TOP-10 Western startups that are worth paying attention to in 2008
Now is a great time to create your own company. The large IPOs of Web 1.0 and recent acquisition deals have raised a new generation of business angels and venture capitalists. Plus, for entrepreneurs now there is a very attractive and realistic exit strategy - to be acquired by Google. All this adds up to a strong market warming up - now the situation is almost the same as in the days of the dot-com boom.
Almost - because now the budgets of startups, after all, are not so wasteful, and many of them, unlike the situation in 1999, have quite good prospects. Here is a list of ten projects worth paying attention to next year - all of them are one step away from the sale or IPO.
What to spend the extra 1000 dollars? In fact, with such a sum in your pocket you have quite a wide selection. But 23andMe offers to buy for this money something that has not yet been widely available: your own DNA. Do you have a propensity for prostatitis? Glaucoma? Heart disease? This startup will help to find out about it. In addition, in 2008, social services will be offered to users who have posted personal information (from race to information about diseases) on the site. Such a project, in essence, can shake the entire medical world. And at the same time to create a new dispute about the moral and ethical component of such a plan.
Founders : Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki
Investment : $ 12 million from Genentech, Google and New Enterprise Associates
Number of employees : 30
It is unlikely that you have ever heard the phrase "This is as simple as programming." But the guys from the Chicago 37signals team pretty seriously simplified the life of programmers and businessmen by releasing BaseCamp products (a project management service) and the increasingly popular Ruby On Rails framework . The company rejects the philosophy of "the more opportunities the better." It follows the path of simplicity and accessibility: it is much more convenient to use things when you pay maximum attention to its most important components. The company itself adheres to the “keep it simple” philosophy: fewer than 10 employees work in its modest offices. And services are started by them as quickly as possible: first, the basic version, and then the improvement based on feedback from users. In December, 37signals released the second version of its framework, which will undoubtedly make the new year of many programmers really happy.
Founders : Jason Fried, Ernest Kim and Carlos Segura
Investments : Unknown amount from Bezos Expeditions
Number of employees : 8
During the launch of the project in 2005, its prospects seemed rather vague. In theory, a startup that launches an ad network for mobile telephony should compete with Google. But was he capable of that? In spite of everything, AdMob bravely challenged the search giant. Over the four months Google has just tested the mobile version of its advertising system, AdMob has provided users with more than 12 billion ad impressions. Today, mobile devices with access to the network are becoming increasingly popular, so this advertising has good prospects.
Founder : Omar Hamoui
Investments : unknown amount (round A) from Sequoia Capital; $ 15 million (Round B) from Accel Partners and Sequoia Capital
Number of employees : 65
Initially, BitTorrent , as a P2P-based peer-to-peer network, was a great tool for illegal file sharing. But later, in 2007, the creators of this protocol saw a new opportunity to use it - as a platform that can be used by various companies for a quick (and legal) transfer of “heavy” files to their customers.
Founders : Bram Cohen and Ashwin Navin
Investments : $ 28.75 million from Accel Partners and Doll Capital Management
Number of employees : 60
Today, GPS is, so to speak, “one-way street” when a satellite sends data to your GPS device. You turn left if the receiver chip decides that this is the best route. But now the route on the map will be compiled using the self-learning system Dash Express . For example, if a user moves by car at a speed of 5 km / h, the system, assuming that he is in a traffic jam, will automatically send other users of the service a notification that they should choose a different route.
Founders : Brian Smartt, Mike Tzamaloukas, Steve Wollenberg
Investments : $ 45 million from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Sequoia Capital, Skymoon Ventures, Crescendo Ventures, ZenShin Capital Partners, Artis Capital, Gold Hill Capital, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 85
If you already pay for home Internet, then why should you pay for it again - in a cafe, airport or hotel? Such injustice did not leave indifferent the authors of the Spanish startup Fon . The idea is simple: share your internet with others, and others will share with you. First, users give everyone access to their wireless Internet connection. This is done with the help of a special router, which divides it into two parts - personal and public. In exchange, these users can use any of the available wi-fi signals for free. Fon has agreements in the USA - with Time Warner Cable, in England - with BT, in France - with Neuf, and its network already has 600 thousand registered users. Free internet worldwide for the price you pay for access from home? Now it is possible.
