The Bethesda Blues and Jazz Supper Club was filled with hopeful entrepreneurs and curious investors yesterday afternoon for the Mid-Atlantic Venture Association’s first TechBuzz of the year. Twenty startups gave four-minute pitches. (In the time it takes you to Google directions to Bethesda, you could be bought by Google.)
We caught up with a few of the presenters before taking the stage. Andre Yee left Eloqua as head of product development soon after the firm was acquired by Oracle to start Triblio, a data-driven lead generation software firm launched last August. He was at TechBuzz with CMO and co-founder Jason Jue, seeking $2M to $3M in seed funding. The company’s software tracks how content marketing leads to actual business. It can see, for example, the activity of a person visiting a business website and what they look at before deciding to become a customer. Triblio has a handful of clients, including Parature.
Affection comes in many forms, as TechBreakfast’s Ron Schmelzer embraces Corpus.io’s Joe Roets. Joe was there to get investor affection for his company’s knowledge management and automation solutions, which are marketed to big publishers and information-focused companies. Joe says the angel-backed company, launched in ’07, could use funding for R&D, scaling, and sales. TechBuzz has been connecting startups with early stage investors since 2011 and executive director Julia Spicer says 40% of companies that present get funded within a year of the event.
Alana Bly told us about her startup, SocialLadder, which connects brands with Millennials and gets them to plug their products through social media. The Millennials earn points for exclusive deals based on their influence level and engagement. Alana says Millennials are immune to traditional buzz around products and prefer to discover new products on their own. The company was founded in July ’11 and the product has already had a successful beta launch with 3,000 users. The company co-founder, Raavi Iqbal, is on the right.
WeddingWire founder Tim Chi gave the keynote and described how his company grew from wedding planning frustration to employing 330 people, raising $30M, and generating $34M in revenue last year. Tim, also a Blackboard co-founder, says his entrepreneurial roots started with his parents, who immigrated to the US from Taiwan, didn’t know the language and culture, and both started their own businesses. One common theme for Tim has been a feeling of not being satisfied despite reaching revenue goals and product launches. There’s always something else that’s pushing him to seek more out of the company.
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