StartupAmerica Archives - Page 3 of 5

Brad Feld On “The Boulder Thesis” VIDEO

Author,founder, entrepreneur, investor and all around startup evangelist Brad Feld was on hand in Chicago on Tuesday for the Startup America regions summit. Feld is one of the founders, and Managing Director of Foundry Group and has been enamored in startup culture for over 15 years.

Feld’s latest book “Startup Communities” was published earlier this month, and in addition to speaking Startup America and 1871 hosted an official launch party for Feld’s book which included signing copies and free books for the first 40 in line.

Feld’s book serves as almost a handbook to other entrepreneurs and startup ecosystem leaders looking to build startup ecosystems in their town. Feld feels that most communities can support a startup ecosystem if they follow some basic guidelines. Boulder Colorado is one of the most well known and respected startup communities outside of Silicon Valley. Boulder didn’t grow into the startup community it is today, overnight. Feld points out that its been growing over the past 15 years and continues to grow.

Feld has been working with Startup America since it’s inception, in fact Startup America CEO Scott Case counts Feld as one of his most trusted advisors out in the field, working in the trenches with startups every day.

During his Startup America talk Feld highlighted the foundation, or framework found in his book “Startup Communities” about building startup communities.

The startup communities have to be led by entrepreneurs
These entrepreneurs have to take a very long term view (20 years)
They have to be inclusive of anyone who wants to be inclusive of the startup community in any way
You have to have activities and events that engage the entire entrepreneurial community

Feld prides himself on his genuine accessibility and is anxious to talk with entrepreneurs and startups from everywhere. He’s a top rate connector and if you’re headed to Boulder he will gladly share members of his network with you that he feels you will benefit from. He’s willing to help just about anyone, however before he helps you he often gives out tasks to do, nothing too hard, but rather questions to answer or information to find out, usually helping yourself in the process. These tasks usually separate the serious from the not so serious.

In the same spirit as his email accessibility Feld stuck around most of the day talking with the Startup America champions about just about anything. In fact we talked about startups, tennis and Australia and how they all interconnect for Feld and his family in February.

Check out the video from his talk at the Startup America summit below:

Linkage:

Check out Brad Feld’s site here

Startup America Here

Everywhere Else here

Chicago Ideas Week: Kara Swisher On The Next Big Thing VIDEO

We are in Chicago this week for the Startup America regions summit for Startup America Champions. We’re actually attending as Champions rather than media. Our good friend Frank Gruber at TechCocktail is also attending the summit as a regional champion from Washington DC.

While we did a little bit of actual work at the summit for the most part it’s been a great learning experience. In fact, when I tried to continue working after lunch, Startup America CEO Scott Case personally came and got me to make sure I was learning and not working. All the sessions on Tuesday were definitely worth it.

That doesn’t mean we couldn’t work at night after the summit was over.

It’s idea week in Chicago through October 14th. It’s a week long series of entrepreneurial, startup and innovator events, talks and lectures very similar to startup week happening in Austin Texas. As part of Idea Week, Startup America Chairman Steve Case (no relation to Scott), spoke in a mega talk Tuesday evening.

Case drove home many of the important points from his talk earlier in the day at the Startup America summit. He also went into a little history of AOL and briefly talked about the Time Warner merger.

After Case cleared the stage, they introduced the next guest (which we hadn’t read the program so we didn’t know) Kara Swisher.

Swisher is an authority on startups, technology and silicon valley. She was one of the reporters featured prominently in the 60 minutes interview with Mark Zuckerberg and she, along with Walt Mossberg, head up AllThingsDigital. She’s a great interviewer and an equally as good interviewee.

Most of the interview was in true Swisher banter, great down to earth, and real tech talk sprinkled with her signature humor. In fact one of the funniest points in her talk was when she made reference to the fact that she’s been married to a Google executive for 14 years, Swisher than pointed out that she is a lesbian (which she’s always been out), and in “straight years” that would be 97 years of marriage.

She referred to Google Glasses as “creep glasses” and Google+ as not a social network.