Founder : Martin Varsavsky
Investments : About $ 35 million from Skype, Google, Index Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Excite, Digital Garage and BT
Number of employees : About 90 worldwide
LinkedIn
LinkedIn has already registered 16 million users in the social business network, despite the fact that until recently it was in the shadow of its seemingly more powerful and dynamic competitors. Now, after the much anticipated upgrade, it looks just fine. The new software platform will provide an opportunity to integrate services on sites such as Business Week : for example, when reading any article, you can see how you are connected with the companies mentioned in it. In addition, it is expected that the site will be able to collect news and events specifically in your area. A boring-but-effective strategy seems to work: in 2008, LinkedIn plans to get $ 100 million in revenue, which is only slightly less than the $ 150 million that Facebook earned this year.
Founders : Reid Hoffman, Allen Blue, Konstantin Guericke, Eric Ly, Jean-Luc Valliant
Investments : $ 27.5 million from Sequoia Capital, Greylock, the European Founders Fund, Bessemer Venture Partners, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 200
It is difficult to imagine a world in which Google is not a leader in the field of Internet search. But if someone can throw off this king from his throne, then it will be a Powerset . A San Francisco company is developing an alternative search engine that is based on “natural language” and takes into account the lexical meaning of the word and its context. Despite the spectacular presentation of the project, which was demonstrated at the September conference of TechCrunch, everything is not so smooth in the company: one of the founders, Steve Newcomb, left the Powerset, and Barney Pell left the post of CEO. But even if the company fails to launch its search engine on the market next year, the entire Silicon Valley will still be watching any progress.
Founders : Steve Newcomb, Barney Pell and Lorenzo Thione
Investments : $ 12.5 million from Foundation Capital, The Founder's Fund, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 60
In the battle of Facebook and OpenSocial there is one sure winner who is not technically even participating in this fight. Slide , the largest “widget” provider, will win no matter which network wins the first place. The success of this startup is largely determined by the dynamics of the popularity of social networks, which next year is likely to remain positive.
Founder : Max Levchin
Investments : start-up financing from Max Levchin; Round A raised $ 20 million from BlueRun Ventures, The Founder's Fund, Khosla Ventures and Mayfield Fund
Number of employees : 60
Google searches for specific keywords, while Spock simply answers the question “What does the Internet know about you?” By indexing pages on the Internet and synchronizing information with social network data, Spock creates so-called “information centers” for specific people. It's very simple: you enter your name in the search bar, and the system generates a profile that includes all the information found about you on the network. By the way, in case if something from the information found does not correspond to reality, then the situation can always be corrected: the service allows you to independently correct false information.
Founders : Jaideep Singh and Jay Bhatti
Investments : $ 8 million from Clearstone Venture Partners and Opus Capital
Number of employees : 25
via techhh.com
Almost - because now the budgets of startups, after all, are not so wasteful, and many of them, unlike the situation in 1999, have quite good prospects. Here is a list of ten projects worth paying attention to next year - all of them are one step away from the sale or IPO.
23andMe
What to spend the extra 1000 dollars? In fact, with such a sum in your pocket you have quite a wide selection. But 23andMe offers to buy for this money something that has not yet been widely available: your own DNA. Do you have a propensity for prostatitis? Glaucoma? Heart disease? This startup will help to find out about it. In addition, in 2008, social services will be offered to users who have posted personal information (from race to information about diseases) on the site. Such a project, in essence, can shake the entire medical world. And at the same time to create a new dispute about the moral and ethical component of such a plan.Founders : Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki
Investment : $ 12 million from Genentech, Google and New Enterprise Associates
Number of employees : 30
37signals
It is unlikely that you have ever heard the phrase "This is as simple as programming." But the guys from the Chicago 37signals team pretty seriously simplified the life of programmers and businessmen by releasing BaseCamp products (a project management service) and the increasingly popular Ruby On Rails framework . The company rejects the philosophy of "the more opportunities the better." It follows the path of simplicity and accessibility: it is much more convenient to use things when you pay maximum attention to its most important components. The company itself adheres to the “keep it simple” philosophy: fewer than 10 employees work in its modest offices. And services are started by them as quickly as possible: first, the basic version, and then the improvement based on feedback from users. In December, 37signals released the second version of its framework, which will undoubtedly make the new year of many programmers really happy.Founders : Jason Fried, Ernest Kim and Carlos Segura
Investments : Unknown amount from Bezos Expeditions
Number of employees : 8
Admob
