ITEN , catalyst for tech startups. Monthly newsletter. This issue is 2013 in Review.
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11/26/13 ITEN Monthly Newsletter- November 2013 campaign.r20.constantcontact.com/render?llr=rirjeadab&v=001750MJEUdJzOb-YNTePdGQ0vZrvMAYfY_cqSUivyH8gHEIRe-uuWcSI5iogR64x6gnjYMFec2… 1/6 You're receiving this email because of your relationship with ITEN. Please confirm your continued interest in receiving email from us. Click here You may unsubscribe if you no longer wish to receive our emails. ITEN: Catalyst for Tech Startups 2013 In Review November 2013 In This Issue Thank You From ITEN Sign Up For Startup Digest The St. Louis Startup Scene in 2013 By Brian Feldt 1MC Retrospective Featured Company of the Month: Gremln 2014 Startup Report Coming Soon Saving Memories Forever Graduates from Mock Angel Program First Companies Matched with ITEN's EIR Featured Events: 2nd Thursday Companies Are Hiring Thanks! ITEN's staff would like to pause and express our thanks for the wonderful support, encouragement, participation, and recognition we receive from so many inside (and outside) our community.......including our sponsors, mentors, investors, entrepreneurs, service providers, board members, advisory board members, ecosystem partners, civic and community organizations, corporations, governmental entities, news organizations, wellwishers, and the hundreds of people who are giving selflessly to the startup ecosystem. You inspire us to be the best we can be. We are lucky to be uniquely positioned to see the progress, accomplishments and all of the seemingly insurmountable challenges that are overcome on a daily basis by these new ventures. Our hats are off to them. To all of our readers: We're grateful to be witnessing with you such dramatic and positive changes in the culture of our city and region! StartupDigest The personalized insider newsletter for all things startup in our area. Subscribe to the FREE weekly St. Louis edition of Startup Digest, providing a menu of the best events for tech startups in our town. With the evergrowing array of startup 2014 Startup Report Coming Soon
You're receiving this email because of your relationship with ITEN. Please confirm your continuedinterest in receiving email from us. Click here You may unsubscribe if you no longer wish to receive our emails.
ITEN: Catalyst for Tech Startups 2013 In Review
November 2013
In This IssueThank You From ITEN
Sign Up For Startup Digest
The St. Louis Startup Scene in 2013 By Brian Feldt
1MC Retrospective
Featured Company of the Month: Gremln
2014 Startup Report Coming Soon
Saving Memories Forever Graduates from Mock Angel Program
First Companies Matched with ITEN's EIR
Featured Events: 2nd Thursday
Companies Are Hiring
Thanks!ITEN's staff would like to pause and express our thanks for thewonderful support, encouragement, participation, and recognition wereceive from so many inside (and outside) ourcommunity.......including our sponsors, mentors, investors,entrepreneurs, service providers, board members, advisory boardmembers, ecosystem partners, civic and community organizations,corporations, governmental entities, news organizations, wellwishers,and the hundreds of people who are giving selflessly to the startupecosystem. You inspire us to be the best we can be. We are luckyto be uniquely positioned to see the progress, accomplishments and allof the seemingly insurmountable challenges that are overcome on adaily basis by these new ventures. Our hats are off to them. To all of our readers: We're grateful to be witnessing with you suchdramatic and positive changes in the culture of our city and region!
StartupDigest The personalized insider newsletterfor all things startup in our area.
Subscribe to the FREE weekly St. Louisedition of Startup Digest, providing a menu ofthe best events for tech startups in our town.With the evergrowing array of startup
With the evergrowing array of startupactivities in St. Louis, it's hard to know whichto attend. Startup Digest can help. Wecurate the events and point you to the bestones for the week ahead.
The St. Louis StartupScene in 2013
Brian FeldtReporter St. LouisBusiness Journal The St. Louis startupscene came a longway in 2013. Itcertainly has a longway to go in 2014.
