Sarah E. Welch

I just got back from the final round of the Community Demos for this year’s TechStars class. I am abuzz! These guys (& gals) are building some seriously cool stuff! Tonight’s demos:

Vacation Rental Partners – Much like Rent Monitor from yesterday’s set of demos, Vacation Rental Partners is trying to solve the headaches for a niche market.  This time, we’re talking individual home owner’s renting out second homes for vacations.  They’ve made things easy for owners while creating a solution that’s just as easy as booking a hotel for guests.  It looks like a slick solution, but this isn’t a market that I know a lot about.  I can tell you that the numbers that they presented looked very good.

ADstruc – I love these guys.  With their (first ever) marketplace for outdoor advertising, they are creating efficiencies in an otherwise very inefficient market.  Instead of dealing with brokers all over the country, large advertisers can buy coast-to-coast by clicking from the comfort of their office–or home–or coffee shop.  This looks like a win-win proposition for all involved.  Bonus: These guys have awesome partnerships already with more to come!

Spot Influence – This is another team working advertising, but this time, they’re helping advertisers identify influential people on very specific topics through calculations based upon how many people follow, listen to, and engage with these people on particular topics. It’s interesting stuff, but the lead in to their presentation made me think that they were helping everyday people connect with experts in their community on particular topics.  Once I realized that it was helping advertisers reach me inside my social circles, I was less excited–at least personally.  These guys offer a definite value, I’m just not their market.

Kapost – Kapost has created a virtual newsroom where anyone can write content to be purchased by publishers.  It’s really a marketplace for words–definitely interesting.  I’d like to learn more about their competitors already in the marketplace.  My biggest concern is that the tech isn’t easily defensible.  They will need to get a foothold into the market to make this a go.

GearBox – Hands down, GearBox won out of all the TechStars grads for fun!  This was definitely a great way to round out the two nights of presentations.  GearBox has built a ball that you can control with your smartphone.  Here, you just have to see it.  It sounds like the ball is just the beginning.  They’ve built an API that will allow manufacturers and software developers to use their tech in any way imaginable.  Back to the balls: if these guys would have had these on hand in the hallway afterwards (concert-style), I have no doubt that they would have sold out.  A developer kit should be available in a few months.  This did remind me of the Star Wars Force Trainer and similar toys, which haven’t been very successful.  There are a few key differences, though.  1) The price point is better – expected to be $40.  2) This is portable.  You already have your phone, and you can slip a ball into your pocket.  3) You’ll look much cooler using this than wearing some dorky headset.  Oh & this is much more fun to watch than someone staring at a ball.

Where would I put my money?  Omniar (my writeup from last night’s demos) & GearBox.  To be fair, I think most of these guys are going to build profitable companies, but in Omniar I’d be looking for a quick return on investment & in GearBox I’d be looking for steady income and a fun time doing it!

Now you have it–my thoughts on the TechStars Boulder Class of 2010.  I can’t wait to watch these companies develop.  Their success so far has put a fire in my belly to get to work on my own side project!

Uncategorized Boulder, Colorado, startups, Tags: Bdnt, technology

One of the first things that attracted me to Boulder was the TechStars program.  I haven’t applied to the program and have no plans to do so (although it seems like the very best summer camp ever!), but I loved the idea of living in a town with TechStars as part of the ecosystem.  The people, the tech, the energy–I’m enjoying the entrepreneurial contact high.

Tonight, I had the utmost pleasure of being introduced to a few of this year’s class of TechStars grads at the Boulder Denver New Tech Meetup.  The rest of the class will be presenting tomorrow night in a second session.  All of this is in advance of the TechStars Demo Day on Thursday.  Here are some of my thoughts about tonight’s crew.  Note: I’m not including anything that I think will be a ta-da moment for these guys on Demo Day.  I don’t want to steal their well-deserved thunder.  Onward!

Rent Monitor – This is an on point solution for a niche market that’s definitely feeling the pain.  Having experience in the property management business, this team built an app to take the pain out of being the landlord–automating and tracking everything.  I’d go one further, I’d want to rent from someone using this app.  I don’t think most bad landlords are bad on purpose–just overwhelmed.  I think these guys could take local markets by storm.  On the founders: I met Deanna Bennett a a couple months ago (I was ‘gate crashing’ a Tech Stars event) and keep running into her at local events.  I’m just getting to know her, but she and her hubby & co-founder Brett Yates seem like the kind of folks you want in your social circle.  This should be an asset when raising capital.

RoundPegg – This is the only product that I’ve used prior to tonight.  I’ve heard so much great stuff about RoundPegg already that I didn’t realize that they were a TechStars company this summer.  I thought they were already very well established.  RoundPegg helps you filter potential employees based upon fit with the company, team, and manager.  It also helps employees find employers that would be a good match.  You can go on their site right now and do a free assessment on yourself.  For me, it was dead on.  I’d love to give this a try in hiring and test myself against it.

Omniar – Omniar wants to “make the world clickable”.  They’ve built an API that allows users to take a picture of an item and learn more about it.  If I had some cash set aside for investing, this would be my pick of tonight’s presenters.  All of the teams were fairly solid, but I think these guys have the potential for a quick and very large exit.  Their model is licensing the technology, but it also means it’s been built in a way that it would be easy for another company to buy and make their own.  There are many possible applications of their tech, too.

BlipSnips – I want to love this tool, but I don’t think I’m the market for it.  Very rarely do I share videos with others, although that might change with BlipSnips.  I don’t know, but I’m going to give it a try.  I can definitely see this being a great tool for videos of family events, though.

Statsmix -These guys have built a drag-n-drop, plug in as you see fit dashboard for all the analytics, metrics, and reports you can throw its way.  On top of that, the tool points out insights based upon aggregating this data together and helps you visualize what’s important.  I’d love to get my hands on this and give it a go.

ScriptPad – Hands down, these guys had the best demo of the night.  They’re facilitating electronic prescriptions.  I love that they are putting this in the hands of docs.  I think they’ve bought themselves close to first to market advantage in what will probably be a crowded marketplace very soon.  If they can ramp up quickly and get a foothold, I think they will be in a very good place.  One thing to watch out for–consolidation of the medical industry.  I designed a similar application for pharmacies about ten years ago but bailed because of consolidation there.

If this is what TechStars Boulder 2010 has to offer, I can’t wait for tomorrow night! (Read the rest here.)

Uncategorized bdnt, Boulder, Colorado, startups, technology