Venture Madness, presented by Invest Southwest in partnership with the Arizona Commerce Authority, introduces the final 16 competing startups that will pitch live for a chunk of the $50,000 prize.
Additionally, Venture Madness announces today that Geoffrey Moore; a best-selling author, Venture Partner, Mohr Davidow Ventures, Chairman Emeritus, TCG Advisors, The Chasm Institute and The Chasm Group, and leading business consultant will deliver the keynote address at the inaugural event.
After two online elimination rounds, only 16 of the original 64 startups remain. These final contenders survived the first two rounds of competition and will live pitch their way through the brackets of this unique, head-to-head business pitch competition that culminates March 5-7 at Talking Stick Resort in Scottsdale, Ariz. Only one startup will be named the Venture Madness Champion.
“Our state provides a platform for innovators to showcase their ideas to the world, creating opportunities for the next generation of Fortune 500 companies and breakthrough startups to rise from Arizona,” said Sandra Watson, President and CEO, Arizona Commerce Authority. “Venture Madness is that coalescence of entrepreneurs, startups, venture capitalists, angel investors, incubators, along with Arizona’s many supporting organizations, which work together to form a vibrant business environment that helps early-stage companies advance in the global marketplace.”
Tickets to Venture Madness, held March 5 – 7 at Talking Stick Resort in Scottsdale, Ariz., include all-access to live pitching, an opening and closing cocktail reception plus tickets to a Spring Training baseball game. Get them through AZTB!
More about the Venture Madness Final 16:
Strongwatch (Tucson | Instrumentation)
Autonomous Surveillance Technology – Never in the Dark – Protection for high value assets
v.
Picmonic (Tempe | Education)
Picmonic is an Arizona EdTech startup founded by two medical students with a mission to inspire and lead a new era of visual learning. Its research-proven, patent-pending learning system utilizes learning through strikingly memorable mnemonic imagery to improve long-term memory retention by over 300%. This pioneering approach, a blend of technology and artistry, generated over $850,000 revenue from medical students in the first year of product launch. Picmonic’s ultimate vision is to reinvent the studying and memorization practices of all students through the science of pictorial mnemonic learning.
Brettapproved (Phoenix | Travel)
We are a travel and entertainment website for people with disabilities and or mobility impairments. On the restaurant side think of us like Yelp, except we’re focused on accessibility and on the hotel side, think of us like Travelocity, Hotels.com, et al except again, we’re focused on accessibility.
v.
Pinnacle Transplant Technologies (Phoenix | Biotech)
Pinnacle Transplant Technologies(PTT) is a multi-service tissue bank dedicated to ethical participation in the donate life process. U.S. food And Drug Administration (FDA) registered and American Association of Tissue Banks (AATB) accredited, Pinnacle only works with federally chartered Organ Procurement Organizations (OPOs) and agencies accredited by AATB to help safeguard our employees, provide superior allografts for transplantation and assure reverence to our donor families.
Universal Bio Mining (Tucson | Biotech)
UBM will enable the processing of waste copper ore by lowering production cost by at least 30%, transforming the processing of this resource from uneconomic or marginal to solidly profitable. The will allow the expansion of the Arizona copper industry, which generates $5B in sales and employs 50,000 in Arizona, by at least 20%.
v.
Outski (Tucson | Travel)
Outski is a unique, highly monetized online social platform on which millions of people will realize their travel plans and dreams; it gives consumers an easy, and effective way to get from “we ought to do this” to actually doing it. Our patent pending technology allows consumers to plan, budget, and research, as well as book, save and pay for travel, goods and services before and during their trip. They can invite, share, collaborate, and coordinate their travel with as many friends and family as they desire. Our model provides numerous revenue streams and currently has no direct competition giving us first mover advantage.
Phocus (Phoenix | Products/Services)
SmartPhocus has designed and developed a line of iPhone cases that both protect the phone and also transforms it into a proper photo and video camera. Our lines include kits with lenses, tripod mounts, shoe mounts, and a full array of photo and video accessories supporting our product. We have extensive automated sales, shipping, and inventory control systems. SmartPhocus sells the products at wholesale and retail via the internet, retailers, and distributors.
v.