But St. Louis entrepreneurs whether in TRex, Lab1500, CORTEX or somewhere else know that. They're not about to settle for"came a long way." In fact, they're thirsty totake the next step. I've been covering the tech community forthe St. Louis Business Journal for roughly ahalf year now. In those five months,significant strides were made that should playa huge role in tech's success in 2014. LaunchCode appears poised to help tackle atalent shortage that could satisfy the flux oftech jobs many predicted for St. Louis.SixThirty is attracting topnotch companiesfrom around the world in the financialservices sector. Arch Grants has a newleadership team in place a team that frommy perspective seems ready to take theorganization to new heights. And TREx'spurchase of the Lammert Building has majorimplications for longterm progress. Across town, the @4240 building will beimpressive. It's already helped recruit theCambridge Innovation Center to town and itwill be fun to see what companies begin toset up shop there. And the innovationhappening over at the Center for EmergingTechnologies is notable, especially with thestartups in the BioGenerator. Those are the highlights. What's missing? Well, a bigtime exit or two would be nice. Itwould certainly add fuel to the innovation firehappening in St. Louis. Most people that I talk to seem to thinkthere's around four to five companies thatcould make a bigtime exit. It's nice toprognosticate, but until it actually happens,it's still a glaring need for St. Louis. More money always helps, too. Where's thepreSeries A capital that can help bridge thegap between seed and serious venture
In April, ITEN published our first ever St. Louis Startup Report,highlighting the history, growth, and outlook for tech industry startups inthe St. Louis region. The report was an instant hit, gaining both local andregional attention. Here are some of the results and metrics that indicate the progress thatour ventures have made and the impact ITEN is having on ourcommunity. These statistics are current as of the end of October, 2013:
298 tech startup ventures are actively involved with ITEN, receivingmentor assistance, enrolled in our programs and attending events.ITEN has interacted with a total of 450 startup tech ventures in ourregion since the inception of ITEN in April 2008.71 Volunteer Mentors are engaged and working with our startups 1on1 and via our acceleration programs.A total of 25 ventures have graduated from our Mock AngelTraining, preparing them for investor consideration. The completelist can be seen at https://www.itenstl.org/programs/forinvestors/mockangelgraduates.ITEN companies have received over $91 M in outside funding todate. Of that total, $50M has been invested into our Mock Angelgraduate companies.The combined monthly revenue run rate of ITEN ventures is $5.5M.Our ventures have created over 850 net new full time employmentpositionsThere are 75 investors or investor groups that are directly affiliatedwith ITEN
ITEN will continue to publish the St. Louis Startup Report every year. Asthe end of 2013 is approaching, we will be calling on all ITEN registeredcompanies to complete our yearend survey. The survey data will beused to determine the ITEN TOP 10 rankings in a number of areas.Completion of the survey will avoid your venture being left out. Asalways, your data will be kept confidential.
Saving Memories Forever Graduates fromMock Angel Program
Harvey Baker, founder and CEO of Saving Memories Forever(www.savingmemoriesforever.com), has a vision to create a very userfriendly appbased product that will help families and genealogistscapture and preserve their important events and memories. Withthousands of users already, the company is off to a great start. SavingMemories Forever graduated from Mock Angels at the November 20thsession, and has become our 25th graduate.