At the end of the interview (the part in the video below) she was asked what she thought the next big thing would be. Her answer may surprise you, and again, even this answer was full of humor, that’s for the most part true:

Linkage:

The Case Triple Threat Steve Case, Jean Case, Scott Case Speak At Startup America Summit

Startup America is holding their fourth quarterly “regions summit” in Chicago Illinois at 1871. The summit brings together nearly 150 regional Startup America influencers, commonly known around these parts as “Champions”.

Startup America champions from as far away as Puerto Rico arrived in the windy city last night for this three day conference meant to bring together regional startup leaders to share best practices, triumphs and even failures that each region can learn from.

To kick off the summit attendees were treated with a Case Triple Threat. Startup America CEO (and founding CTO of Priceline.com), Scott Case, kicked off the festivities. Case and Startup America’s Donna Harris have been busy over the last year flying around the country helping to launch Startup America regions. Scott Case (not related to the other two Cases) spoke briefly welcoming everyone to the event.

The first talk of the morning was a fireside chat between Harris and Startup America Chairman, and AOL Founder, Steve Case .Case has been traveling the country on his own talking to startup and entrepreneur communities throughout the United States. At one point Case pointed out, if you make great products no one cares where you’re from.

Case is no stranger to starting a company and raising money outside Silicon Valley. He’s started companies in Detroit Michigan before, but of course he’s most known for his little internet startup that launched out of Tyson’s Corner Virginia (a DC suburb) before anyone even knew what the internet was. Case told the familiar story of how no one really understood the internet back than and how it was just for a “bunch of geeks”.

Steve also brought home the point that Startup America, in it’s current form, is on a SWAT team mission to launch regions across the country over the next three years, and build growth within the organization. However the mission for Startup America is to have the regions function independently during that time. After that, the Startup America national office will function more as a support piece rather than a mouth piece.

The work the team at Startup America has done is nothing short of greatness though. With the addition of Startup Utah, just yesterday there are now 30 Startup America regional partners.

The third case of the morning was just before lunch. That’s when Case Foundation CEO and Steve’s wife, Jean Case came and spoke about her fearless movement within the Case foundation. The foundation just launched an initiative across the country looking for fearless people who will be the cornerstone of startups, and the economy to come.

Check out our video of Steve Case wrapping up his fireside chat with Harris below:

Linkage:

Check out Startup America here

Here’s nibletz’ coverage of Startup America here

You should be here, Scott Case will!

Maryland Startup: EasyWebContent Is Startup America’s 10,000th Member

We knew that the Startup America partnership was getting really close to it’s 10,000th member. We’ve been tracking that progress since the beginning and when the member counter hit 9700 last week we knew they were close.

In case you’ve been living under a rock, or are brand new to nibletz.com “the voice of startups everywhere else”, Startup America is an organization spearheaded by the Case Foundation and blessed with a billion dollars in funding from the federal government under the Obama administration.

Startup America has multiple benefits for entrepreneurs and startups. It’s free to join, and at the last count there were over 93 benefits to members, ranging from a pretty snazzy mileage perk on American Airlines, to substantial savings on Dell computers and a libraries worth of free e-books. All of the “perks” are related to starting a startup or resources a startup would need as they grow.

Startup America is very inline with the mission here at nibletz.com. In fact, Scott Case, the CEO of Startup America (and no relation to Steve Case), will be speaking at the upcoming “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference”.

As for their 10,000th member EasyWeb Content, they come from neighboring StartupMD. Founder Payman Taei explained to Startup America in a blog post, that they were running a web design business. What they found was that there were a lot of companies that wanted to get online but didn’t have the budget to do so.

There are a bunch of “DIY” website builders, for instance GoDaddy has a product called “Website Tonight” that allows users to create websites in minutes. But remember, at the core GoDaddy is a domain name registrant, and not a design firm.

With EasyWebContent’s background in design, they’ve built a tool that gives small business owners the ability to build their own, sharply designed websites and content.

