Southland Kicks Off With Emmy Lou Harris, Rodney Crowell And A Party With SouthernAlpha

Southland, Southern Alpha, startups, Tennessee, Launch Tennessee

The Southland conference officially kicks off Thursday morning at 9am but the pre-festivities started Wednesday night in historic downtown Nashville.

Investors and VIP’s from as far away as Vancouver were treated to a swank VIP party at the legendary Ryman Auditorium to kick off the two day conference celebrating startups, culture and technology. Baker Donelson’s Emerging Technologies Practice Lead, Chris Sloan said it was “the most amazing investor party I’ve ever been to” Why? Because Launch Tennessee, the producers of the conference, were able to get local national country stars Emmy Lou Harris and Rodney Crowell to dazzle the crowd with an intimate performance.

Launch Tennessee CEO Charlie Brock getting into an exciting discussion with one of the hundreds of entrepreneurs at Southland

Launch Tennessee CEO Charlie Brock getting into an exciting discussion with one of the hundreds of entrepreneurs at Southland

While that party was going on, event attendees who arrived Wednesday evening were treated to a roof top party at the Rock Bottom Brewery hosted by our cousins at SouthernAlpha. Southern Alpha’s Walker Duncan, Kelly Boothe and Dave Ledgerwood were meeting and greeting startup founders, entrepreneurs, startup support organizations and investors from up and down the east coast.  Even 500 Startups partner and founder of dashboard.io Paul Singh, was on hand, with his lovely wife Suki mingling with the crowd, talking up startups and what dashboard.io can do for founders and investors.

We bumped into Kim Munzo, founder of Florida based Aspiredu and the winner of $25,000 best in village award at Everywhereelse.co The Startup Conference. Munzo made the trek from Tampa Florida to see what the Southland buzz was about and to update us about the progress their educational analytic startup has made since winning the crown at our conference.

Steve Buhrman the CEO and founder of am>venture backed (we are also backed by am>ventures) WannaDo gave us a sneak back of a bad ass upgrade to their event discovery app and assured us that they will be adding new metropolitan areas rapidly.

chrisOur Memphis startup community was in full force. On the hot and muggy night people kept saying Memphis brought the heat, and that we did. Pam Cooper (Boosterville), Brittany Fitzpatrick (MentorMe), Richard and Richard (ScrewPulp), Charleson Bell (Bionanovations) and Allan Daisley (Memphis Bioworks), shut the party down (as usual).

If Tuesday evening was any indication of what to expect from Southland this is going to be one epic conference. Stay tuned for more Southland coverage here at nibletz.com the voice of startups everywhere else.

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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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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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Memphis’ Startup WorkForPie Selected For Southland For Kufikia

WorkForPie, Kufikia, Memphis startup, Nashville, SouthlandCliff McKinney and Brad Montgomery, the Memphis based startup team behind WorkForPie have been working on a new product called Kufikia for the past few months. McKinney explained to nibletz that Kufikia loosely means “to achieve” with that they have come up with a learning platform for advanced software developers.

With a new innovative approach, combining cohort based learning, typically found in an accelerator program, with mentoring, and early stage job placement, they were able to get selected as one of the first 20 startups in the Startup Village at the Southland conference in Nashville Tennessee next month. We revealed the entire list of 20 startups earlier today.

Kufikia participants will get the “3 S’s” out of the program according to McKinney. Those three S’s are; structure (a 9 week long curriculum), study buddies (cohorts of 10 students going through the program together), and support coming from the platforms sponsors. Each cohort will have three company sponsors that will alternate in three week intervals throughout the course of the program.

McKinney and Montgomery plan on starting the first cohort in late June. For the first program they are targeting participants in Silicon Valley, the Pacific Northwest, New York and Nashville. Actually four cohorts will run simultaneously. Although this is an online program they want the students and company resources to be in close proximity to each other.

Kufikia has already attracted some heavyweight sponsors for their platform, which they aren’t identifying just yet.

The sponsors will benefit by working closely with the students in the program and hopefully converting them to new employees. McKinney says that most companies spend upwards of $15,000 providing internships to potential employees that may not work out. By working with the students over the nine week period the company sponsors will develop relationships with them and hopefully hire them on.

The sponsors participating will have jobs to fill, and hopefully with those students. McKinney and Montgomery are making a bold bet on the success of the program. Sponsors are under an agreement to provide mentoring and coaching to the cohort but don’t make a financial commitment to Kufikia until they actually hire someone.

Both Montgomery and McKinney are looking forward to showing off this new product to the attendees at Southland including over 41 venture capital and angel firms that have committed to attend.

Find out more about Kufikia here.

Check out this awesome guest post by McKinney here: Are accelerators everywhere else better at producing groundbreaking innovation?

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Here Are The First 20 Startups In Southland’s Startup Village Highlighting The South East

Southland, Startup Conference, Nashville, Launch TennesseeWe’re less than a month away from the inaugural Southland conference combining the best of southern culture and technology. The two day conference takes place June 12-13th at the Cannery Ballroom and the Mercy Lounge in downtown Nashville. It’s been strategically placed between the CMA Music Festival and Bonaroo.

Launch Tennessee, a public/private partnership with the state of Tennessee, and responsible for the state’s nine accelerator regions, is spearheading and organizing the Southland Conference along with the Music City Music Council.

The conference is highlighting startups and entrepreneurship across the 12 states in the southeast. To that end, the first twenty startups (out of 50) have been selected for the startup village. These startups will get a chance to show off in front of all of the event attendees including 41 venture capital and angel firms that have committed to attending the event. They’ll also be competing for $10,000.

