Tag: techstars
TechStars Patriot Boot Camp is an intense three-day program that will educate and mentor Veterans and Service Members to innovate, build technology companies, and create jobs. TechStars hopes that participation in the Patriot Boot Camp will be the catalyst for Veterans and Service Members to kickstart a company, find co-founders, and advance as entrepreneurs. Veterans, spouses of Veterans, or companies comprised of 50% or more Veterans are encouraged to apply to the July event in D.C. and 75 qualified applications will be accepted.
The deadline to apply is June 24th, this Sunday at midnight Eastern time. Apply now!
If you have questions or want to help out as a mentor, drop TechStars a note.
The Microsoft Accelerator (Powered By TechStars) Is A Hit And It’s Expanding
The first cycle of The Microsoft Accelerator, powered by TechStars, is in its final run up to demo day. The first program has focused on Kinect applications and has some super teams, such as Gestsure (they control operating rooms with motion control) and Ubi (they turn any surface into a touch screen.)
Demo Day is in Seattle on June 28th. If you are an investor (angel or VC), send me an email and I’ll get you an invitation.
TechStars and Microsoft have been so pleased with the program that a second cycle of the Microsoft Accelerator in Seattle has been added focusing on cloud-based applications. The applications are open now through July 13. Each company gets $20k in funding, mentorship from top entrepreneurs, investors and Microsoft executives, $60K in Azure credit, office space, training and support, and demo day to pitch to investors, media, and industry influentials.
As you may know Microsoft has really made some awesome improvements to Windows Azure. Most notably it’s much more open source focused. Want to run Linux? No problem. Python? No problem as Microsoft has embraced open source with this update of Windows Azure. While you need not be using Azure to apply to the Microsoft Accelerator, if you’re playing in the Microsoft ecosystem at all I’d really encourage you to take a look at the latest news about Windows Azure.
If you are an entrepreneur working on something cloud computing related, especially in the Microsoft ecosystem, consider applying to the Microsoft Accelerator today.
If you are in Boulder, are a CTO, are into changing the way email works, and are looking for a hot young TechStars company to join, take a look at OkDidIt. They are looking to add a CTO to their team to augment one of the technical founders (who is the CEO) – the job description is up at Careers 2.0.
The skills and requirements follow:
REQUIRED:
– CS degree from a top school (or equivalent experience)
– minimum 7 years experience building real-world systems software
– proven ability to be the technical team lead
– prior startup experience as a founder or very early employee
– in love with agile development
– proficient developing on Unix-type platforms (no Windows dev experience required)
– proficient developing in Python
STRONGLY PREFERRED:
– experience using co-routines/Greenlets/gevent
– experience using MongoDB
– experience developing/supporting platform APIs
If this is you, email me or apply now!
If you are a developer, I encourage you to carve out an hour and watch TechStars CEO David Cohen’s presentation at RailsConf 2012 (30 minute presentation and outstanding 30 minutes of Q&A). He starts out with the assertion that “developers are the new investors” – how could you not be interested in hearing more about that?
David and I wrote a book last year called Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup and this is his riff to a room full of developers about some of his top tips. Special bonus – see a photo of me in my pajamas at minute 7.
It dawned on me last night that as of tomorrow TechStars will have three programs running at same time with about 40 companies actively engaged in programs in Boston, New York, and San Antonio. Last week David Cohen, the co-founder and CEO of TechStars announced that he had raised a new $28 million seed fund called Bullet Time Ventures II. The final companies are being selected for The Kinect Accelerator. The TechStars Boulder applications for this summer’s program close on Friday March 16th.
Not including the active programs, 126 companies have gone through TechStars since we ran our first program in Boulder in the Summer of 2007. We publish all of the results – as of now 110 are still active, 8 have been acquired, and 8 have failed. 772 people are employed by these companies. The percentage of companies getting funded at the end of a class has increased from 70% in 2007 to 90%. When we started, companies received $12,000 to $18,000 depending on number of founders. Today, they receive that, plus $100,000 in the form of a convertible note.
I’m most proud of the mentor network that has been created, the engagement from TechStars alumni in new companies, and the community involvement of local angels and VC investors in each geography where the programs occur. Whenever I visit one of the programs, the energy level is off the charts, whether it’s the first day or the 73rd day of the program.
In 2007, the idea of an accelerator was a new concept. Today it’s mainstream, as evidenced by the proliferation of accelerators around the goal and exemplified by the Global Accelerator Network.
The number of things in play at TechStars in 2012 is awesome. I’m incredibly proud of the entire team for what they’ve created, and where they are going with it.
If you are an entrepreneur, don’t miss out. Apply for TechStars Boulder now. And be part of the awesomeness being created in 2012 by TechStars.