Check out the video below with Taei who talks about Maryland and Startup America. Links below:

Linkage:

EasyWebContent is here

While you’re at it go here too

Nashville Startup Jamplify Exhibiting At DEMO Courtesy Of Startup America

As we reported earlier this morning, Startup America revealed the 8 startups that won their contest for a free trip to DEMO in Santa Clara California this week. Four startups are exhibiting in the DEMO Showcase Pavilion. The other four startups are presenting on the main stage.

Nashville Jumpstart Foundry graduate Jamplify was one of the four startup selected for the exhibit space in the DEMO Showcase Pavillion.

Jamplify is a hybrid, promotional, crowdsourcing platform. With Jamplify’s finished product, you get the most logical promotional vehicle for bands, musicians, and bloggers that’s available to date.

Jamplify crowdsources people for promoting the bands that they love. Rather than crowdsourcing for actual capital Jamplify is crowdsourcing for social capital and human capital, and then there’s the payoff.

Jamplify is like the kickstarter for fan based, crowd based musical promotion. As a fan of a band or a promotional ambassador you can agree to promote a band or musician. Based on your social graph and the amount of people that you actually touch with the campaigns short, trackable url you will become eligible for prizes from the band or artist you’re promoting.

Jamplify arrived at Nashville’s Jumpstart Foundry from New York City where the founders worked on Wall Street.

Check out their video pitch from Jumpstart Foundry’s demo day in August below:

Linkage:

Check out Jamplify here

DEMO here

Startup America here

Everywhere Else here

Meet The 8 Startup Winners From Startup America’s DEMO Contest

The fall DEMO conference kicks off in Santa Clara California today. It’s one of the most popular startup events, and longest running startup events in the world. In fact, TechCrunch Disrupt was born just to compete with DEMO.

Unlike “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” presenting at DEMO can be extremely expensive, especially for a bootstrapping startup from “everywhere else”. That’s why Startup America teamed up with their regional partners to run a contest for 8 lucky startups to attend and present at the DEMO conference free of charge.

Four of the startups will show off their companies in the DEMO Showcase Pavillion. The other four will show off on the main stage following in the foot steps of companies that were once startups themselves and have grown into household names, like E*Trade, TiVo and Salesforce.

“We’re incredibly excited to collaborate with DEMO and our regions to send startups to launch at this renowned event,” said Scott Case, CEO, Startup America Partnership. “You only need to look at a list of DEMO alumni to see what a game-changer it is for any startup focused on growth.”

Here are the four startups that are exhibiting in the DEMO Showcase Pavillion:

Jamplifiy- Nashville TN
CEO: Andy Pickens
About-Jamplify believes in the power of existing fans, and that they are a marketing force for anyone seeking a new audience. Jamplify is a promotional platform allowing anyone who has content to leverage their current fan base to get the word out. Promoters are assigned unique links for a Content Creator¹s particular jampaign, and Jamplify tabulates the number of unique people that each Promoter drives to the content.

CoPatient
Region:Oregon
About: CoPatient was created to give patients the knowledge and insight desperately needed to understand medical bills. By using technology, patients have a stronger voice in financing their healthcare.

Charlie Contacts
Founder: Junaid Kalmadi
About: Charlie Contacts let’s you “have them at hello” by arming you with all the need-to-know information about your contacts before any meeting, conference or phone call. This mobile-to-mobile app searches news and social sites and everything in between to provide you with all the details on your upcoming interaction.
Hallway
Founder: Sean McElrath
About: Hallway’s website allows students to post questions on various school subjects which their peers then answer. Students can then rate the most useful questions and answers, which rise to the top of the page. Students can also share notes and collaborate on assignments, and the website has built-in tools such as a personal calendar, class calendar, and assignments tabs. While there are several Q&A sites made specifically for college students (including startup Answer Underground, Hallway is one of the few that targets high school students.

