Nov 6, 2008

Launch Pad at the Web 2.0 Summit

During the afternoon keynote, several start-ups were given 5 minutes each to pitch to a panel of VC's from NEA, Sequoia, Omidyar Network, Mohr Davidov Ventures, and Panorama.

Carbonetworks - Michael Meehan
  • Provides companies a platform for managing their carbon footprint and strategy.
  • Incorporated in 2005. 300 corporate subscribers to date, growing at 2-3 per day.
EveryScape - Mok Oh
  • 3D views of real places online. You can walk around outside, walk in to shops, zoom around.
GoodGuide
  • Source of product information to find healthy, safe products.
  • Are there carcinogens in products?
  • Web-based and also launched an iPhone client. Also available by SMS message.
  • VC concerns: start-up or public service? content-generation cost? velocity of new products developed is quite high.
Predictify
  • Platform for online predictions by users.
  • Revenue model: sponsored questions by marketers. $1/question.
  • 1M predictions with 200K questions since its launch one year ago.
Qik - Bhaskar Roy
  • Streaming live video from cell phone to the web.
  • Use cases: sharing video with friends, bloggers, Ashton Kutcher, travel diaries, media companies for live news.
  • Works with any J2ME phone.
  • Platform that supports multiple back-ends: facebook, twitter, itunes, blogger, tumblr, youtube.
  • Will be embedded in Nokia 5800.
  • VC concerns: monetizing video,
  • VC's liked: IP, differentiation,
Sungevity - Danny Kennedy
  • Sells solar panels on-line.
  • Online quote for solar panel installation.
  • Web site has a video-based
  • On target to meet $2.5M first-year revenue goal.
My take-aways
  • For each presentations, there were very widely varied reactions/feedback by the different VC's.
  • The passion of the entrepreneur during the presentation does have an impact.

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