Over the last three weeks I’ve had numerous people ask me how my trip to Boston has been going. For a while I corrected them and said “I’m mostly in Cambridge” but gave up. Tonight, after hanging out at the TechStars Boston Mentor evening and program kickoff, I got into a long discussion with a Bill Warner and Ken Zolot about Cambridge, Boston, and startup communities. At some point in the conversation I blurted out “I have no idea why we call this program TechStars Boston instead of TechStars Cambridge.” And then something that I thought was important dawned on me.
My entire entrepreneurial view of “Boston” is centered around Cambridge. I’ve been here for two of the last three weeks (I spent four days in New York). I’m staying in a hotel in Kendall Square across from Google and next to MIT. I’ve spent my days walking to meetings at MIT, Kendall Square, Tech Square, Central Square, and East Cambridge including what I refer to as “the old Lotus building”. I’ve had all of my meals in Kendall Square or Central Square. Other than running, I’ve only been physically in Boston four times – first when I arrived at the airport, then when I took the train to New York, then when I returned on the train from New York, and finally when I spent the morning at Fidelity’s FCAT offices at Summer Street.
Now, I know there is plenty of startup activity in Boston. My old neighborhood near Fort Point Channel (I used to live on Sleeper Street in a condo at Dockside Place) is bustling with startup activity. There’s plenty of stuff on 128 and 495. There’s are other entrepreneurs tucked around the city. But that’s not the interesting story, at least in my mind.
The few square miles in Cambridge around MIT is the white hot center of startup activity in the region. One of my basic principles of startup communities is the need for what I call entrepreneurial population density (EPD) which I calculate as the total number of entrepreneurs and employees of entrepreneurial companies divided by the total number of all employees in a region. Then an even more powerful metric is entrepreneurial density, which is EPD / size of region. A large EPD in a small physical region wins.
Part of the magic of Boulder is the entrepreneurial density of the place. And as I wander from meeting to meeting in Cambridge, running into people on the street who I know, or who I met with the day before, or I who I want to know, reminds me of the dynamic in Boulder. For example, I ran into Matt Cutler on my way to Rich Levandov’s office and we walked over together. I bumped into the StartLabs organizers when going to a meeting with Will Crawford. I saw Joe Chung while hanging around StartLabs. I saw 50+ mentors who I knew last night at TechStars and expect to see more today when I’m there. While having breakfast with Michael Schrage at the Cambridge Marriott Joost Bonsen came over and said hello. At Dogpatch meeting with Yesware I saw Dave Greenstein and gave him a hug for his new kid. And the list of moments like this, which happened with 10 square blocks, go on and on. But when I hop on the red line and travel to South Station, the magic disperses.
I remember when the Boston VC community moved from downtown Boston to Waltham. I understood it was an effort to create a “Sand Hill Road” like venture community but the big miss was that an MIT student couldn’t hop on a bike and ride to Waltham like a Stanford student could with Sand Hill Road. And it’s no surprise that downtown Palo Alto, which is even closer to Stanford, is an attractive place for VCs to hang out. The snarky message when the VCs moved to Waltham was that they wanted to be close to their fancy houses and their private golf clubs and the entrepreneurs could come to them. It’s no surprise that many of these firms have relocated to Cambridge, recognizing that they should be in the middle of the entrepreneurial energy.
I’d suggest to the Cambridge and Boston startup communities that they should think of themselves as two separate but related communities. Even within Boston, it seems like there are different startup communities in downtown, 125, and even 495. I think that thinking of it “Boston” is a mistake.
In my world view, the entrepreneurs drive the startup community. Focus on entrepreneurial population density and entrepreneurial density – and make sure your geographic region is small. Over time, linking the critical mass together in a larger region (e.g. Silicon Valley or Boston) is fine, but the real power comes from the startup communities with the largest EPD in small physical regions which are big enough to have critical mass.
As someone obsessed with human computer interaction, the Kinect is an important piece of hardware. Of all the various things Microsoft is working on these days, I find it the most interesting. I’ve seen some awesome things done with it by my friends at Oblong and Organic Motion and saw a ton of neat hacks at last year’s Blur Conference.
Recently, Microsoft announced the Kinect Accelerator, a program created to incubate startups building the next generation of innovative experiences for the Kinect. Microsoft’s Kinect Accelerator is powered by TechStars and applications for the Kinect Accelerator are now being accepted through January 25, 2012. If accepted, each company will receive an equity investment of $20,000 in exchange for six percent of the company in common stock, which will be held by TechStars. While Microsoft is putting significant effort into the accelerator program, Microsoft will not retain intellectual property or equity in any of the participating companies.
From March to June 2012, the companies will co-locate in space provided by Microsoft in Seattle where they will be provisioned Xbox development kits, Kinect hardware, the Kinect for Windows SDK and space for testing and developing Kinect based applications. Microsoft BizSpark will also supply each of the companies with a full complement of Microsoft development tools and support.