The 20 startups released so far are a great representation of the entire south east region, many of which we’ve covered here at nibletz.com the voice of startups everywhere else.

Distil Networks, Washington DC area (Northern Virginia) is a technology startup that protects proprietary online content from bots and scrapers. We covered Distil back in August, here.

The Royalty Exchange: is a Raleigh based startup that provides an online marketplace platform for those who want to buy, sell, license, all types of alternative assets and royalty streams.

Variable Inc, is a Chattanooga startup that makes the NODE device for iPhones and Android phones. This bluetooth connected device has sensors built in a small body that measure a variety of things,

World Housing Solution: an Orlando based startup, wants to make a difference in the lives of others through the design, manufacture and construction of sustainable buildings. They do this through structural, insulated, composite panels.

Banyan, based in Chattanooga they were the big winner at last year’s GigTank investor day securing an additional $100,000 at the end of the investor day pitches. The startup began in Florida and relocated to Chattanooga. They provide a cloud based collaboration tool for researchers and did a great job during this pitch to show how the gigabit ethernet in Chattanooga benefit their startup.

QuickCue: is another Chattanooga startup that we actually saw pitch at an event in Nashville. They provide a table reservation and communication platform for restaurants.

Verdeeco: is a smart grid analytics startup based in Atlanta.

Do 5 Things, based in Knoxville Tennessee this startup is a marketing optimization platform for utilities looking to increase rebate redemptions and encourage behavior change.

Patient Focus, is a Nashville startup that is exclusively for patient pay collections “after insurance and before bad debt”

Kufikia, is a new off-shoot of Memphis based WorkForPie. We’ve covered WorkForPie extensively at nibletz.com. Kufikia is a hybrid between online accelerator, internship, and hiring tool connecting highly skilled developers and software engineers to companies through cohort based learning.

Splitsecnd is a Nashville based hardware technology startup focused on connecting motorists in accidents to help. Similar to Onstar but focused on splitsecnd quick response, the devices sensors can determine accidents and connects the motorist to a 24 hour emergency response center.

viaCycle is an Atlanta bike sharing startup focused on the “next generation of bike sharing” we reported on them back in April of 2012.

VIPAAR This startup based in Birmingham Alabama at the Innovation Depot is “telepresence software”. They were the first startup to receive funding from the Central Alabama Angel Network. We covered that story last September.

American Songspace: is a Nashville startup that according to our friend Milt Capps at Venture Nashville and is “relaunching this summer” and they describe the platform as “a song catalog management system,” 

Beam Technologies, is a Kentucky based startup that has literally appified the toothbrush. We interviewed their CEO Alex Frommeyer back in August.

Evermind, is a Nashville startup and Jumpstart Foundry alumni.  The founding team came out of Griffin Technologies. We saw them pitch their hardware startup that monitors a loved one by their electric current habits. Check out this innovative startups pitch here.

Ridepost was a graduate of the Iron Yard accelerator in Greenville South Carolina and is now incubating at the Fort based in the 1776 DC space. We interviewed this ride sharing startup back in August.

Gatske, it’s not a sexy startup but definitely useful. This startup based in Greenville SC helps plan and manage audits.

NextGxDx is a Nashville startup and 2010 graduate of Jumpstart Foundry. They’re an online marketplace for genetic testing.

Populr.me is a Nashville startup. We’ve covered them extensively and their co-founder Nick Holland has been an extremely useful resource, and almost mentor to the Nibletz team. We’ve covered Holland and Populr extensively here at nibletz.com

Here’s more on Southland at nibletz.com The Voice of startups everywhere else.

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Tennessee Showcasing Startups, Culture And More At Southland June 11th and 12th

Southland, Nashville startups,startup events, startup conference,startups,bonaroo,CMALaunch Tennessee and the Music City Music Council have teamed up to hold a new startup and innovation conference in Nashville in June. The conference, called Southland, butts up to two of the regions biggest music events, Bonaroo and the Country Music Association Music Festival.

This unique scheduling allows fans of both music and innovation to plan a nice 10 day trip to Nashville and enjoy a mixture of both.

Southland will feature venture capitalists and angel investors from across the country along with an extensive lineup of speakers and panelists with a firsthand knowledge of the power of innovation and its ability to transform a region’s ecosystem. Speakers include Sarah Lacy (Founder, PandoDaily), Michael Sippy (Vice President of Consumer Products, Twitter), Michael Marquez (Co-Founder, Code Advisors), KC Estenson (SVP & GM, CNN Digital), Ali Partovi (Co-Founder, Code.org), and many more from CNN, Scripps Networks Interactive, IBM and others.
“The Southeast is a hotbed for technology startups,” notes Charlie Brock, CEO of LaunchTN. “This conference is going to be the premier event for bringing together the best our region has to offer in entrepreneurs and cultural tastemakers, along with investors, technology and health care executives from around the country.”
In addition to the usual startup conference programming, like a startup village, and engaging keynotes speakers and panels, Southland will also offer a “Makers Marketplace” of southern culture featuring local musicians, BBQ pit masters, small batch distillers and southern artisans.
Unlike the national everywhereelse conference hosted in Memphis Tennesse, which highlights startups and innovation across, Southland is poised to be the largest regional conference for innovation and startups. Sandwiched in between the two major musical events, the Southland conference will offer an unheard of and very attractive cultural and innovation injection to all attendees.

Tickets are only $300, interested in attending visit southlandse.com

Nibletz provide the best startup coverage in the southeast, here’s more!