baltimore and had strong ties to Charm City, named all of OMGPOP’s conference rooms after characters from the HBO hit series, The Wire. That, coupled with Porter’s WYSIWYG attitude quickly earned him the respect of many tech journalists.

After OMGPOP was acquired by Zynga, Porter became the head of New York operations for the company. According to the announcement back in March of 2012, OMGPOP was to be Zynga’s top mobile unit. However, as Business Insider reported on Tuesday, things didn’t quite turn out that way.

According to Business Insider’s Alyson Shontell, Monday afternoon around 2pm the dreaded “all hands meeting” was called at the NY office of Zynga. These meetings had become common practice in New York, and as the employees filed into the room, they grabbed beers, “Sensory-numbing beverages were now essential for these gatherings.” Shontell wrote.

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The resident HR employee at Zynga’s New York office told the employees the news. The New York office was being shut down. Employees quickly filled out paperwork to get there severance packages and then it was party time.

Business Insider reports that hoodies, t-shirts and anything with a Zynga logo were quickly destroyed, however morale stayed positive. Desks were cleaned out, trophies from Zynga meetings were left behind.

“There were no hard facts or figures. No real explanation. Just typical corporate BS,” one former employee who was in attendance tells Business Insider. “Everyone was just like, ‘Yep.’ Not surprised at all. It was like the weight had been lifted off our shoulders, that a decision had finally been made.”

“Most layoffs are sad. You imagine big corporate settings where security is there to lead people out of the office so they don’t make a scene. This was the opposite,” says the former employee. “Music was being played loudly, and people were ripping up Zynga hoodies and T-shirts. Anything that was Zynga was completely left there. The sentiment felt positive.”

The OMGPOP team was never really integrated into Zynga. Right around the same time of the purchase, Zynga had gone public and their stock started falling immediately. Shortly after that it was reported that Zynga would no longer have the stranglehold on social games on the Facebook platform, meaning that the company would need to rely on other money making avenues.

You would think that with Zynga’s focus coming off of the “ville” franchises, a mobile team like OMGPOP would be put to work full steam ahead. Employees told Shontell that really wasn’t the case at all. Earlier this year OMGPOP released a refresh of Draw Something as Draw Something 2. Right before Dan Porter’s exit from the company in April, Ashton Kutcher had actually tweeted how much he liked the new version of Draw Something. Kutcher had gotten an advance copy of the game.

Porter has already moved onto another startup and continues with his insidestartups.org. Just a few months before Porter’s exit, Zynga CEO Mark Pincus was named the 4th worst CEO.

Check out all of our OMGPOP coverage here.

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Brandery Startup Alum FlightCar Faces Lawsuit

Brandery, FlightCar, Cincinnati Startup, Lawsuit, Sharing Economy

(flight car founders: Kevin Petrovic, Shri Ganeshram, Rujul Zaparde photo: bostonglobe.com)

 

Last year, one of the most exciting startups in the 2012 class at The Brandery startup accelerator in Cincinnati, Ohio was FlightCar. The startup, made up of teenage MIT dropouts. had a revolutionary idea. With FlightCar, instead of paying to park your car at the airport, you could rent it out to somebody else, making money rather then spending it.

After honing their branding, image, and product at the Brandery last summer, the FlightCar team secured a huge insurance policy, follow on funding, and their place in Y-Combinator. In April, after Y-Combinator’s demo day, the trio raked in another $5.5 million dollars in venture capital.

FlighCar quickly began testing their model at Oakland Airport and soon after rolled out service to San Francisco International Airport.

That’s when the trouble began.

Insidebayarea.com reported on Wednesday that the startup is being sued by the city of San Francisco. San Francisco City Attorney, Dennis Herrera, is accusing FlightCar of dodging fees, undercutting competition, and not adhering to rules which include payments by car rental companies back to the airport.

