Hi! I’m a recovering nice guy. I’m on the 3rd step of my 12 step program to get more direct and less nice. Thankfully, as an angel investor, I have lots of people helping me. Let’s start at the beginning. I have a full time job, and I donate much of my time in the…
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The Senate is now considering a bill that would cut the red tape preventing startups from crowdsourcing their funding. The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act (HR 2930), introduced by Congressman Patrick McHenry (R-NC), passed 407-17 in the House of Representatives in November and was supported by President Obama. The crowdfunding bill exempts companies raising $2…
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TabbedOut, a free mobile payment app we’ve covered in the past, has a new CEO with big plans for the company. Paul Fiore is replacing co-founder Rick Orr, who will stay on as Executive Vice-President. If you haven’t heard or used TabbedOut, it lets you pay a bar or restaurant tab in real time from…
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A year old startup that participated in the minority-focused accelerator NewMe and graduated from 500 Startup just closed a $750k seed round. Silicon Valley-based OneSchool was started by 3 college kids; they develop mobile apps that let students browse campus maps, find course listings, discover nearby restaurants, check sports scores, access a directory of professor…
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This morning HelloWallet announced that they closed $12 million in Series B funding. Chicago-based Morningstar, Inc. invested $6.75 million and DC-based TD Fund (TDF) invested $4 million. Existing investors and new investors also participated in the round. Morningstar and HelloWallet plan to co-market their services to employers and 401(k) providers. I had a chance to…
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When Jay Chahil started working in DC, he’d go out to lunch with coworkers every day – like most young professionals. “I began to realize that everyone else was pretty much doing the same thing and missing out on meeting new people. I also noticed a lot of people eating alone,” he said. “I wanted…
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DreamIt Ventures recently announced DreamIt Israel, the first hybrid Israel-United States accelerator program. DreamIt has run several high-profile accelerator programs out of both Philadelphia and New York, and has launched such names as SCVNGR, Take the Interview, Postling, Adaptly, Notehall, among others. This will be their first international version. This four month program begins on…
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It is certainly no secret that raising money for your startup requires that you have a proven product, a solid customer acquistion strategy, and a sustainable business model. If you’re in DC, though, you have a bit of an uphill battle, as Uppidy founder Josh Konowe shared with me yesterday. If you’re not familiar with…
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If your new startup is trying to rise above the noise and get noticed – and looking for funding – you might want to move headquarters to Ohio and/or hire a female CEO. Brandy Wimberly, Founder and CEO of Toledo, OH-based Buyvite, a group-buying platform, told me that it seems there’s a lot more money…
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The University of Maryland is home to one of DC’s most active angel investor groups. In 2011, members of the Dingman Angels wrote checks for 9 companies, making 2011 the network’s most active year since its founding in 2004. Investments included Brazen Careerist, Cirrusworks, HugeFan, Nexercise, SevaCall, Spinnakr, Spotflux, Veenome, and YouEye. “Dingman Center Angels’…
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I love love love espresso – well, cappuccino to be honest – and though I don’t know how to code at all, I am super excited about the ZP Espresso Machine, a product design project currently on Kickstarter that was developed by engineers Gleb Polyakov and Igor Zamlinsky. While I dig the fact that their…
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Good news for venture capital firms and those seeking venture funding – in Q4 2011. According to Thomson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association (NVTC), venture funds raised $5.6 billion last quarter. That was up more than $3 billion from the prior quarter and nearly $2 billion fromQ4 2010. Now the bad news: All…
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A new tech accelerator is coming to town: Fortify.vc, a venture fund from Virginia, will begin accelerating some of its portfolio companies at The Fort in DC. The Fort’s launch is supported by a grant of $100,000 from DC mayor Vincent Gray. Initial startups will include Venga and Social Tables – you’ll find them over…
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Pinterest is extremely addicting – maybe moreso than Facebook for some people. But if you use it regularly, I bet you are frustrated by at least one of the following problems: frequent 502 errors, show-stopping bugs, lack of privacy settings, and inability to use it on your iPad. Meet Juxtapost, a simple-to-use social discovery website…
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Facebook owns social. LinkedIn owns professional. How about recreational? “The bet we’ve made is that people have 3 big persona’s in their life: social, professional, and recreational,” says Gabe Lozano, LockerDome Co-Founder and CEO. ”We want to cover recreational – an area that we believe people are more passionate about than any of the…
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In late 2009, Sonpreet Bhatia, Puneet Mehta, and Archana Patchirajan had a moment of inspiration – create a useful tool for discovering New York City. It was the dream of creating this tool that led all three of them to leave their VP-level technology jobs on Wall Street. Unlike a lot of ex-Wall Street folks,…
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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
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
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
Coming off of one of our biggest Tech Cocktail mixer events in Chicago this past week, which showcased 14 early-stage start-ups, we thought it would... Read More