Tag: Demo Day

11 Startups Pitch at Techstars Demo Day in Austin

September 4, 2014 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

By LAURA LOREK
Founder of Silicon Hills News

The team behind Burpy.com, photo by Laura Lorek

The latest Techstars Austin class showed off their hustle, determination and maturity at Demo Day Wednesday.

All of the startups already have customers, revenue and market traction.

Bob Metcalfe, professor of innovation at UT, introduced Burpy, a grocery delivery service formed by five friends at UT. He recounted a story about how they went to his office to show him their minimum viable product.

Metcalfe listened to their pitch then spun around in his chair, called up their site, Burpy.com, on his computer and ordered a case of Diet Coke.

A few minutes later, a mobile phone rang and one of the guys answered it and then jumped up and ran out. A half an hour later, he returned with Metcalfe’s Diet Coke order.

Burpy became a member of the Longhorn Startup class at UT. During the course, they earned As, recruited employees, got customers and revenue and they started expanding to San Antonio and Houston, Metcalfe said.

Metcalfe introduced Aseem Ali, CEO of Burpy. Burpy was one of 11 Techstars companies that pitched their ventures to investors, press and others at Techstars Austin Demo Day at the Austin Music Hall.

Like all of the Techstars companies, Ali’s pitch came off without a hitch.

“We’ve grown this business from our dorm room just over a year ago to more than $75,000 in gross monthly reoccurring revenue,” Ali said.

Grocery shopping is a $600 billion industry and by 2018 home delivery will become an $18 billion business, Ali said.

Burpy faces competition from Instacart, Amazon, Wal-Mart to Go, Google Shopping Express and others. But it’s focused on expanding throughout the Texas market and already has a strong foothold, Ali said.

“We are bringing the store to your door,” he said during his pitch.

These Techstars Austin startups are the best class yet, said Jason Seats, managing director of the program. He has managed four Techstars programs including two in San Antonio for the Techstars Cloud program.

The latest Techstars program also featured many female entrepreneurs including Claire Vo, co-founder and CEO of Experiment Engine.

Claire Vo, co-founder and CEO of Experiment Engine, photo by Laura Lorek

“We help businesses make more money by enabling them to run A/B tests designed by conversion experts,” Vo said.

A/B testing is testing two versions of a website to see which one appeals more to customers, Vo said.

“By not testing enough, companies are leaving tons of money on the table,” she said.

Experiment Engine gives its customers access to a marketplace of conversion experts, Vo said.

“We believe this is the future of work pairing technology with human expertise,” Vo said.

Julia Jacobson, co-founder and CEO of NMKRT, photo by Laura Lorek

Julia Jacobson, co-founder and CEO of NMKRT, pitched her New York-based startup, which creates revenue streams for influential independent publishers by turning their content sites into stores.

“Publishers are the retailers of the future,” Jacobson said. “We make this a reality today.”

And Daina Linton pitched Fashion Metric, which she co-founded with her husband Morgan. The company employs a proprietary algorithm to help online shoppers find clothes that fit.

This year, more than half of the companies also plan to make Austin their permanent home. Burpy and Experiment Engine are already based here. Pivot Freight plans to move from Arizona. Cloud 66 is relocating from London. Fashion Metric has extended its lease and is considering a permanent move.

Every Techstars company that stays in Austin gets a $20,000 investment from Joshua Baer , co-founder of Capital Factory and Rony Kahan, co-founder of Indeed.com.

“My big focus is on growing the Austin community and getting great entrepreneurs to come here and stay here,” Baer said. “I wish I could invest in all of them, but my focus is really on Austin-based companies.”

Baer also commented this is the best Techstars class so far.

“I think it’s really a diverse class,” he said. “Each of the companies has traction. They’ve got customers and revenue. They’re really in market. It’s a very, very strong class.”

Josh Kerr, CEO and co-founder of Written, served as a mentor to NMKRT. He was extremely impressed with the startup and the entire class of Techstars Austin.

“They are all extremely talented,” Kerr said.

“This class had a lot of rough edges in the beginning but they all shaped up into great companies,” Kerr said.

Kerr plans to invest in several of the companies, but he declined to say which ones.

During a break in the Demo Day presentations, BrewBot provided refreshments to the audience with its IPA Demo Day beer. The company, founded by five friends from Belfast, Northern Ireland, makes a personal home brewing robot.