The kicker, though, is the fact that FlightCar actually operates off a lot not located on airport property. FlightCar’s co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, Kevin Petrovic, who isn’t old enough to rent a car himself, told insidebayarea.com “I think they have a lot of pressure from rental car and airport parking companies,” he said. “We do take away some of their business.”

Herrera is counting on ordinances that say SFO is entitled to collect fees from rental car companies that primarily serve it’s travelers even if the rental operation is not located on SFO property.

Petrovic defends FlightCar by saying they aren’t an actual rental car company and hotels and restaurants surrounding the airport don’t pay fees to the airport.

“FlightCar has refused to comply with any of the rules,” Deputy City Attorney Jennifer Choi said. “We want the court to order them to comply with the law.”  The city also points out that FlightCar doesn’t currently hold a commercial ground transport permit or an off-airport business license.

FlightCar joins a slew of “sharing economy” startups–including ride sharing startups like SideCar and room sharing startups like AirBnB–which have faced legal and public scrutiny over their business models.

FlightCar has been operating in Oakland and Boston without incident, so far. Outside of this lawsuit from the City Of San Francisco, people seem to like the idea of renting out their car for money rather than spending it. In addition to the rental fee, FlightCar cleans and washes each car before and after the rental and insures that you get to and from your car without hassle.

For more info on FlightCar, check them out at flightcar.com

See FlightCar’s pitch video from the Brandery’s 2012 Demo Day.

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Kansas City & Kauffman Foundation To Host Teen Conference

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One of the big benefits to growing your startup in Kansas City is the proximity to the Kauffman Foundation. The group is constantly backing, helping, and innovating in the startup community space. Kansas City often gets the earliest access to the Foundation’s newest programs like 1 Million Cups.

Now, our friends at Silicon Prairie News are reporting that KC is about to see a new one day seminar/conference program geared towards teenagers.

William Robison, a Kansas City-based self proclaimed “Solopreneur,” came up with the idea for Teen Idea Labs when his own kids started asking questions about owning and starting their own businesses.

“As a business owner, for as long as they can remember, they have only witnessed this side of the world,” he told SPN. “As they mature, I challenge them to explore opportunities of their own.”

Robison took the idea to Kauffman Foundation’s Nate Olson, and now the all-day program becomes a reality.

The first Teen Idea Labs will be held at the Kauffman Labs next Wednesday, June 12th and will kick off with the teenage attendees taking part in that morning’s 1 Million Cups meet-up.

“These younger minds are willing to challenge these belief systems and develop with better forward thinking minds. These are the next generation of incubator and Kansas City Startup Village residents.” Robison told SPN’s Megan Bannister

Interested teenpreneurs and innovators can find out more at Silicon Prairie. They can register free here at eventbrite.

Southland Conference Announces Investor Panels Including Mark Kvamme, Founding Investor For LinkedIn

Southland, Launch Tennessee, Startup Conferences

Launch Tennessee’s Southland conference, happening June 11-12th in Nashville, Tennessee, will highlight the best in startups, technology, and down-home Southern culture. The event is intentionally sandwiched between the CMA Music Festival and the legendary Bonnaroo, and adds an element of entrepreneurship, almost SXSW-style to these two historic events. With the way Southland’s schedule is shaping up, it too will become a staple in the Music City.

Over the weekend we reported on the 50 startups from across the Southeast that were chosen to participate in Southland’s Startup Village. Eleven states were represented, with 17 startups hailing from Nashville.

On Monday, Launch Tennessee CEO and conference organizer Charlie Brock announced some heavyweight investor panels, which will provide firsthand, top-notch knowledge of early stage investing to startup founders, entrepreneurs, and local angels from across the Southeast.

The first panel “VC Trends: From Silicon Valley To The Southeast” will feature Mark Kvamme, Paul Santinelli, and Jason Sibley. Kvamme is a co-founder and partner of Columbus, Ohio-based Drive Capital. Previously, he was special limited partner and general partner at Menlo Park, Calif.-based Sequoia Capital, where he was the founding investor of LinkedIn, Cast Iron Systems (acquired by IBM), MarkLogic Corporation and Funnyordie.com.

