The team at GroupToast believes that when you want to party with your friends, you shouldn’t have to call a gazillion places, wait for call backs, negotiate drink fees, and then have to coordinate everything. I’d have to say that I agree. This Chicago-based startup gives people the ability to have venues compete for their…
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If you’re interested in both giving and getting, Chicago-based Toodalu can help you rack up cash for yourself and your favorite charity – all by simply going about your daily shopping routine. Toodalu is a new breed of loyalty rewards that generates charitable giving to the causes you choose, each time you spend at a…
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According to iPhone and iPod touch repair service iCracked, 20% of the nearly 200 million iPhones sold worldwide end up breaking – whether that’s a cracked screen from a late-night fumble or water damage from diving into your sink. If you’re one of the 20%, check out iCracked and find a local iTechnician in your area….
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“Driving in traffic is a different kind of hell every day,” said Harvard psychologist Daniel Gilbert. The same could be said for taking the metro. Somehow after weeks and weeks of delays, construction, and bumper-to-bumper, we still hope for a smooth commute. That’s why commuting is its own class of agony. To ease the pain…
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According to the Worldwatch Institute, 1.3 billion people don’t have access to electricity, and another 1 billion don’t have reliable access. Some of those people are in Cambodia, where entrepreneur VS Hariharan took a trip earlier this year. “People don’t have power with their cell phones, so they actually walk a couple of kilometers to…
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Though good-intentioned, our acts of charity are sometimes inefficient – we give our local homeless shelter some clothes, for example, when they’re desperately in need of those forgotten wooden chairs in our basement. Setting out to slash those inefficiencies is Zealous Good, a Chicago startup that connects charities to people with unwanted items. Just tell…
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Aria Rajasa doesn’t mind when his startup is called a clone. In fact, he feels good – it makes the business easier to understand, keeps his team motivated to be as good as the original, and provides benchmarks for progress. So I shouldn’t have been surprised when Rajasa told me that his startup, GantiBaju, basically…
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Your startup is taking off. You put a lot of work into developing clever brand names and nifty logos that reflect your products or services. Your brands start to get name recognition, and business starts to pick up. Then one day, you get back from your coffee break to find a citation-filled e-mail from too-many-names…
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NetHound is online network monitoring service launching today – that is based in the Czech Republic (more on the tech scene there in a bit). Not only does this SaaS solve a major problem, the small 4 person team added a bit of humor to the service: NetHound barks as soon as it finds a…
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The best way to explain loyalty rewards platform Zavee comes courtesy of Cofounder and COO Ron Stack: “Daily deal sites like LivingSocial and Groupon get the customers in the door. Zavee keeps them coming back.” Sounds like a no-brainer – what merchant wouldn’t want to use a tool that can do that? And who would…
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Michael Mikikian, Founder of LA-based Gickup, which we have covered before, wants to bring back an oldie but goodie – The Dating Game. Yes, the cheesy, super popular game show that ran from 1965 to 1986. This time, of course, it will be all online – and The Blind Video Dating Game (BVDG) looks really…
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For the second year in a row, Tech Cocktail traveled to Boise, Idaho to participate in develop.idaho, a half-day conference focused on software development hosted by the Idaho Technology Council (ITC). Nestled at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Boise has a lot to offer as a city – it’s the state capital, home of…
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Solomon Arman Nabatiyan was a research professor at Northwestern University before he started pitching investors. His company, CerviaDx, was planning to create a revolutionary cervical cancer test that would be as easy as a pregnancy test. It seemed like a great investment, Nabatiyan explains: a woman dies of cervical cancer every 2 minutes, yet it’s…
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Brent Freeman, Founder and CEO of Roozt, the world’s marketplace for cause-related brands, knew in elementary school that he wanted to make a difference in the world. “My dad is cinematographer here in LA, and he always said, ‘Follow your heart and do what you love.’ When my mom passed away from cancer when I…
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As we reported yesterday, the president is expected to sign a bill on Thursday to allow crowdfunding for startups from non-accredited investors (i.e., you and me). Once this happens and the SEC details the rules, EquityNet will be one of the first sites to allow this new crowdfunding. The site has already seen $50 million…
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Small businesses are constantly hearing about all the things they have to do – you have to have a mobile website, you have to be active on social media, you have to create compelling content to share with your target market, you have to have a mobile app. That’s all good and well, but when…
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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