BrewBot has a mobile phone app and specialized hardware machine that lets people chose a recipe and ingredients to brew beer in its home brewing robot. It works for everyone from master brewers to novices, said Chris McClelland, its CEO.

“BrewBot creates the ultimate brewing environment that is limited only by your imagination,” McClelland said. “This magical machine turns beer lovers into beer makers.”

The Techstars 2014 Austin class:

Brewbot – A beer brewing robot controlled and monitored by your smartphone.

Burpy – Delivering same-day groceries and home essentials from a variety of local stores.

Cloud66 – Deploy and manage Ruby apps on any cloud.

Common Form – Do your taxes in 5 minutes from your pc or mobile device.

Experiment Engine – A/B testing with a marketplace of conversion experts.

Fashion Metric – Using big data to enhance fit and sizing for apparel retailers and brands.

Free Textbooks – Equips student influencers with software to replace their bookstore.

LawnStarter – The easiest way to order and manage lawn care.

NMRKT – Powering eCommerce for blogs, online magazines, and content creators.

Pivot Freight – Rate comparison engine and discount broker for freight shipping.

Smart Host – Intelligently price your short-term and vacation rental.

Techstars Startup Cloud 66 Plans to Move to Austin Permanently

September 2, 2014 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

Khash Sajadi, CEO of Cloud 66, a Techstars company in Austin, photo by Laura Lorek

Cloud 66 moved to Austin from London two months ago to participate in Techstars and the startup plans to stay here.

For its business, the U.S. is the best place to be, said Khash Sajadi, CEO and co-founder of Cloud 66.

Cloud 66 is one of 11 companies in the latest Techstars program in Austin. All of the companies will pitch their companies Wednesday afternoon during Techstars Demo Day at the Austin Music Hall. This year, several of the startups plan to stay in Austin after the program ends Wednesday.

They’ve got financial incentives to stay too.

“I’m looking forward to seeing what the Techstars Austin class has accomplished this summer and Rony Kahan and I have committed a total of $20,000 investment for each of them that decides to stay in Austin,” Joshua Baer, founder of Capital Factory, wrote in his weekly Austin Startup Digest.

“When it comes to cloud computing, Austin is particularly important,” he said. “There are a lot of enterprises and cloud infrastructure players around here like Rackspace in San Antonio and Dell in Austin.”

Cloud 66 has seven employees and four moved to Austin.

The company, founded in 2013, helps software developers build and manage the software that powers their business. It provides IT services as a service.

“This is the engine that powers the business,” said Sajadi.

The company provides technology infrastructure for small to medium-sized software as a service companies. Cloud 66 serves 5,000 software developers in 700 companies globally. Its customers include the BBC, CareerBuilder.com, Adobe, Bugheard and Web Summit. Its competitors include Heroku, a cloud application platform.

The company has raised $730,000 including a $120,000 investment from the Techstars program.

One of the biggest benefits of participating in Techstars Austin program is being able to work with Jason Seats, the program’s managing director, because Seats comes from a cloud background, Sajadi said. Seats, co-founded Slicehost, which he later sold to Rackspace and then headed up its cloud computing operations. Seats is an investor in Cloud 66.

Circuit of the Americas is One of Austin’s Biggest Startups

April 25, 2014 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

BY LAURA LOREK
Founder of Silicon Hills News

Greg Fenves, Provost of UT, Bob Metcalfe, professor of Innovation at UT, Joshua Baer, founder of Capital Factory and Longhorn Startup Labs instructor, Bobby Epstein, founder of COTA and Ben Dyer, EIR at UT and instructor at Longhorn Startup Lab.

Don’t put too much pressure on picking a particular career in college, said Bobby Epstein, founder of the Circuit of the Americas.

“You might pivot a couple of times,” he said.

Epstein gave that advice at Longhorn Startup Lab’s Demo Day Thursday night to hundreds of people at the Lady Bird Johnson Auditorium. Bob Metcalfe, professor of innovation at UT, interviewed Epstein, who runs COTA, a Formula One racetrack and one of the largest startups in the Austin area. He quizzed Epstein about his entrepreneurial background and asked him what advice he would give to aspiring student entrepreneurs.

“The best advice you can give anyone as an entrepreneur is to be prepared to work 70 hours to 80 hours a week,” Epstein said.

It’s ok to risk everything, Epstein said. “But don’t risk more than that.”

Too many people start undercapitalized businesses.