Santinelli is a partner at North Bridge Venture Partners in Palo Alto, Calif., where he specializes in communications and infrastructure and focuses on investments in open source, software, security, Internet applications, and infrastructure and communications. He founded and ran NOCpulse, a Silicon Valley software startup that was acquired by Red Hat Network.

Sibley is a director at GE Ventures, Healthymagination Fund. He was previously a Vice President at GE Equity and a member of its healthcare investment team. He is currently building out GE Ventures’ Boston investment office, which is focused on life sciences, medical technology, and energy investments.

“Mark, Paul, and Jason are experienced investors who can provide the kind of insight that early-stage companies need,” Brock said in a statement. “This panel will be an outstanding opportunity for entrepreneurs to get an insider’s perspective on what investors are looking for today.”

The regional investor panel, “VC Trends: Focus on the Southeast,” includes Rik Vandevenne with River Cities Capital Funds of Cincinnati, Ohio, and Raleigh, N.C.; David Jones with Southern Capital Ventures/Bull City Venture Partners of Raleigh, N.C.; Spence McClelland with Noro-Moseley Partners of Atlanta; and Sid Chambless of the Nashville Capital Network.

In addition to investor panelists, representatives from more than 35 venture capital companies are attending Southland, including Durham, N.C.-based Hatteras Venture Partners; Menlo Park, Calif.-based Shasta Ventures; and Battery Ventures, which has offices in Waltham, Mass., Menlo Park, Calif., and Israel.

Other Southland speakers and panelists include Slava Rubin, co-founder and CEO of Indiegogo; Dan Pelino, general manager of IBM Healthcare and Life Sciences Industry; Ali Partovi, co-founder of Code.org; George Kliavkoff, executive vice president and deputy group head of Hearst Entertainment & Syndication; Gary Swart, CEO of oDesk; and Paul Singh, partner at 500 Startups.

Stay tuned to Nibletz for even more Southland coverage. Here’s what we’ve covered so far.

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Carlton Crothers Named President/CEO At EmergeMemphis

EmergeMemphis, Memphis startup, Carlton Crothers

EmergeMemphis, the incubator and technology hub in downtown Memphis, has named Carlton Crothers as the new President and CEO.  Crothers has 14 years experience in cultivating, developing, and bringing early stage technologies to market.

Most recently Crothers was a Principal at Innovation Ecosystem Design based in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. According to his LinkedIn profile, the private company provides successful innovation ecosystem solutions. Before Texas, Crothers was the CEO of Technology Incubation and Acceleration as part of the Michigan Tech Enterprise Corporation (MTEC SmartZone).

In his position in Michigan, Crothers oversaw 54,000 square feet of office space housing 19 companies with over 170 employees. Those companies created over 500 spinoff jobs with $68.3 million invested in a rural community of 12,000.

“Our organization’s mission is to provide value-added services to our members that will positively impact their growth, accelerate the successful development of member companies, springboard high technology education programs, and recruit new companies and talent to Memphis,” Scott Fountain, chairman of EmergeMemphis and senior Vice President/Chief Development Officer of Baptist Memorial Health Care, said in a press release. “Our board is thrilled to attract Carlton to Memphis, especially given his proven track record of job creation.”

“The measurable goals of EmergeMemphis generate wealth and economic stimulus into the Mid-South economy,” Steve Bares President and Executive Director of Memphis Bioworks said in a statement. “In addition, they seek to assist emerging businesses that are not residents in the building through our many programs aimed at assisting entrepreneurs succeed.”

Eric Mathews, Co-President at Start Co, who also served as the most recent Interim Director at EmergeMemphis, said, ” I am excited in welcoming Crothers to our growing Memphis entrepreneurial ecosystem. With EmergeMemphis, Bioworks, and Start Co operating on all cylinders, Memphis will grow its leadership role in technology, entrepreneurship, and job growth across the southeast”

Mathews’ organization, Launch Your City (recently renamed Start Co), “graduated” out of the EmergeMemphis incubator earlier this year.