The Mock Angel program is specifically designed to prepare emergingtech startups for investors. Companies already in ITEN can apply foradmission to Mock Angels, and there is a rolling admission policy. Mostventures complete Business Model Validation before being admitted toMock Angels. Mock Angels specifically works on the investor pitch and preparation ofdue diligence materials, but this work often exposes deeper issues in thecandidate company's business model. Many ventures have madesignificant pivots during their time in the program that have led directly
gap between seed and serious venturecapital? Cultivation Capital seems like it's onthe right track, but there's got to be more. Heading into the new year, there are threeareas I'm particularly interested in seeingplay out. 1. What type of deals will CultivationCapital make as it continues to mature? 2. How will the new SEC regulationsallowing general solicitation alter the playingfield? Groups like iSelect are already tryingto exploit those regulations. If they succeed,that could be huge. 3. What company makes the first big exit?Will they put some of that money back intoSt. Louis? If not, will it all be for naught? With all that said, a shameless plug. If you'renot already subscribing to the St. LouisBusiness Journals's TechFlash dailynewsletters, please do. We push out all thelatest news and info to come out of thestartup community here in St. Louis. Andplease follow me on Twitter at either (orboth) @stlbizbfeldt and @TechFlashSTL
1MC Retrospective
In February of this year, ITEN brought one ofthe Kauffman Foundation's newest initiativesfor entrepreneurs to St. Louisthe 1 MillionCups program. 1 Million Cups (1MC) is asimple way to engage entrepreneurs incommunities around the world. Each week,the 1MC program offers one or two localentrepreneurs an opportunity to present theirstartup to a diverse audience of mentors,advisors, entrepreneurs and interested public.Presenters prepare a short presentation andengage in 2030 minutes of feedback andquestioning after they present. Entrepreneursgain insight into possible ways they canimprove their businesses, gather realtimefeedback, connect with a community thattruly cares about their progress, and walkaway feeling like they have advanced theirbusiness. The audience also learns a greatdeal from the presentations. At the time it started here in town, St. Louiswas the 4th city to host a weekly 1MCgathering. Now the program exists in 20cities across the country. Here in St. Louisover 50 startups have presented at our local
significant pivots during their time in the program that have led directlyto later success. Graduating companies are introduced to a growing listof investors looking for the best tech deals coming out of our region. See the full list of Mock Angel graduates athttps://www.itenstl.org/programs/forinvestors/mockangelgraduates.
First Companies Matched with ITEN's EIR John Grispon ITEN EIR
In the four months since beginning work as theinitial Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) for ITENI've learned firsthand there's an incredibleamount of ecosystem talent seeking to supportthe aspiring tech entrepreneurs in St. Louis.There's also a terrific number of smart, energeticstartup companies that have unique concepts togrow their business in our city. Identifyingpotential startups that made for a good matchrequired a combination of analysis, experience,
feel, and a bit of luck. Another critical component is identifying the rightteam chemistry that fits with an advisor's personality and managementstyle. And certainly the idea or problem the company solves is ofsubstantial importance it has to be unique and big. After meeting withmany qualified companies I felt my experience and background were bestsuited to contribute to Pixel Press, TechSource 360, and AcuteTeleCare.
Robin Rath and the team at Pixel Press (www.projectpixelpress.com)were a great match from the first meeting. The combination of gamedevelopment industry experience and software industry knowledge made
Pixel Press attractive. Pixel Press enables users to draw their own videogame on paper and then 'automagically' transfer the drawing onto an iPadusing the builtin camera and clever software. A couple of clicks and youcan play and share your game with friends.
The combination of a unique idea along with a creative and openmanagement team made this an easy decision. The team has doubled insize while the product has advanced substantially going from prototype toa working beta. In early November Pixel Press went through their firstITEN Mock Angel presentation. The team has also solidified investmentsfrom a few key local investors and is part of this fall's Capital Innovatorsclass. Finally, the multiple partnership prospects with recognized industrynames make Pixel Press a name to watch in St. Louis.
TechSource360 (www.techsource360.com) is new to ITEN but founderMark Kehoe and his team have a combined 26 years in startups andpublic companies. TechSource360 seeks to leverage their print industryexperience and enterprise rolodex to reveal and reduce the printing costsof Fortune 1000 companies by creating realtime print policy controls fornetwork devices. With an easytoinstall enterprise solution they collectmassive amounts of rich data detailing how and what organizations printwhile deep analytics help enterprises shrink print expenses and reducetheir carbon footprint. I chose to work with Mark based on his great company concept and myability to contribute to awareness of the financial and technical resourcesin the startup ecosystem. While only having worked with the team for thelast six weeks, we are preparing to participate in ITEN's Mock Angelprogram and have worked hard to simplify the company message andcreate a new pitch deck. AcuteTeleCare's David Jacques is developing a healthcare solution toimprove care coordination for the over 800K people in the US thatexperience a stroke. The lack of trained stroke specialists combined withthe delays in treatment limit timely delivery of effective medication tothe patient. While other inmarket solutions focus on hardwarebaseddelivery, Acute TeleCare's remote patient monitoring model seeks toleverage mobile devices and familiar lightweight tools with easyinstallation at many points of care for faster decisions.
over 50 startups have presented at our local1MC weekly events. Presenting companieshave found talent, made business connectionsand honed their presentation skills. Thediscussions have been lively and fruitful foreveryone involved. Earlier this year a group of entrepreneursstepped forward to become the facilitators ofthe program here in St. Louis. Paul Heirendt,Aaron Mottern and Paul Hermanson work tobook companies, filter presentations andfoster the discussion each week for 1MC inSt. Louis. Their help has been tremendous inreaching out to their networks and beyond forcompanies each week. Since its inception here in town, 1MC St.