“It’s great to be ambitious and start a business but don’t risk everything you have to start something that’s undercapitalized because that’s potentially a formula for failure,” Epstein said. “Don’t think that when you get to that next point the next dollar is going to be there. I think that’s really important before you spend it all.”

Epstein, a UT graduate, was born in New Jersey, but grew up in Dallas and spent time in Indianapolis. His father was an engineer, inventor, and entrepreneur and worked at Bell Labs.

He didn’t have a lemonade stand but he did host a carnival in his backyard. And he ran a DJ business in high school.

Epstein attended UT in 1983 and graduated with a degree in Liberal Arts. When Metcalfe asked him if he knew Michael Dell, who founded his company at UT in 1984, Epstein said no.

“He was a year ahead of you,” Metcalfe said.

“In many ways,” Epstein said.

Epstein didn’t start a company in college. But he did drop out of medical school. He ended up working on Wall Street on a bond-trading floor doing research. He created predictive and regression models on trading patterns.

“It was supposed to be a summer job,” Epstein said. He liked the job and he worked a lot of hours. He decided not to go to medical school and he continued working in the bond trading industry. He ended up working on mortgage derivatives and in 1992 he founded a broker dealer. He sold that business with 100 employees in 1995. He founded a new business, Prophet Capital Asset Management, and moved it to Austin in 1997 and has had 19 years of steady growth. His hedge funds manage more than $2 billion, according to a Forbes article.

“So this business was so successful that you were able to consider founding and financing COTA,” Metcalfe asked.

“Yes,” Epstein said.

“Can you tell us how that happened?” Metcalfe asked.

He met a guy who wanted to bring Formula One to Austin and Epstein thought that was a terrible idea. But he had a piece of property he bought in 2005 in Southeast Travis County that Epstein planned for houses. Instead, he pivoted. He turned what would have been a residential development into a racetrack. Today, that piece of property is about 20 percent of the land that COTA sits on. The 3.4 mile racetrack is on a 350 acre development. It also includes an amphitheater, which can accommodate up to 14,000 people.

The Circuit of the Americas got its primary funding from San Antonio Billionaire Billy Joe “Red” McCombs along with Epstein’s contributions. The state of Texas, through its Major Events Trust Fund, also pledged millions to the project.

Since COTA has been in business for a year and a half, it has had an economic impact of $1 billion, Epstein said. It has also raised the global profile of Austin, he said. And it has created lots of jobs, he said. COTA has 100 year-round employees and thousands that come in to work for events. The project costs $400 million in construction, the two Formula 1 races have generated $250 million to $300 million each in economic impact and the track has hosted more than 1.4 million people, Epstein said. And 250,000 have come in from outside Texas.

“A billion dollars in revenue in a year and half. Doesn’t that make you the biggest startup in Austin?” Metcalfe asked.

“It’s not all our revenue,” Epstein said. “That’s the only thing. We have two revenue streams. One revenue stream that goes to everyone else and one revenue stream that goes to COTA.”

“Let’s call it gross revenue,” Metcalfe said.

COTA does encourage people to come in from out of state and spend money, Epstein said.

“We get the people with the biggest pockets and have them come here and empty them out…if they have a great time they’ll come back,” Epstein said.

COTA isn’t yet profitable but it has helped the local economy tremendously, he said.

The racetrack is betting on other events such as the X-Games and concerts at its amphitheater, which will host a Jimmy Buffet concert next month, to push it into profitability.

Metcalfe also asked Epstein about all the technology used in the cars and said that’s one more reason COTA is a high tech startup. The criteria for a fast car, according to a Ferrari car designer, are a fast engine, aerodynamic design and high-tech wheels, Metcalfe said. He didn’t mention the driver, he said. He asked if there would a driverless robotic car race or an electric car race.

Epstein said he didn’t think the drivers were expendable. They have tested driverless cars on the track though, he said. And they have raced electric and solar vehicles there also.

