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Ramping Up For Startup Riot

Published on March 19, 2008 in Events, Startups and Venture Capital. 0 Comments

This blog has been eerily quiet since I announced and started ramping up for Startup Riot. Everyone seems to be very enthusiastic about the event and I’m hurriedly seeing venues and trying to figure out a cost effective way of doing this. As I mentioned before this is going to be an event focused on getting pitches from startups (Atlanta or not) in 3 minute chunks. Of the initial projection of 45 slots, I’ve already got about half of them filled with companies who have pre-registered. I may expand this number based on demand (which will then require reconfiguring either the schedule or the venue or both) but the initial 45 companies have the best shot of pitching at the event.

I’ve also started reaching out to investors (both angels and venture capitalists) to introduce the event. Everyone so far seems interested in attending (even without a firm date set). My next round of introductory invites is going to go out to large local corporations and non-profits. The large corporations are a good chance to land paying customers (or potential acquirers!). My hope is that startups at the event will see non-profits as a way to get name recognized pilot customers who can provide valuable feedback while non-profits get to use bleeding edge technology for free/cheap. If you view non-profit folks in that capacity I think it’ll be a win/win.

So what do I need from you? A few things. I’ve already got a handful of people who have volunteered their time and help for this event. I need more of those people - people who volunteer to work the registration table, help with presentations, move people from area to area, etc. Also, if you have contacts with venture capitalists, angel investors, large companies, or non-profits who you think would come to this event, contact me and I’ll introduce the event to them with your help. This will help get them to register for the event once details are set.

So how do you contact me? Well, you can email me, DM me on twitter, or send a message through LinkedIn.

ClearLeap Lands the Jump

Published on March 17, 2008 in Startups and Venture Capital. 1 Comment

Big funding news this morning. Clearleap just announced a $9 million first round of funding that they’ve closed. Who is Clearleap? Well, they’re pretty new to the scene since they just started back in mid-2007. They were founded by a bunch of ex-N2 Broadband folks. N2 Broadband was previously acquired by Tandberg Television (Tandberg was itself acquired by Ericsson after they received a buyout offer from Suwanee based Arris Group).

So the things that are interesting to me is the time since they’ve been around (7 months according to Braxton Jarratt - Clearleap’s CEO - his photo on the left), the size of the round they got (especially for a first round of funding), and the funders themselves. On the first two points I don’t have much to add so let’s talk about the funders.

The lead funder seems to be Trinity Ventures which is based in Silicon Valley (Noro-Moseley also invested in this round as did Imlay Investments and the former CTO of Time Warner Cable). Trinity is a pretty large fund overall with about $1.2 billion under management and their last fund (Trinity IX) closed in 2005 with $300 million. Given the age of the fund, they’ll probably start raising another fund in a few years. But more importantly, Clearleap is Trinity’s first investment in the Atlanta area. They’ve had interesting investments like Speedera (disclosure: they were a partner of mine at Digital Envoy before they were acquired by Akamai) and scanR but also companies like Starbucks and P.F. Chang’s (not sure if this means that Clearleap’s offices will be stocked with Starbucks). Hopefully with this initially foray into an Atlanta area startup, Trinity will start looking at other opportunities in the Atlanta area. Also, I hope I can entice them to attend the upcoming Startup Riot event. Same goes for the folks from Clearleap (you reading this Braxton?).

As for what they’re doing, Clearleap is working on a way to expand the ways that television content is delivered to consumers. Instead of doing something like Joost, Clearleap is focused on working with satellite and cable providers to deliver a cohesive experience for the consumer. From the little I know it sounds interesting although the path to adoption is a lot harder since it takes agreement and coordination from entrenched players. That being said, I haven’t heard of many people talking about using Joost (I tried Joost and gave up on it - I should probably revisit it at some point) so perhaps the issues aren’t that unique and Clearleap’s approach will provider a better user experience and thus lead to wider adoption.

By the way, this is also a huge win for ATDC as well since Clearleap was recently added as an ATDC company.

So congratulations to Braxton and the rest of the folks at Clearleap! We’re all looking forward to hearing about some interesting developments from you guys and seeing you involved in the local community! By the way, Clearleap is hiring.

Servinity Now!

Published on March 12, 2008 in Startups. 1 Comment

I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be giving publicity to Servinity just yet. In fact, I didn’t even bother to ask. They’re a new startup and they haven’t launched anything yet but I’ve been keeping up with their blog. Man, talk about a pretty well done startup blog (way better than this one).