Here are the four startups that will get to present on the DEMO main stage today and tomorrow

EcoLek, LLC
About:EcoLek LLC aims to reconnect people with nature by helping them identify the birds around them. Our Bird Alerts, available now at www.GetBirdeez.com, sends you customized notification emails about birds that have been seen in your area. The Birdeez App will help you identify birds and collect bird sightings, and the Birdeez Social Network let your share those sightings with your friends and to meet other birdwatchers in your area.

eBrevia, LLC
Founder:
Ned Gannon
About:eBrevia is commercializing natural language processing technology developed at a major research university to assist corporate attorneys, in-house counsel, and business executives in performing a variety of tasks more efficiently, accurately, and cost effectively. Using machine-learning techniques, the company¹s software can extract and summarize legal provisions from a wide array of legal documents.

Click With Me Now
Founder:
Mike Behr
About: The company offers a simple screen sharing solution that doesn¹t require extra software and works directly within the browser, allowing users to quickly share their online experience in real time with friends, coworkers, or clients. Click With Me Now received $50,000 in seed funding following its acceptance into the Capital Innovators program earlier this year, and is currently running in closed beta.

RecBob
Founder: John Schnipkoweit
About: RecBob is a Facebook app that manages adult sports teams, making them easy and fun! RecBob sends game reminders, tracks who¹s in and who¹s out on game day and automatically finds subs as needed so rosters are always full.

Of course we wish all eight startups good luck while they’re out there at DEMO. The DEMO conference can be very lucrative for any startup. This isn’t the first time Startup America has been able to help get startups from “everywhere” to major conferences and events. StartupDC held a pitch contest earlier this year for a spot at the highly coveted Capital Connection/TechBuzz event. That winner CONT3NT went on to the finals of the TechBuzz competition.

Linkage:

Find DEMO here

Startup America here

Everywhere Else here

Steve Case Continues To Advocate For Startups Everywhere Else

Steve Case, the co-founder of AOL, Revolution, The Case Foundation and the Chairman of the Startup America Partnership, spoke today at the Empact Summit. Empact is an event in Washington DC that promotes youth entrepreneurship and connects innovators of today with future innovators of tomorrow.

Case is currently on a nationwide road trip where he is promoting entrepreneurship and Startups across the country. Case finds different ways to drive home the same mission everywhere he speaks.

This time around though, Upstart, the startup and high growth division of the Business Journals, , reports that Case is concerned. He doesn’t want the US to get too cocky, as their are other countries that have startup and entrepreneurial ecosystems growing nearly as fast as the US.

We’ve seen first hand countries like Israel, Romania, Greece, the UK, and other countries launching startups, and supporting them with accelerators, incubators and of course cash.
“The United States of America was a startup 200 years ago,” said Case, reports upstart., “We didn’t just wake up and become the leading economy in the world. It was entrepreneurs…who drove enormous economic growth.”

Case’s life is filled with startups. Outside of launching the widely used Internet service provider, Case’s Revolution, is a venture capital firm that invests in high growth potential startups like ZipCar, across the country. Case and his wife Jean’s philanthropic foundation, The Case Foundation is a founding partner of the Startup America Partnership.

Just like keynote at Capital Connection/TechBuzz in May, Case was very supportive of startups outside of Silicon Valley. While Case said that the startup activity in Silicon Valley was “awesome” he also said it was “vital to support entrepreneurial centers around the country”.

Linkage:

Source: Upstart

Here’s more Startup America coverage from Nibletz.com

Are you going to be here?

Startup America To Help Curb Sliding Startup Job Creation

Startup America is working with high growth potential startups to fuel the nations job market (CEO Scott Case photo: nibletz LLC)

An alarming study was released yesterday by the Hudson Institute entitled “The Collapse Of Startups In Job Creation”. Many startup enthusiasts, founders, and entrepreneurs were shocked to hear that with all of the national talk about “startups”, job creation has slipped 22% since 1977 (according to the study).

It’s important to understand that with this study “startup” is used to describe not only traditional entrepreneurial driven tech startups but small businesses as well. Regardless, the data has some scratching their heads.

Since 1977 new firms have combined to create an average of 3 million jobs per year. The most recent data available from 2010 showed that the 1977 figure was off by 22%, all the while most thought jobs created via small business and startups were improving, not declining. Going back to the George HW Bush and Clinton years close to 11.3 million Americans per thousand worked in startup jobs.

