If you need a robust e-commerce solution, you need Shopify. If you only want to sell one product, you need Toronto-based startup ShopLocket. Their platform allows you to create a single product “display case” online that can be embedded anywhere – your blog, website, social media – making it fast and easy to sell anything…
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Something is brewing in India. “The joke about Bangalore is that if you knock at a door, you’ll meet either a startup or somebody planning to start up,” says Shradha Sharma, founder of Indian tech blog YourStory.in. YourStory.in is also organizing a series of workshops and competitions called TechSparks, kicking off this month. The 2012…
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Expedia, Travelocity, Kayak, Bing Travel, Orbitz, Yapta, Hotels.com, Priceline, TripAdvisor, JetSetter, DealBase, Hotel Tonight, Hotwire, Agoda, Room Key, HotelSweep, Hipmunk, Momondo, Room77, YourRoomKey. What I’m trying to say is, travel booking is a competitive space…. Could there possibly be room for another entrant into this field? According to Bob Rogers, COO and co-founder of DealAngel,…
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With tons and tons of accelerators today, new startups are churned out constantly. But according to Shani Shoham, a mentor at a handful of incubators worldwide, we don’t see enough variety and innovation: “They’re all focusing on the same 5-6 things, the usual suspects: the social networks, the mobile advertising. So that basically leaves a…
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Korean students study too much – or at least the Korean government thinks so, according to a 2011 Time magazine article where officials patrol for students studying at “cram schools” after 10 pm. Cram schools offer tutoring so students can ace entrance exams and make it into prestigious, hyper-competitive schools. According to a popular joke,…
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As we prepare to kick off our monthly speaker series Tech Cocktail Sessions in Boston next week (register here), we have been getting a lot of questions about the Boston area startup scene. With some of the top educational establishments in the country – Harvard, MIT, Boston U, Boston College, Babson, Tufts, and many others…
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There is a lot of video on the Internet – and it’s growing so quickly that by 2015, we’ll have 500 billion hours of video online. Billion. Finding fun videos to watch now is a random exercise that results in a lot of wasted time, so imagine how hard it’ll be in 3 short years. …
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Clearspring, the company behind social sharing and analytics platform AddThis, will henceforth be known as AddThis. What’s more, the DC-based company released some powerful statistics: AddThis is now on 14 million sites, reaching 1.3 billion users every month. It powers those little sharing buttons and offers analytics on how readers and fans are interacting with…
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500 Startups announced their next class of 27 startups this morning from around the world. The 4th Annual Funding Games includes a few DC startups (go home team!), as well as a few we have covered before here at Tech Cocktail. Here’s a rundown on who’s who and what’s what: ActivityHero: Yelp for kids activities…
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Since I’m new around these parts, I thought this would be a better way than any other to give you some insight about who I am as an entrepreneur (or “entreprenewbie” as I like to call it) and new media specialist. I’m really forgetful. No really. I forget everything. I’m so engrossed in what I…
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How many times have you watched a loved one open a gift that you spent hours (or, um, minutes) picking out and wrapping, only to see disappointment flash on their face before they remember that it’s the thought that counts? Kind of a sucky feeling. Baltimore-based startup NoBadGift wants to replace that feeling of failure…
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South Africa had an unemployment rate of around 25% in 2010, and some other African countries fare much worse. It’s not necessarily because jobs are scarce: often, it’s a problem of candidates not knowing jobs are available, or facing discrimination based on their tribe. “In some cases these job seekers have to trek for miles…
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You’re 80 days into an incubator program, and you realize that your startup idea just isn’t working. It’s only 20 days until demo day – and your big pitch in front of a roomful of investors. What do you do? The team at Gradeful faced this very dilemma, and they decided to pivot. They had…
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After moving to Chicago from the West Coast, Kayne Grau took over as Chief Technology Officer at Cars.com and looked to raise the level of technology credibility at the company that started featuring automobile listings and media in 1997. Kayne did this by updating its overall technology approach and stack – while becoming more progressive in the process….
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When we first covered Belly last year, the Chicago-based startup was in the process of taking ownership as the Windy City’s go-to customer loyalty mobile app. Today not only has Belly announced expansion into the New York and Boston markets (for a total of 8 markets including Madison, Milwaukee, Miami, Austin, and Phoenix), but they’ve…
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Is your beta so quiet you can hear the crickets chirping? Or is that just the sound of your mom and dad clicking around? If you need to stir up some activity, consider trying BetaPunch. BetaPunch connects startups with beta testers, who can record their screens and get paid to play. They’ve attracted almost 500…
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Two months after the iPad 2 debuted in March, around 40% of users surveyed said their iPad was their primary computer, up from around 30%... Read More
There are a number of startup accelerator and incubator programs in the United States. We are fans of these programs (not to be confused with... Read More
We are excited to announce the participating startups for Tech Cocktail's South by Southwest (SXSW) event: #Startuplife Celebration presented by .CO. It was one of... Read More
With our Startup Mixology Conference coming up next week followed by our classic Tech Cocktail DC Summer mixer which will showcase a handful of early-stage... Read More