DreamIt Ventures Austin’s Inaugural Demo Day Introduces Nine Startups

March 10, 2013 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 3 Comments

BY ANDREW MOORE
Reporter with Silicon Hills News

On the Stage at DreamIt Austin Demo Day -Photography by Samantha Davis

DreamIt Ventures Austin’s inaugural demo day showcased its first crop of startups at an event Saturday.
After 12 weeks of work at Capital Factory in downtown Austin, the nine startups finally took to the stage at the Bullock Texas State History Museum to pitch their companies to potential investors.
DreamIt Ventures is a startup accelerator similar to the TechStars program – helping startups make over a year of progress in just three months. The program is in Philidephia, New York, Austin, and TelAviv, Israel. It has completed 9 classes since its start back in 2008. The DreamIt ventures program offers qualifying startups free office space, a stipend for living expenses, dedicated mentors, legal and accounting services, and access to tons of potential investors. While the program generally lasts 14 weeks, the following nine startups had to be ready in 12 so they could have their demo day at South by Southwest Inactive.
Doccastor
When trying to put together a big tech conference, getting sponsors and investors to provide funding is crucial. But reeling in those sponsors can be tricky, if there is no proof that people will attend. CEO and co-founder Kyle Christian Steel presented a solution to this problem.

Kyle Christian Steele and Himanshu Pagey of Doccaster

Doccastor is designed to help show investors how much buzz their event is getting. It accomplishes this by creating a virtual locker that holds all the information for a given event. When users log into Doccaster with Linkedin and look at the event information, their activity is tracked to show their level of interest. The event creator using Doccastor can then show potential sponsors how many people are checking out the event and considering participating. Any sponsor or user who posts information in the locker can see the basic profile information of any user who viewed their content – giving sponsors valuable feedback and more incentive to participate.
Doccaster also makes it easy for users to find out about what events are happening around them. The service can be logged into with any mobile device, and users can view all related documents as well as contact the event creator. Additionally, users can see any other doccastor events happening in close proximity.
Doccaster has just started a $1 million round.
NewsTastic
Presented by CEO Eric Paradis, NewsTastic was created to link local journalists with paying local jobs. They have created a marketplace where local companies who need an event covered can sponsor journalists and pay them for an article.
“We were able to see firsthand just how outdated and inefficient existing news organizations are,” says Paradis. “NewsTastic has a better approach”.
Companies have several incentives to do this. First, it’s an easy way for them to find a journalist to cover the company’s local event without hiring a PR agency. Second, the company can get its name out by sponsoring coverage of local events that affect potential customers. Any articles written will have the sponsor information visible to readers.
The service is also a way for local freelancers to build a reputation and earn extra cash. Reporters who are able to establish their credentials will automatically get access to paying jobs. New reporters can have access to jobs that don’t pay, but boost their credentials. Successfully completing those assignments will increase their credentials and unlock paying assignments.
NewsTastic has already signed an agreement with Microsoft to cover events at SXSW. They will receive around $150 per story from Microsoft and pass along $100 to the journalists who covered the story.
Newstastic is now opening a funding round of $800,000.
Pincam

Kevin Taehwa Kim of Pincam Austin Demo Day -Photography by Samantha Davis

Pincam was presented by Kevin Kim, who works with an app development team for South Korea-based SK planet. The Pincam app is a video recorder that lets the user “pin”, or mark while recording, their favorite five second highlight segments to later combine into one highlight reel.
“Pincam is the only app that insures users capture the best moments in their special days,” says Kim.
Pincam can do this while recording an original video or can be used to edit a video the user already has on his iOS device. Edited videos can be grouped together into channels for other users to see. The channels can be open to everyone or restricted to a group of contacts such as family and friends. The app also makes it easy to share the video with Gmail, Facebook, or other outlets.
Seer
Presented by Conall Arora, Seer is a web app that congregates all the important data that a user needs access to every day into one location.
Seer is an intelligent desktop that can pull in multiple kinds of files from Gmail, Google Drive, Exchange, Dropbox, Evernote, and Apple desktops. Once the user gives it access to one of these sources, it will pull in and index to one single personalized desktop. That content can then be organized for easy access. When you select any of those files to work on, Seer pulls up a menu of any content related to it such as emails or word documents.
Seer is also in the process of implementing an intelligence component where the program can figure out what information you need to see first each day you wake and turn on your computer. Arora Claims Seer will be even able to prioritize the most important people in your life. By analyzing words or phrases in your content, Seer will bring you information related to your closest contacts before any other information.
Seer will release a beta in April to the first 700 people on their waitlist. The app will be launched in June.
Trendkite
Presented by CEO AJ Bruno, Trendkite is a media monitoring company. It helps companies find out where their PR efforts are best spent by monitoring the web for articles, Facebook messages, and tweets about that company.
“We are helping organizations understand what the world thinks of them, and act accordingly.” says Bruno.
Trendkite gives companies a dashboard that gives them several different metrics for how often their business is referenced and where. They search and scan millions of articles a day. The metrics can be filtered to include only the data a company wants – such as financial articles or press releases. The dashboard can also help target certain information, such as what the press is saying about a company’s CEO. Additionally, Trendkite allows companies to compare themselves to their competitors on different metrics.
The company has as an annual subscription fee for their service. They have already acquired several bigger clients such as Opentack and Gamefly.
Trendkite has just opened a $750,000 round.
FastFig
FastFig does for math what Microsoft Word does for writing. Presented by Brian Peacock, FastFig is intended to help students learn math more efficiently. His team wants students to spend more time on math and less time crunching numbers.
“The students are spending too much time crumpling up pieces of paper because they missed one number, rather than focusing on how to understand and set up the problem.” says CMO Greg Heller-LaBelle.
FastFig intends its product to be used by freshmen and sophomores in college to more quickly crunch numbers after setting up complex equations. They also see it being used by advanced high school students. The processor can do basic math, algebra, and calculus – and it can tell the difference between math and English so that note taking is still easy. The processor is browser based, making it available on almost any device. The math documents are also very easy to share.
FastFig is currently being utilized at the University of Pittsburg as well as a couple high schools. It is starting a $250,000 round of funding which will enable it to put the technology in 30 schools across the country.
Stereotypes