Louis has enjoyed a partnership with the NineNetwork in Midtown. The Nine Network hasprovided a physical home for 1MC as well asproviding the essential coffee. One uniqueadvantage of this collaboration has been thefact that the Nine Network has filmed,livestreamed and archived all thepresentations since the first one in February. You can see them at ninenet.org/1mc We look forward to even more activity in2014!
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Featured Company:Gremln
The adoption of Facebook, Twitter, and othersocial media by businesses is nothing new,but did you know that there are entireindustries that have barely put their toes inthe social media waters because they areafraid? The realtime nature of social mediabrings with it unique risks that makeregulated industries, such as financialservices and healthcare, sit on the sidelines. Recently though, this has begun to change.83% of consumers say it's important to readuser generated content before makingdecisions on financial services. 44% ofmillennials will not purchase insurancewithout reading other's opinions. Combine these with the bafflingstatistic that 70% of customer questions inTwitter still go unanswered and you havestatistics that have helped regulatedcompanies to realize that involvement insocial media is essential. They are activelyseeking a software solution that helps themmitigate the risk of social media involvementand GREMLN is exactly what it is needed. GREMLN is secure social media software for
David is an experienced entrepreneur but sought additional insights intothe local ecosystem and fund raising. AcuteTeleCare resonated with mebecause of my experience with my own company (Respondesign) in thetelemedicine space. Our relationship is only a few weeks old and we areworking together to identify the necessary resources to bring thisintriguing product to market.
Featured Events2nd Thursday
December 12th, 2013 4pm until about 6pm Networking with ITENcompanies, mentors, investors and interested friends. (Speaker starts atabout 4:20) Topic for December: The Year in Review: 2013 This year has been anexciting one in many ways, with important advances for the tech startupcommunity. Let's take a step back, look at the successes andchallenges and what it all means as we approach the new year. We'lllook for ideas and suggestions from the audience about what you thinkthe region needs, and how we can maximize the positive trajectory forthe tech startup ecosystem. Speakers: Francis Chmelir and Jim Brasunas, ITEN; others soon to benamed.
Held at the Tavern of Fine Arts , 313 Belt Ave St. Louis 63112, just offPershing between Union and DeBalivere. It's a happy two hours with allof your friends from ITEN and beyond. Everyone is invited; plenty offree parking.
Always interesting discussions and it's a great way for entrepreneurs,investors, mentors and others interested in networking with and aboutstartup tech ventures to connect with each other. 2nd Thursday is opento all and all are welcome, so do come hang with us! Special heartfelt thanks to our 2nd Thursday event sponsors: AHMFinancial, and the iSelect Fund. If you missed the last 2nd Thursday, Click here to watch our archivedvideos.
ITEN 2nd Thursday Speaker Series November 142013 Part 1
GREMLN is secure social media software forsocial media risk mitigation. Think of them asa social media marketing and analysis suitewrapped in a security layer to maintaincompliance with communications guidelinesset by the SEC, FINRA, FFIEC, the FDA, andmany others. This is done by providingmessage workflow that prevents anymessages from going live without goingthrough the appropriate review process. Filtration tools enable companies to preventcertain words, phrases, and abstractconcepts, such as stock tips, from beingposted. Additional tools include messagearchiving and automatic insertion ofdisclosure statements based on messagecontent. These tools, combined with a fullmarketing and engagement suite, removeroadblocks to social media participation, andprovide the tools these companies need to besuccessful in social media. With over 150,000 registered users, GREMLNis well on its way to being a significantmarket player in secure social media tools. They were recently endorsed by the NewYork Bankers Association as the exclusivesocial solution for the banks in that state. See what The North Face clothing companyand the Missouri Bankers Association call"essential to any business with a social mediapresence." Check them out today athttp://GREMLN.com.
