TechStars Graduate 11 More Startups

For the past four years TechStars, the Boulder, CO based seed accelerator program, has engaged in funding up-and-coming companies with an entrepreneurial summer camp of sorts. The program consists of up to $18,000 of funding alongside a three-month incubation program for the founders.

Last week TechStars held its “Demo Day”, the final step in the incubation process. The Demo Day gave the startups the chance to present their work to over 300 potential investors in an 8 minute pitch. When asked about the event Liam Davis-Meade, CTO of ScriptPad, a service that turns digital devices into prescription pads for doctors, referred to the final day as “a weird mix of exhilaration and relief, tempered by [the fact that] now the real work begins. It was the first step, a big step, in a long series of steps.”

While the Demo Day is the climax of the program, the real value of TechStars is found in the three-month process as a whole; as the co-founder of Rent Monitor, who develop management software for landowners, likened the process to getting an MBA in three months.

All of the founders worked in the same workspace, receiving instruction from TechStar’s Mentors, in fields such as legal, business development and finance. David Cohen, TechStars CEO, said that mentors are brought on through personal connections and because they know they are “awesome”.  While several founders referred to the mentors (Eric Reis, Don Doge and Dave McClure to name a few) as the most valuable assets, they also praised the value of working with the other founders. The relationships built between the companies even paralleled, by ScriptPad’s CEO Shane Taylor, to a fraternal bond.

Seed accelerator, angel groups and start-up pitch events have become increasingly popular over the past few years with the success of Y Combinator and Techcrunch50 (newly re-branded as TechCrunch Disrupt). These programs have opened the door for early stage startups and investors alike. John Laramie of ADstruc, an outdoor billboard marketplace and TechStars graduate, credits these programs as the “driving force behind mentoring, supporting, and launching successful companies.”

Below is a list of the companies that took part in the TechStars 2010 Boulder class:

ADstruc

ADstruc is an advertising marketplace for outdoor billboards. Ranging from Times Square wallscapes to billboards on the back of bicycles ADstruc looks to become the Google AdWords for the large outdoor advertising format.

BlipSnips

BlipSnips is a tool for adding interactive annotations to online video. These annotations make it easier for viewers to share specific moments in content, engaging the viewer and those they share with online.

Kapost

Kapost is a social publishing platform that allows the audience of a site produce content for it. It currently works within blog frameworks such as Wordpress and Drupal. Watch their commercial to get a sense of what Kapost offers here.

Omniar

Omniar is a visual search platform that can be utilized through an open API and is currently open for beta testing.

Orbotix

Orbotix, formerly Gearbox, is an advanced toy company. Currently their flagship project is a ball controlled via smartphone. They are currently looking to develop beyond the simple ball game with their API.

Rent Monitor

Rent Monitor is a management dashboard for landowners to manage their properties and simplify the process of running their business

Round Pegg

Round Pegg is a service aimed towards finding employees that will fit company culture and eliminate the mess a miss-hire causes.

Spot Influence

Spot Influence is a curated search engine where users are provided information from the top influencers of their desired topic. This is done primarily through social media keywords.

ScriptPad

ScriptPad looks to turn digital devices, currently the iPhone and iPad, into digital prescription pads. The elegant solution to messy handwritten prescriptions that may be filled incorrectly while digitally documenting the process.

StatsMix

StatsMix is a customizable dashboard for companies to display data and analytics for their websites and APIs.

Vacation Rental Partner

Vacation Rental Partner is a management tool for those who rent out their vacation homes as opposed to hiring a management company, keeping control in the hands of the owner and minimizing cost.