The blog has covered all kinds of mundane, but important, aspects of starting a company. They’ve posted all the different logo revisions they chose from (I think they chose the best one of the batch) as well as how they came up with the name (ConnectedSpoons isn’t all that bad).

You don’t often get entrepreneurs who talk about all of these aspects of their business. Usually this is because of a lack of time instead of a lack of willingness. I’m sure glad these guys thought to do this and engage folks early in their lifecycle. And Josh, don’t worry I don’t mind the long blog posts. They’re pretty interesting - at least to me.

So for now, all I can say is - Servinity Now… Insanity Later! (if you don’t get that, go watch some Seinfeld).

Introducing Startup Riot

Published on March 10, 2008 in Events, Startups and Venture Capital. 9 Comments

Okay, so I’ve been thinking about this for a while and it’s finally time to test the waters and see if I can pull off this event. At the last Startup Dinner, I mentioned that I’d like to do a startup focused pitch event. The idea would be for startups to get up on stage and do a (strictly enforced!) three minute pitch on their company. I’m calling this event Startup Riot.

Target Audience

The invited audience will be three pronged so that all interested startups will have one or more groups to pitch.

First, I’ll look to invite folks who are looking for jobs especially those who are just graduating from local colleges. Rather than condemn these folks to cube farms, let’s try to get the best and brightest working in some great startups.

Second, I’m planning to invite those involved in technology with large local corporations and non-profits. Clearly getting these folks as customers would be a boon for any startup. Non-profits actually present a unique opportunity for both parties. Startups can leverage these folks as early adopter customers and get valuable feedback on their product/service while non-profits can have the opportunity to adopt new technologies for free/cheap.

And finally, I’m planning to invite investors - angels and venture capitalists. No need to explain why I hope.

Between these three groups, every startup that wants to pitch will have one or more groups that they’ll want to appeal to. But remember, you’ll only have three minutes in which to do this.

The Schedule

The format I’ve been able to come up with would get us through about 45 company pitches over the course of the day with lots of time left over for networking and private discussions. The format may change and adapt based on the venue I end up using as well as the demand for pitch slots. If it’s way over 45, then I’ll rejigger the event so that everyone gets a shot.

I intend to allow any startup that wants to pitch to be able to do so although I reserve the right to refuse anyone a slot based on my sole opinion. Realistically though, most anyone can suffer through three minutes of the most idiotic pitch.

Sponsors and Cost

This isn’t going to be cheap to do. I’m looking into catering (lunch and whatnot), venue costs, printing, etc. I’m fortunate to already have a few people volunteer their time for this event but the overall cost is still going to be hefty. Given that, I’m planning on running this event differently than most of my other events or events run by other local entrepreneurs.

First, I’m going to get sponsors for the event. Yes, that includes service providers. But once costs are covered, I’m not going to keep taking sponsors on for the event. The goal here is to cover cost and not overwhelm the event with non-startup folks. So if you’re interested in sponsoring this event, you probably need to contact me sooner rather than later since I’ll give preference to those who contact me first.

Second, the event is not going to be free for all individuals but fees will take into account each groups ability to pay. Pitching startups will get some allowance of folks they can bring for free. This also goes for non-profits looking to potentially use products and services from the startups. Large companies will have some minimal fee to make sure qualified folks are signing up. Job seekers will pay some minimal amount in an effort to make sure folks who show up are qualified candidates and aren’t just signing up with no intention of showing up. Finally, investors will pay some amount to attend as well.

What I Need From You

So what do I need from you? Well, first I need to make sure that I can actually get 45 or so startups lined up to pitch. If there are more than that who want to pitch I need to know that as well since I need to figure out a schedule that works for this event. At this point I’m targeting either late April or early May for this event and it looks to be an all day event in Atlanta. If you are a part of a startup that wants to pitch, fill out this form and indicate your interest in pitching. If you have any questions, feel free to drop me an email, contact me via LinkedIn, or send me a note on Twitter.

JungleDisk Up For Webware Award

Published on March 5, 2008 in PR & the Press and Startups. 0 Comments

Our friends over at JungleDisk have been nominated for a Webware award in the utility & security category.  Show your love for an Atlanta based company and vote for them to win.

I’m not sure if any other Atlanta based companies are represented but I’m sure other East Coast companies are.  If you find them and like what they’re doing, use their proximity to the East Coast as your tie breaking decider on who to vote for.

Good luck Dave and JungleDisk!

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