Jason Keck of Stereotypes

Presented by CEO Jason Keck, Stereotypes is trying to make music personal again.
“It’s a group messaging app that lets you have real, two-way conversations with your friends around music,” says Keck.
You can share different music with different groups of friends. The app is designed to push messages with memorable songs to groups of people, letting them somewhat relive memories of listening to the song.
According to Keck, test users stay on the app for an average of 8 minutes and messaged groups have an average of 8 friends. They will take advantage of this by offering the app for free and then using established revenue models such as ads and in-app purchasing. Keck also sees the app being used successfully by different music groups to connect with their fans.
They will open a $500,000 round this summer.
Yevvo
Yevvo is a video sharing app presented by founder Ben Rubin. The company is based in Israel. Yevvo allows its users to share live, raw video from their mobile phones almost instantly. App users just press one button and their phone is a live camera.
Once a Yevvo user is live, any other users linked to him gets an alert that there is a live stream happening and can follow that stream by accepting the alert. The video is not saved – it’s designed to be a one-time opportunity to glance into the life of another user wherever they are.
“The power of video is in the feeling of drama, anticipation, uncertainty. This unfiltered intimacy we have with the audience,” says Rubin.
There is currently a real-time lag of about 7 – 12 seconds, but Yevvo is working to cut that time down. The person serving the live video can see the number of viewers grow in real time and will be able to identify what friends are tuning in.
Yevvo has just finished a closed beta of 300 users. Of the 100 sampled, users spent an average of five minutes using the app each day.
Yevvo is now available for iOS devices in the app store. Rubin claims the app is currently registering 10 users per minute right now.
Planana
Planana is a rewards platform designed to help brands maximize visibility during the events they sponsor by interacting with attendees.
“We turn event attendees into brand advocates,” said presenter and CEO Anna Sergeeva. “And we convert that social momentum into actionable data for brands to use events as a viable way to increase their sales.”
With Planana, a user who signed up to go to a sponsored event is given incentives to reference the sponsor in social media for a reward. By tweeting that they are at a Microsoft event, for instance, a user might receive special seating or a free drink. Users can tweet a default message but can create their own as well. Planana also tracks who attends events and whether their attendance resulted in a conversion – or a purchase of some sort. They can even track some conversions weeks after the event – creating extremely useful analytics for brands.
Planana has been generating revenue for 5 weeks and claims to already be profitable. Six major companies have already signed on. They are starting a round of $500,000 in order to scale up their services and sales team.

You’re Invited to TechStars Cloud Demo Day on April 11th

March 27, 2012 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 1 Comment

In January, entrepreneurs from all over the country arrived in San Antonio for the first ever TechStars Cloud.
Nicole Glaros, one of the program’s directors, moved to San Antonio with her family for the three month program.
Jason Seats, the other director, says the program is coming to a conclusion with TechStars Cloud Demo Day on April 11th at the Charline McCombs Empire Theater at 226 N. St. Mary’s Street.
At the event, 11 TechStars Cloud teams will give eight minute company pitches to the audience which will include investors, TechStar mentors, family and friends as well as community members.
To reserve a seat, you’ve got to RSVP on Eventbrite because the event is expected to be at capacity.
Angel and other investors can also contact Jason Seats directly about reserving a seat at the event.
TechStars Cloud Demo Day runs from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. with an after party at the Weston Center Terrace starting at 7 p.m.