Conversely, the Kauffman Institute has said numerous times that since 1980 companies less than five years old have accounted for nearly all the job growth. The Kauffman Institute, The Hudson Institute and many government socio economic advisors have said that startups are needed to fuel job growth.

Startup America, the organization spearheaded by AOL founder Steve Case in conjunction with the Obama Administration, is working day in and day out to continue to support and fuel high growth potential startups, in hopes to quickly re-invigorate the U.S. jobs market and curb the slide.

Recent data from Startup America’s optimism survey reveals that the partnership and it’s nearly 10,000 member startups, founders and entrepreneurs are on the right track. The survey, published last week, says that 85% of the Startup America members plan on adding jobs in the next year. 44.6% of members plan on adding more than 3 jobs.

Startup America CEO, Scott Case, told nibletz.com today “America’s economic heroes are young high-growth startups and the founders that lead them. Over the last 18 months amazing startup communities have rallied around these companies all around the country. I’m in LA today and the energy is palpable – we see the same in places like Iowa, Tennessee, Colorado, and Illinois. No doubt every region needs to go all-in to support America’s startups.”

Linkage:

Read the CNBC Story here

Here’s more Startup America coverage from nibletz.com

Have you heard?

New Mexico Joins Startup America Partnership With Startup New Mexico

New Mexico marks the latest state to join the Startup America Partnership with their region Startup New Mexico. Startup New Mexico launched on Wednesday evening at an event at the Embassy Suites Downtown Hotel in Albuquerque. New Mexico has a growing ecosystem of startups covering technology, web startups, mobile and tangible products. Now, those entrepreneurs and startups in New Mexico can take advantage of the over 90 member benefits Startup America offers to it’s 9500+ and growing membership. Joining Startup New Mexico and Startup America is free.

“Focusing on high-growth startups is a smart strategy for New Mexico to grow its economy,” said Scott Case, CEO of the Startup America Partnership. “Startup New Mexico provides a state-wide network to help the entrepreneurs building the next great success story to access the opportunities and resources unique to the state.”

There is a hotbed of startup activity in the southwest spanning from southern California including LA’s “Silicon Beach”, through New Mexico, Las Vegas and the southern parts of Texas.

“Given its unique business, research and cultural environment, New Mexico is poised to unleash its potential to become a national leader in startup creation, science & technology commercialization, economic growth, and job creation,” said John Mierzwa, Co-Chairman of the Startup New Mexico team.

Loraine Upham, Startup New Mexico Leadership Team member notes, “As host to the two largest National Laboratories continually generating innovative new technologies and solutions, and as owner of the second largest Sovereign Wealth Fund in the U.S., New Mexico is a cauldron of economic growth potential. Entrepreneurs are the catalysts that can leverage these terrific resources into jobs and value creation. Startup New Mexico can help bring it all together.”

Linkage:

Here’s Startup New Mexico on the web

Join the Startup America partnership here at S.co it’s free

If you’re a startup “everywhere else” you need to make sure to get here.

Startup Washington Launches To A Full House

In the past week we’ve seen two new state regions join the Startup America Partnership, a nationwide organization for entrepreneurs and founders of high growth potential startups. The organization provides over 90 member benefits to it’s almost 10,000 member base. Startup America was implemented last year under the Obama administration. AOL Founder and Revolution Founder serves as Chairman of the Startup America board. Scott Case (no relation), the founding CTO of Priceline.com serves as the organizations CEO and national spokersperson.

On September 6th a large and diverse group of Washington State entrepreneurs, innovators, founders and startups gathered at the Intiman Playhouse for the Next 50 Commerce & Innovation Economy Month event alongside the launch of Startup Washington. The event itself sold out in less than two weeks and had over 300 people in attendance. The launch event featured short remarks from Wash. Secretary of Commerce Rogers Weed, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn, and Startup America national co-founder Pam Contag.