EmergeMemphis is a business and technology incubator with the goal of helping high-growth start-ups and early stage companies become self-sustaining.  They do this by strategically aligning entrepreneurs with various resources, a compelling environment, and mentors that help ensure the success of the participating companies.  Emerge operates as a 501-c-3, but plays a unique and critical roll bridging the public and private sectors. EmergeMemphis was formed in 2001 and serves as an incubator for high-growth companies.  While this often means technology-based business models, Emerge also seeks companies across a wide range of industries and models. Their renovated, historic property in downtown Memphis includes 35,000 square feet of tenant space.  Today, 37 companies as well as FedEx’s Innovation Lab, are residents at Emerge.

Memphis startup organization, Launch Your City,rebrands as Start Co

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Texas’ Cowtown Angels Announces Largest Investment To Date

Cowtown Angels, Dallas Startup, Wisegate, Startup FundingThe Fort Worth Texas based Cowtown Angels, part of TECH Fort Worth have announced their fourth and largest investment to date. Cowtown has invested $620,000 into Wisegate Inc.  This was also the first time that Cowtown Angels have led a round of financing.

The Cowtown Angels members have invested $1,415,000 in four companies to date and currently have two more deals under consideration. In addition to Wisegate, members have invested:

$345,000 in PerioSciences, which has developed a line of antioxidant oral care products

$125,000 in National Dental Implant, developing a non-surgical tooth replacement for non-functional teeth

$325,000 in Inview Technology Corporation, a developer of compressive sensing cameras.

Wisegate is an online community designed to enable IT professionals to exchange ideas and solve problems. The company was founded in 2007 and is generating revenue from their $3,000 annual memberships. Wisegate CEO told the Austin Business Journal that the company has “thousands of members”

Cowtown Angels were the lead investor in a $2.8 million dollar round with 23 participants.  They previously raised $461,000 in 2011 and $900,000 in 2010.

TECH Fort Worth receives applications of companies who want to “pitch” to Cowtown Angels members at their monthly meetings, presents the qualified applicants to the Angels’ screening committee and helps companies selected by the screening committee prepare their presentations. Angel members decide individually whether they want to invest in a company.

“I see this investment as validation for our idea that there was a need for a local angel network,” said Darlene Ryan, Executive Director of TECH Fort Worth.  “We believe that the Cowtown Angels program increases the amount of entrepreneurial activity here and helps the entire community.”

There are currently 20 members in the Cowtown Angel network.

Have you seen Dialexa, one of the coolest startups in Texas.

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LaunchTn Reveals All 50 Startups In The Southland Startup Village, 17 From Nashville

LaunchTn, Launch Tennessee, startups, Southland, startup villageLaunch Tennessee the private/public partnership designed to support 9 accelerator regions for startups in entrepreneurship across Tennessee is highlighting the entire south east region, it’s culture, technology and startups at the upcoming Southland Conference in Nashville in two weeks.

Of course the day and a half long conference, being held at The Cannery Ballroom and Mercy Lounge in Nashville’s historic Cannery Row District, is going to feature some great keynotes, like a fireside chat with Sarah Lacy, author, technology writer and founder of Pando Daily interviewing Gary Swart the founder of oDesk. The next 30 hours after that are packed full of great talks, performances, pitches and an exhibition Startup Village.

For their Startup Village, Launch Tennessee used an application and vetting process. Originally, startups that submitted had to have raised or made at least $250,000 that was quickly rescinded based on the work of startups statewide going through or just recently completing accelerator programs.

With that requirement out of the way, Launch Tennessee took a hard look at just about every state in the Southeast from Virginia to  Florida and of course as far west as Tennessee to fill the booths of the Startup Village.

Over 11 states are represented from a mix of technology spaces including social, mobile, media, health tech, ed tech, social entrepreneurship and even consumer packaged goods. Nashville had a whopping 17 startups make the startup village.