Reply Buy (Scottsdale | Mobile)
We’re creating the “Constant Contact” of the mobile commerce industry. Just as “Constant Contact” disrupted the email marketing space by enabling businesses of all sizes to easily engage in email marketing; our new sales platform called ReplyBuy allows customers to rapidly launch and deploy customized sales campaigns across multiple channels. We simplify an otherwise complicated process by providing a single interface for businesses to manage mobile customers and generate mobile sales using Facebook, Twitter, radio, TV, email & print advertising.
Contatta (Scottsdale | Software)
Contatta’s collaborative email is email built for the way we work today. A complete reimagining of what email should be, with Contatta, shared contacts, tasks, files and collaboration tools are built right into your email–the center of where you spend your day. The result is you and every member of your team drastically reduce the amount of time spent in the inbox, so you can spend more time on the things that move your business forward.
v.
Park Genius (Tucson | Software)
Park Genius is applying the “Think Big, Start Small” model to the parking management industry by bringing a 21st century cloud-based smartphone payment solution to an industry still largely working with 1950’s technology. Our long-term objective is to position Park Genius for a time in the near future when coin-operated parking meters and payment kiosks will become obsolete by cloud-based parking management solutions requiring no costly hardware. We have successfully penetrated the existing $500 million per year coin-operated parking market by providing municipalities like Tucson, AZ the most cost-effective parking management solution available today.
Recoleta (Tucson | Advertising/Marketing)
Recoleta’s Personal Grocery Circular is a personalized grocery discount delivery platform that represents “The re-imagination of the printed traditional grocery circular”. The Personal Grocery Circular aggregates the 150 most individually relevant offers based on each shopper’s past purchase history. Recoleta draws from three distinct universes of weekly offers to create each unique Personal Circular: (a) the 3000+ weekly grocer temporary price reductions (weekly sale items), (b) the 150+ “click-to-card” coupons available via Coupon Networks, and (c) the fast growing click-to-card “personal deals” universe. Perhaps most important is our revenue model: Recoleta gets paid each time a shopper “clicks” (activates) a coupon or a consumer packaged goods personal deal.
v.
Endovantage (Tempe | Healthcare)
EndoVantage provides clinicians with powerful computational tools that can accurately simulate medical device deployment (e.g. stents) into blood vessels and predict hemodynamic outcomes. Using EndoVantage’s tools, clinicians can design the optimal treatment strategy for each unique patient case. The new found personalized planning capabilities will reduce treatment costs and expensive secondary interventions. EndoVantage’s core technology was developed jointly by Arizona State University (ASU) and Mayo Clinic. It is currently being used at both Mayo Clinic Hospital and Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix, AZ.
SiO2 Nanotech (Phoenix | Nanotechnology) SiO2 Nanotech is currently commercializing a line of technologies that address the issue of fogging due to condensation, a prevalent problem with surgical scopes, implants, high precision instrumentation, industrial instruments, and protective eyewear. SiO2 Nanotech’s current source of revenue is from small batch high-grade optical glass for industrial clients, and has the ability to scale-up by contracting processing to a local manufacturer. In addition to processing high-grade optical glass to industrial clients, SiO2 Nanotech is pursuing FDA 510K permit of a medical device for their medical-grade anti-fog emulsion, VitreOxTM.
v.
Delivery IT (Phoenix | Software)
A vertically integrated, enterprise grade, unbranded, cloud-based platform that manages hundreds of existing delivery companies for the retailer, accessible by the touch of a button at the cash register and thereafter oversees the product delivery end-to-end, captures all analytics and reports it back to the retailer.
Notebowl (Tucson | Internet/Web Services)
Notebowl provides one beautiful interface for students to stay on top of all their activities on campus, whether its clubs, athletics, or other organizations.
v.
Clear Demand (Scottsdale | Software)
Omni-channel retailing connects all channels (store, mobile, Internet) and leverages information across channels to create a consistent brand and shopping experience.