Seattle is a hotbed of innovative startup and entrepreneurial activity in present day and over the past 25 years. The Seattle region plays home to Microsoft, Amazon.com, T-Mobile USA, HTC USA and countless other companies that have driven innovation in mobile and internet over the last 20 years. Seattle also has an incredible local startup and tech website, geekwire.com. In the current wave of startups, StartupWeekend and Microsoft BizSpark are both driving forces behind national innovation and both are also headquartered in Washington state.

Rashmir Balasubramaniam, Founder of Nsansa and MC for the evening, connected and elevated attendees with a playful and engaging tone for the evening.

“Washington State is a melting pot of innovation, entrepreneurship and conscious leadership. Our unique set of industries, ideas, and intentions are coming together to ensure that our people and our environment thrive,” said Balasubramaniam.

“All of us on the Startup Washington team were thrilled to see such an incredible response to this event. We are more excited than ever about celebrating innovation and entrepreneurship in Washington State, and anticipate another 50 years of innovation and entrepreneurial success stories from our region,” noted Lindsay Andreotti, CEO, Brilliance Enterprises and Co-Chair of Startup Washington.

Linkage:

Check out StartupWashington.org here

Check out Startup America here at S.co

Startups “everyhwhere else” check out “everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference” here

Startup America Quarterly Survey Shows Growing Faith In Economy & More

The Startup America Partnership released the results for their first quarterly optimism survey. The survey is being conducted quarterly in conjunction with global management consulting firm Oliver Wyman.

The survey results from this quarter were released on the heels of two major mini conferences Startup America partnered with StartupRockon to host at the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention. Both events highlighted the role that startups play in the U.S. economy.

The results of the survey echoed the importance and highlighted the resurgence of faith in the US economy from the membership of Startup America. The fact that so many entrepreneurs have faith in the direction the country is going, restores confidence all around. Nearly 50% of the survey respondents indicated they were more confident now, about the U.S. economy.

With unemployment at a rate of 8.1% right now in the United States, the most encouraging find in the Optimism Survey was that 85% of Startup America members plan on hiring in the next 12 months. This speaks to the core of the Startup America mission to serve as a resource, and organization for high growth potential startups that will ultimately add more jobs to the economy.

Out of the 85% of Startup America members that said they would be hiring in the next 12 months 42% said they would add between 3-10 employees. 11% said they would hire ten or more employees. This supports data from the Kauffman Foundation that’s said between 1980-2005 companies that were less than five years old accounted for nearly all of the net job growth in the U.S.

“As young companies grow and generate revenue they hire more employees, creating more job opportunities,” said Scott Case, CEO of the Startup America Partnership. “Our members are comprised of amazing startups from every region in the country and we encourage everyone to connect with startups in their local community in order to meet the real heroes of the economy.”

The Optimism survey will be conducted quarterly to have a pulse on where startups stand in regard to the economy.

Linkage:

Startup America Optimism survey page is here

Here’s the PDF with the raw data

Here’s more Startup News from Nibletz.com

Meeting Burner Partners With Startup America For New Member Benefits

The member benefits that Startup America members get when they sign up for Startup America are plentiful. There is a wide range of great businesses resources, tools, literature and more available to Startup America members at deeply discounted rates and sometimes free. Microsoft, Dell and American Airlines are just some of Startup America’s large corporate member partners that are hoping to spur innovation by providing their hardware, and services at discounted rates. (did we mention signing up for Startup America is free?)

The latest company to join the ranks of Startup America member benefits partners is MeetingBurner.

The Startup America partnership has been using MeetingBurner’s platforms to host their educational webinars with top startup ecosystem advocates across the country. Here’s a short list of just a handful of people featured in Starutp America webinars hosted on the MeetingBurner platform:

SEOmoz CEO Rand Fishkin
Rebecca Corliss (Head of Social Media at HubSpot)
Eric Jackson (CEO CapLinked/PayPal),
Jason Best & Sherwood Neiss (founders of Startup Exemption and two of the key guys who pushed the Crowdfunding bill through Congress)
Ingrid Vanderveldt (Entrepreneur and Dell’s first Entrepreneur in Residence)
Don Charlton (CEO The Resumator)
Tristan Walker (Andreesen Horrowitz/Former BD at Foursquare),
Tony Tjan (Founder CueBall VC firm/HBS Author)

Now, Startup America member companies can use the same webinar platform for their own webinars and web meetings. MeetingBurner is offering a 25% discount on MeetingBurner Pro or Premium for Startup America members.