The companies will interact with and have access to mentors during the course of the program including Microsoft executives, entrepreneurs, and investors. The goal is to help new startups develop both the technology around their Kinect experience as well as the business model so the resulting company can prosper as an independent entity after the program.
Some of the mentors, in addition to me, include:
- Jeff Powers, Founder, Occipital,
- Andrew Tschesnok, Founder, Organic Motion
- Manu Kumar, Investor, K-9 Ventures
- Eran Egozy, Founder and CTO Harmonix
- David Cohen, Founder/CEO, TechStars
- Eric Norlin, Organizer, Blur, Defrag, and Glue conferences
- Jason Mendelson, Managing Director, Foundry Group
Some of the Microsoft mentors include:
- Dan’l Lewin, Corporate VP, Strategic and Emerging Business Development
- Craig Eisler, General Manager, Kinect for Windows
- Phil Spencer, VP, Microsoft Games Studios
- Anoop Gupta, Distinguished Scientist, Microsoft Research
- Michael Mott, General Manager, Microsoft Games Studios
- Rick Martinez, Executive Producer, Microsoft Studios
- Dave Drach, Managing Director, Emerging Business Team
- Adam Isgreen, Creative Director, Microsoft Studios
- Jeff Matsushita, Executive Producer, Microsoft Studios,
- Rhys Dekle, Director, Business Development, Microsoft Studios
David Malcolm, a former Microsoft executive and current TechStars mentor, will be the Managing Director of the Kinect Accelerator. Since the program is powered by TechStars, it’ll follow the standard TechStars timeline finishing up with a demo day at the end of the program.
If you are an entrepreneur working on something related to Kinect, I can’t imagine a better place to spend three months of your life accelerating your business. Apply now.
I hate Christmas music. Hate, hate, hate. Call me Grinch Feld. I don’t care. It just makes me want to poke knitting needles in my ears to stop it. Amy and I were in City Market grocery shopping the other day and at some point I had to go outside and scream. It felt good enough that I was able to go back in the store and finish buying greek yogurt and vegetables.
Yesterday I got a note from David Cohen with an attachment of a parody of The 12 Days of Christmas. At first I almost just archived it on general principle. And then I listened to it. And it was hilarious. I decided that since it was a parody, it got to go in a different category than “Christmas-Music” in my brain and I tagged it instead as “Hilarious-Parodies Humor TechStars.”
David asked me to send him a quick video of me lip syncing “Fiiiiiive sleepless weeeeks.” That was easy and I appear at 2:17 looking a little like Ted Kaczynski.
I thought the lyrics were priceless. I hope I don’t get blocked because of SOPA.
On the twelfth day of Techstars my startup gave to me
Twelve companies funded
Eleven piping pizzas
Ten pitch sessions
Nine servers crashing
Eight mentor meetings
Seven cups of coffee
Six geeks-a-coding
Fiiiiiive sleepless weeeeks
Four investors
Three sexless months
Two hackstars
And a space to work in rent freeeeeee
PBS Newshour has a neat eight minute segment on accelerators. TechStars is featured, along with several others. This makes me happy as part of our goal when we started TechStars was to “open-source” the mentor driven accelerator process. It’s been awesome to be part of this incredible (and – in my opinion – incredibly important phenomenon).
The punch line from the interview is in the first 30 seconds.
“The Kauffman Foundation, which studies entrepreneurship, recently found that startups create about 3 million new jobs a year.”
I really wish every member of Congress would read this over and over and over again. Whenever I see stuff like Protect IP and SOPA making progress through Congress (both bills – which if passed – will have a chilling effect on entrepreneurship and job creation) I get frustrated. It’s easy (but incorrect and uniformed) for people in Washington to dismiss accelerators, and entrepreneurship, as a small part of our economy. But when there’s as much focus as there is on creating jobs, it seems like our friends in Washington should be turning everything else upside down to be supportive of activities that create jobs, especially when the job creators (e.g. entrepreneurial companies) aren’t asking them for anything. And remember that these are only direct jobs – think of all the indirect jobs that get created by the payrolls, wealth, and taxes generated by these entrepreneurs.
If you don’t understand what an accelerator is, or just want a nice eight minute overview, watch this video. And repeat to yourself “startups create about 3 million new jobs a year.”
Near the end, Vivek Wadhwa makes the comment that “other countries like India and China are learning our secret sauce. They are learning what made America what it is.” I’d add Europe to that – following is a picture of me talking to a group of entrepreneurs in Copenhagen this moving via Skype as part of Startup Bootcamp, a TechStars Network partner with accelerator programs in Copenhagen, Dublin, and Madrid. This is a worldwide phenomenon – and it’s awesome.