Here’s the entire list, congratulations to all:

Company Name City State About
American Songspace Nashville TN American Songspace is an online platform for songwriters.
Angel Eye Little Rock AR Angel Eye is a camera that allows parents to see their kids in the neonatal ICU unit from their mobile device or computer.
ArchiveSocial Durham NC ArchiveSocial archives businesses’ social media data.
AspirEDU Tampa FL AspirEDU is educational analytics software with performance metrics used by education administrators and teachers.
AudiencePoint Chattanooga TN AudiencePoint provides smart email marketing/connection to social media.
Banyan Chattanooga TN Banyan is software for scientists to collaborate.
Beam Technologies Louisville KY Beam Technologies makes the first connected toothbrush with sensor embedded in the brush.
BioNanovations Nashville TN BioNanovations provides a device that allows you to monitor the progression of bacteria in cultures.
Cardagin Networks, Inc. Nashville TN Cardagin Networks provides a customized mobile-enabled customer loyalty program for large and small businesses.
Checkd.in Nashville TN Checkd.in helps companies effectively use multiple social media marketing platforms via their application and consulting work.
Consensus Point, Inc. Nashville TN Consensus Point provides crowd-sourced prediction software.
Creative Allies Asheville NC Creative Allies is a crowdsourced merchandise design business used by musicians.
Distil Networks Arlington VA Distil is a content protector network/cloud-based intelligent gatekeeper.
Do 5 Things Knoxville TN Do 5 Things is a marketing optimization platform.
Everly Memphis TN Everly makes drink flavor packets.
Evermind, Inc. Nashville TN Evermind is a consumer-friendly senior monitoring system.
Facedeals Nashville GA FaceDeals allows users to check in to a location on Facebook through facial recognition scanning.
Fuelzee Nashville FL Fuelzee is a product development stage app that allows users to identify cheap gas and rewards associated with gas and then check in to specific gas stations to redeem these awards.
Gamemaster Greenville SC Gamemaster is a scavenger hunt business platform.
Gastke Inc. Greeneville SC Gastke is a cloud-based accounting software.
iCitizen Nashville TN iCitizen is a social media platform connecting constituents to local leaders.
Kufikia Memphis TN Kufikia is a code school for experienced programmers.
LeanKit, Inc Franklin TN LeanKit is a workflow IT system for large businesses.
Maxx Tech d/b/aBarMaxx, LLC Fort Lauderdale FL Maxx Tech is a liquor inventory management system that works on mobile devices.
NextGxDx Nashville TN NextGxDx is an online marketplace for genetic testing.
Oqulus Gainesville FL Oqulus is a medical imaging analysis company for detecting eyesight related issues for diabetics.
OverDog, Inc. Nashville TN OverDog connects fans with athletes via video games.
PatientFocus Nashville TN PatientFocus is a health care billing company.
Populr.me Nashville TN Populr.me allows users to easily create and share single web pages.
PowWowHR Atlanta GA PowWowHR provides online benefits administration, including HR & payroll.
PushLocal Natchez MS PushLocal is an application that allows you to send daily specials to your followers.
Quickcue Chattanooga TN Quickcue is an app that handles a restaurant waitlist, reservation system and table notifications.
RedeApp Louisville KY RedeApp is a mobile messaging service for large companies to send secure messages to various audiences, including employees.
RidePost Inc Greeneville SC RidePost is an online transportation company.
Sagent Partners, LLC Nashville TN Sagent Partners is a vendor-buyer procurement matchmaking service.
ScrewPulp Memphis TN Screwpulp is a platform for online publication for independent authors.
Sideqik Atlanta GA Sideqik is a web platform that allows marketing teams of different companies to cross-promote their products or services and track how many leads are coming to their Sidequik designed landing page.
Skuid Chattanooga TN Skuid is a tool that layers on top ofsalesforce.com to simplify user experience and improve user interface.
splitsecnd Nashville TN splitsecnd is a plug-in crash detection device.
Streamweaver Nashville TN Streamweaver is a mobile video app capable of split screens.
The Royalty Exchange Raleigh NC The Royalty Exchange is a marketplace to buy and sell royalties from movies, music, etc.
Variable, Inc. Chattanooga TN Variable is an expert technology and network security consultant.
Vatex Explorations LLC Cocoa Beach FL Vatex Explorations provides blister packs with chips embedded providing data via GPS system to know when the medication was opened and how frequently.
Vendor Registry Knoxville TN Vendor Registry is an online portal connecting vendors and buyers that matches vendors and buyers by type of service.
Verdeeco Atlanta GA Verdeeco is a smart grid analytics company offering big data solutions for utilities.
viaCycle Atlanta GA ViaCycle is a bike sharing system.
VIPAAR Birmingham AL VIPAAR is remote presence software.
VoiceHIT New Orleans LA VoiceHIT is an emerging electronic health records (EHR) and clinical documentation software provider with a mission to use technology to drive improvements in care quality, coordination and collaboration.
World Housing Solution Inc. Orlando FL World Housing Solutions provides reusable, energy efficient housing structures.
Yellow Jacket, LLC Baton Rouge LA Yellow Jacket is a stun gun iPhone case.