To get started just sign up for Startup America at their website s.co and if you’re already a member look for it in your member dashboard alongside the numerous other great benefits.

Linkage:

Meetingburner is here

StartupAmerica is here

And we’re “everywhere else”

LiveBlog: Startup America Panel At The DNC 2012: How Government Can Foster Startups

1:22pm: Igor Jablokov: startups are becoming the R&D cauldron for big established businesses now. Rather than keeping in house R&D and upsetting Wall Street big companies are vetting startups that they could acquire with the new technologies they want/need

1:20pm: Chopra: Obama challenged America to double their exports. EdTech startups are having more success overseas. Other countries are hungry for education and EdTech. “We are more accustomed to selling Boeing overseas rather than having entrepreneurs sell EdTech overseas”

1:15pm: What role does government play in demand: Polis: Sound economic stewardship, restoring our fiscal integrity, getting rid of the special interest loopholes, new trade policies

1:09PM Scott Case: Tells Chopra he is only the second elected official he has ever spoken to as the CEO of Startup America Partnership, that has said “why don’t we build our own companies” rather than “what factories can we get to come here”

1:06PM: Martinsville is going to invest in entrepreneurship locally stemming from Startup America. Chopra visited Martinsville, a community with double digit unemployment and found that entrepreneurship and talent is all about making a job just as much as it is about getting a job.

12:59pm: Dan Roselli: The stimulus act isn’t the government rolling up a dumpster full of cash. He and his business partner used the Stimulus Act to help buy and revitalize the building that now houses the PPL. When it’s not home to bloggers and online media for DNC 2012, Packard Place is the incubator for incubators and 5 floors of startups, entrepreneurs and founders.

12:56pm: Cowell on the innovation fund in North Carolina. Policies like founders tax credits can help founders and spur entrepreneurship. NC is the the 20th state in the US that is offering an “innovation” type fund. Government isnt typically good with these kinds of funds, so they want to outsource and have a public/private partnership. NC uses Credit Suisse as a third party officiant of their fund and gives them an “arms length” distance from the fund itself.

12:54pm: Scott Case question “Where do you see the line” in regards to where government is part of startups. Chopra is talking about policy barriers that make it harder for startups to break into markets. Healthcare data ecosystem counts over 200 new products or services that utilize health data.

StartupRockingon With StartupRockon At The DNC

It’s been a festive night in Charlotte North Carolina. While many started partying like a democrat Friday evening, StartupRockon and StarutpAmerica along with MassChallenge have kicked off their presence at the StartupRockon party tonight featuring national recoding act The Roots.

The party has had some great people from startup ecosystems throughout the country, Luke Rafenstahl the Mayor of Pittsburgh is a huge startup advocate and he arrived early for the festivities.

Our awesome social media liaison for the StartupAmerica partnership Anna Eisenberg along with Kathleen Warner the COO of Startup America and the partnerships Communications Director, Chris Roche have been talking innovation all night.

The Publisher of Hypervocal, and founder of StartupRockon, Lee Brenner has done an exceptional job of organizing these events in a short amount of time. Brenner pointed out on stage this evening that this is just the startup of StartupRockon at the Democratic National Convention. More programming including panels with StartupAmerica CEO Scott Case and Huffington Post Publisher Arianna Huffington kick off tomorrow morning.

As for The Roots they’ve been tearing the roof off the mother sucka tonight kicking off the party with a tribute to The Beastie Boys MCA and the godfather of DC GoGo Chuck Brown. A Roots version of Paul Revere complete with vocals from MCA and a mad GoGo swing kicked off their set.

We’ll be here all week reporting all the startup goodness from the must attend political event of the last four years the Democratic National Convention.

Linkage:

More of our DNC 2012 Coverage Here