Greenling wants to change the way you eat

December 27, 2011 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

At the Capital Factory’s Demo Day, Mason Arnold gave a quick pitch on Greenling, the organic grocery delivery service.
“Our food system is broke,” Arnold said.
He estimates more than half the population in the U.S. will die from food-related disease, primarily obesity-related illnesses. He founded Greenling to change the way people eat. And he says Greenling “makes it easy, fun and delicious to change the way you eat.”
If you’re making resolutions for the new year to eat right and exercise, you might want to check them out. The Austin-based startup has more than 5,000 customers. Some of their most popular products are their seasonal veggie boxes and complete meal kits. Greenling recently partnered with Austin-based Whole Foods, which also works with local and organic farmers to bring fresh produce to customers in the Austin and San Antonio region.
This video is from the Capital Factory’s Demo Day.

And if you still want to know more, check out Greenling’s video.

A storify wrap up of The Capital Factory’s Demo Day 2011

September 9, 2011 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

HelpJuice takes the pain out of online customer relations

September 7, 2011 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

Emil Hajric, CEO of HelpJuice, gave a demonstration to investors at the Capital Factory’s Demo Day 2011. His company was one the five Capital Factory 2011 Demo Day Finalists. HelpJuice makes an application that makes updating knowledgebases like Frequently Asked Questions or FAQs for companies easy.

Groupcharger’s app engages almuni

September 7, 2011 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 2 Comments

Kirtus Dixon, co-founder and CEO of GroupCharger was selected as one of the five Capital Factory 2011 Finalists. He pitched his company to investors during Austin Startup Week at the Capital Factory’s sold-out event Demo Day 2011.

Dixon’s company, GroupCharger, seeks to get alumni more actively involved and donating to their Alma Maters through its first web application called AlumniCharger. But that’s not an easy task.

For example, Oklahoma University has an alumni base of roughly 300,000, but only 8 percent give back every year, Dixon said. The university is using GroupCharger’s app to increase engagement with its alumni, Dixon said. The app finds alumni on social networks and then sends event information, invitations and introductions to other area alumni.

“Alumni who stay in touch with their schools after graduation are three times more likely to give back,” Dixon said.

Higher education institutions receive $30 billion in contributions annually and universities spend $2.4 billion on technology to engage alumni, Dixon said. The market is huge with 1.5 million alumni clubs, 55,000 alumni associations and each university spending, on average, $125,000 a year to market to alumni.

GroupCharger launched its beta version in July and it has 20 customers including the University of Oklahoma, the University of Texas and Texas A&M University. They pay $500 for the service, Dixon said.

GroupCharger is seeking to raise $200,000 in venture capital and already has $75,000 committed, Dixon said. It needs the money to expand to 40 universities which will be its break even mark to profitability, Dixon said.

TeamTopia seeks funds to tackle youth sports market

September 7, 2011 / LauraLorek@gmail.com / 0 Comments

SwimpTopia makes it easy to join a swim team.

The Austin start-up, known as TeamTopia, first product is SwimTopia, a web-based application that reduces the paperwork hassle involved in joining a swimteam, said Mason Hale, CEO of co-founder.

Launched earlier this year, SwimTopia has 2,700 registered users and 1,100 athletes for 6 teams. It has processed $120,000 in registration orders.

“At this point, we have a working product and customers who are happy,” Hale said.

The U.S. swimming market is estimated at 2.6 million athletes on 25,000 teams paying $250 registration fees and dues and another $300 million in merchandise and equipment.
50 million youth sports athletes in the U.S. that spean $5 billion in merchandise and registration fees.

“Every team uses its own registration, communication systems,” Hale said. “When I see this I see a big opportunity to save a lot of people a lot of time. To take the hassle out of something that is supposed to be fun. To enable coaches to spend more time coaching and parents to spend more time with their kids.”

The swim market is huge but it’s just the entry point to the overall youth sports market with 50 million children enrolled in organized youth sports, Hale said.

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