Source: VentureNashville.

Check out ScrewPulp one of the three startups selected from Memphis Tennessee.

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Bob Metcalfe, Inventor Of The Ethernet, To Keynote Chattanooga’s GigTank Demo Day

Bob Metcalfe, Ethernet, 3Com, Chattanooga starutp, GigTankWe weren’t kidding yesterday when we said that Chattanooga was a happening place for startups and tech. Yesterday we reported that Chattanooga was the 7th city to add the Kauffman Foundation’s new, 1 Million Cups, weekly morning networking and startup events.

Today, Chattanooga news comes to us by way of our friends at SouthernAlpha. It was announced earlier this week that Bob Metcalfe, would be the keynote speaker for Chattanooga accelerator, GigTank’s, Demo Day on August 6th. The GigTank Demo Day kicks off a month of Demo Days for Tennessee accelerators. GigTank, JumpStart Foundry (Nashville) and the ZeroTo510 accelerator (Memphis) all graduated on consecutive weeks in August.

For those of you that don’t know, Bob Metcalfe was the person who invented ethernet. For those of you not familiar with ethernet (man I’m feeling old here), it’s the “cat 5 cord” that plugs into your computer when you “hardline” yes we are well aware that there are actually computer users out there that have never been “plugged into” the internet.

Ethernet was created 40 years ago and recently celebrated it’s 40th anniversary at an event in Mountain View California.

It’s only fitting that the inventor of ethernet keynote the GigTank’s demo day. GigTank is an accelerator that was built on top of Chattanooga’s 1gb ethernet. Despite what some may believe, Chattanooga was the first city with 1gb ethernet to residents and businesses, a year before Kansas City turned the light on.

I am looking forward to being in Chattanooga … [for] GIGTANK Demo Day,” Metcalfe said in an email. “Are we not all engaged in gigafying the Internet?”

Metcalfe created ethernet as part of the infamous Xerox PARC lab (Paolo Alto Research Center), this is the same facility where the Xerox technology that was allegedly stolen by both Apple and Microsoft, was created. That story was chronicled in the movie Pirates of Silicon Valley.

In 1979 Metcalfe founded 3Com which eventually purchased US Robotics, the world’s leading manufacturer of external and internal modems. US Robotics is also the company that created the first Palm Pilots, although the 3Com brand took the Palm project over after buying US Robotics.

Metcalfe now serves as the Professor of Innovation at University of Texas, Austin.

You can check out the great startups in the GigTank and Bob Metcalfe at GigTank Demo Day, here’s a link to request an invite.

Speaking of Tennessee here are the first 20 startups selected for the Startup Village at Southland.

Milwaukee’s Gener8tor Accelerator Kicks Off Summer Session With These 5 Startups

Gener8tor, Wisconsin accelerator, Milwaukee accelerator, startup acceleratorWisconsin based startup accelerator Gener8tor, is holding it’s summer session at their Milwaukee location this year. To date, the accelerator that operates out of both Madison and Milwaukee, has graduated 13 startup companies that have raised $5 million dollars in venture capital and created over 70 jobs. They hope to add to that impressive group with this year’s summer session.

Gener8tor co-founder Troy Vosseller and Joe Kirgues take a more hands on approach with their startups and keep the class size small. This seems to have paid off so far in terms of follow on funding and job creation. Of the 13 startup “graduates” so far, only one has been from outside of Wisconsin. That startup, MobileIgniter, relocated from Colorado.

This year’s summer session includes startups from Chicago, Austin Texas and Minneapolis. The other two startups are from Wisconsin, one from Madison, the other from Milwaukee.

This session begins today and runs through August 29th when the startups will participate in what Gener8tor co-founders call “Launch Day” (a much better name than Investor Day or Demo Day). Both Vosseller and Kirgues know that a startup really begins at the end of the program.

“The Summer 2013 Program consists of some of the most innovative startups from around the country,” Troy Vosseller, co-founder of gener8tor, said in a news release. “We’re really looking forward to helping these companies grow and achieve their full potential.”

Here are the five startups selected for Gener8tor’s third cohort.

Catalyze.IO Catalyze.IO offers cloud-delivered backend infrastructure for health and wellness applications to make it easier, cheaper and faster for developers to create solutions for healthcare. (Milwaukee, WI)

DeckPresenter DeckPresenter is a web presentation tool built for businesses designed to host, manage and track PowerPoint decks. (Austin, TX)

Docalytics  Docalytics builds online tools to help marketers get more from their content marketing activities. The Docalytics platform gives marketers a more efficient way to generate and qualify new leads, while gathering actionable information about how their prospective customers interact with their documents. (Minneapolis, MN)

OpenHomes: OpenHomes is a safe, affordable, modern way to buy or sell a home. OpenHomes uses technology to connect homebuyers and sellers as well as helping real estate agents serve their clients better and more efficiently. (Madison, WI)

Optyn  Optyn optimizes the marketing relationships between businesses and consumers. For consumers, Optyn is the first ever “marketing inbox” that lets consumers easily control their connections with businesses and automatically organizes their marketing emails. For businesses, Optyn increases conversions and revenue by acquiring and engaging customers through a simple, quick and inexpensive “opt-in” process. (Chicago, IL)

Check out the pitches from Memphis startup accelerator, Seed Hatchery’s recent investor day.

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Kauffman Foudation’s Million Cups Now Brewing In Chattanooga

1 Million Cups, Kauffman Foundation, Chattanooga, Startup,startup newsWhile many know Chattanooga, Tennessee for it’s choo choo, the city has actually been on the cutting edge of a lot of things in the startup and technology space. First off, regardless of what anyone says, Chattanooga was the first city in the country to offer 1gb ethernet to residents and businesses city wide. They actually rolled out “the gig” two years ago, a year ahead of Google in Kansas City.

Last year, Chattanooga hosted the first ever startup accelerator focused on “the gig” and appropriately named it the “Gig Tank”. They have a great co-working space called co-lab and a very engaged startup community. In fact they’ve held startup events in Chattanooga attracting some of the biggest Silicon Valley names like Paul Singh.

Now Chattanooga has teamed up with the Kansas City based Kauffman Foundation to bring their 1 Million Cups program to the city. Chattanooga will mark the 7th city nationwide to implement the weekly morning gathering program that is building startups over coffee and conversation.

1 Million Cups began in April 2012 in Kansas City, the hometown of its founding organization, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. Foundation leaders intend to expand the 1 Million Cups network to 20 cities by the end of 2013. To support the growth in its partner cities, the Kauffman Foundation also introduces today an enhanced website for the program and microsites for each participating city to share information with local followers.

“We’re thrilled to add Chattanooga to the 1 Million Cups family, because this city is making big strides in entrepreneurship,” said Nate Olson, a Kauffman Foundation associate and co-founder of 1 Million Cups. “Great ideas are found everywhere, and we’re excited to see the startups and community forming in Chattanooga.”

The 1 Million Cups program started in Chattanooga this past Wednesday and featured Chattanooga Whiskey Co., which has had an exciting month. Legislation signed May 16 by Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam cleared the way for the company to manufacture its product in the city, and a week later the startup successfully concluded a $10,000 Kickstarter campaign.

Chattanooga’s 1 Million Cups program is being spearheaded by Bill Brock, computational engineer at SimCenter Enterprises and managing director of engage 3D, Andrew Holliday co-founder of Harvest Creative and Allie O’Connell manager of the GigTank accelerator.

“When visiting Kansas City this spring, we were struck by 1 Million Cups’ success in harnessing the energy of the city’s entrepreneurs,” Brock and O’Connell said. “We’re confident the simplicity of this program will resonate with Chattanooga’s growing startup ecosystem and become a weekly ritual for our innovators and entrepreneurs to connect.”

Chattanooga joins Kansas City; Des Moines, Iowa; Houston; St. Louis; Cedar Rapids/Iowa City, Iowa; and Reno, Nev. in offering 1 Million Cups locally. Each Wednesday morning in each city, 1 Million Cups gives two early-stage startups the opportunity to present their companies to an audience of mentors, advisers, researchers, builders, makers and other entrepreneurs. Each founder presents for six minutes and then fields audience questions for another 20 minutes.

Interested in attending 1 Million Cups in Chattanooga click here. Want to check it out in another city, click here.

Tennessee is preparing for this huge startup and cultural conference 

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Cyanogen Gets Caught With The Startup Bug, Looking For Developers In Seattle

Cyanogen, Steve Kondik, Startup, Seattle Startup

(photo: Talkandroid.com)

Cyanogen, Steve Kondik, is a name we wrote quite often at thedroidguy.com but a quick perusing through the archives of nibletz and since focusing on startups “everywhere else” (3/2012) we haven’t gotten a chance to talk about the Android developer who’s Cyanogenmod open source firmware changed the landscape of Android for millions of users.

After creating the initial Cyanogenmod the project became a community effort with several developers working on future releases of the firmware that when installed, allows users to take advantage of many of the benefits Google has in the Android Operating system.

Android’s biggest manufacturer, Samsung, took notice of Kondik and his work with Cyanogenmod. Kondik moved from his Pittsburgh roots to Seattle to work on Samsung’s Android team.

Now it turns out that he’s left Samsung and while it was unclear at first why the change, things are starting to come to the surface. Apparently Kondik has been hit by the startup bug.

Granted Cyanogenmod was like a startup itself, except for the revenue part, however it came to market before “startup” was such an uber cool thing. With years of development experience it’s really no surprise that Kondik is involved in a startup himself.

We reached out to Kondik earlier today who said the startup he is working with is still in stealth mode. He wouldn’t comment as to whether or not he was a cofounder but did tell us he hopes to release more information on the startup later this summer.

Kondik did however confirm that the startup he is working with (or is it on) is based in Seattle and it’s a mobile focused startup.  To that end he’s looking for developers, and shocker, they don’t need to be just Android developers.

Kondik told us today that remote working is a possibility but ideally a developer interested on working with this startup should be in the Seattle area (or perhaps willing to relocate).

Here’s what we can tell you about Kondik, since meeting him in person in 2010

– He’s an incredible guy to know, he’s extremely smart and willing to share his knowledge in a collaborative way, much the way Cyanogenmod evolved to today.

– Cyanogenmod turned into an astronomical success. While it’s open source and free, there are millions of Android users using the firmware.

– You can count on the fact that Kondik wouldn’t waste his time with something not worthy.

Cyanogen is looking for developers, interested in working on his next big thing? Venture over to his Facebook page.

This Athens Georgia startup started with a honey bee dance.

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