During the launch of the project in 2005, its prospects seemed rather vague. In theory, a startup that launches an ad network for mobile telephony should compete with Google. But was he capable of that? In spite of everything, AdMob bravely challenged the search giant. Over the four months Google has just tested the mobile version of its advertising system, AdMob has provided users with more than 12 billion ad impressions. Today, mobile devices with access to the network are becoming increasingly popular, so this advertising has good prospects.Founder : Omar Hamoui
Investments : unknown amount (round A) from Sequoia Capital; $ 15 million (Round B) from Accel Partners and Sequoia Capital
Number of employees : 65
Bittorrent
Initially, BitTorrent , as a P2P-based peer-to-peer network, was a great tool for illegal file sharing. But later, in 2007, the creators of this protocol saw a new opportunity to use it - as a platform that can be used by various companies for a quick (and legal) transfer of “heavy” files to their customers.Founders : Bram Cohen and Ashwin Navin
Investments : $ 28.75 million from Accel Partners and Doll Capital Management
Number of employees : 60
Dash
Today, GPS is, so to speak, “one-way street” when a satellite sends data to your GPS device. You turn left if the receiver chip decides that this is the best route. But now the route on the map will be compiled using the self-learning system Dash Express . For example, if a user moves by car at a speed of 5 km / h, the system, assuming that he is in a traffic jam, will automatically send other users of the service a notification that they should choose a different route.Founders : Brian Smartt, Mike Tzamaloukas, Steve Wollenberg
Investments : $ 45 million from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Sequoia Capital, Skymoon Ventures, Crescendo Ventures, ZenShin Capital Partners, Artis Capital, Gold Hill Capital, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 85
Fon
If you already pay for home Internet, then why should you pay for it again - in a cafe, airport or hotel? Such injustice did not leave indifferent the authors of the Spanish startup Fon . The idea is simple: share your internet with others, and others will share with you. First, users give everyone access to their wireless Internet connection. This is done with the help of a special router, which divides it into two parts - personal and public. In exchange, these users can use any of the available wi-fi signals for free. Fon has agreements in the USA - with Time Warner Cable, in England - with BT, in France - with Neuf, and its network already has 600 thousand registered users. Free internet worldwide for the price you pay for access from home? Now it is possible.Founder : Martin Varsavsky
Investments : About $ 35 million from Skype, Google, Index Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Excite, Digital Garage and BT
Number of employees : About 90 worldwide
LinkedIn has already registered 16 million users in the social business network, despite the fact that until recently it was in the shadow of its seemingly more powerful and dynamic competitors. Now, after the much anticipated upgrade, it looks just fine. The new software platform will provide an opportunity to integrate services on sites such as Business Week : for example, when reading any article, you can see how you are connected with the companies mentioned in it. In addition, it is expected that the site will be able to collect news and events specifically in your area. A boring-but-effective strategy seems to work: in 2008, LinkedIn plans to get $ 100 million in revenue, which is only slightly less than the $ 150 million that Facebook earned this year.Founders : Reid Hoffman, Allen Blue, Konstantin Guericke, Eric Ly, Jean-Luc Valliant
Investments : $ 27.5 million from Sequoia Capital, Greylock, the European Founders Fund, Bessemer Venture Partners, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 200
Powerset
It is difficult to imagine a world in which Google is not a leader in the field of Internet search. But if someone can throw off this king from his throne, then it will be a Powerset . A San Francisco company is developing an alternative search engine that is based on “natural language” and takes into account the lexical meaning of the word and its context. Despite the spectacular presentation of the project, which was demonstrated at the September conference of TechCrunch, everything is not so smooth in the company: one of the founders, Steve Newcomb, left the Powerset, and Barney Pell left the post of CEO. But even if the company fails to launch its search engine on the market next year, the entire Silicon Valley will still be watching any progress.Founders : Steve Newcomb, Barney Pell and Lorenzo Thione
Investments : $ 12.5 million from Foundation Capital, The Founder's Fund, as well as several private investors
Number of employees : 60
Slide
In the battle of Facebook and OpenSocial there is one sure winner who is not technically even participating in this fight. Slide , the largest “widget” provider, will win no matter which network wins the first place. The success of this startup is largely determined by the dynamics of the popularity of social networks, which next year is likely to remain positive.Founder : Max Levchin
Investments : start-up financing from Max Levchin; Round A raised $ 20 million from BlueRun Ventures, The Founder's Fund, Khosla Ventures and Mayfield Fund
Number of employees : 60
Spock
Google searches for specific keywords, while Spock simply answers the question “What does the Internet know about you?” By indexing pages on the Internet and synchronizing information with social network data, Spock creates so-called “information centers” for specific people. It's very simple: you enter your name in the search bar, and the system generates a profile that includes all the information found about you on the network. By the way, in case if something from the information found does not correspond to reality, then the situation can always be corrected: the service allows you to independently correct false information.Founders : Jaideep Singh and Jay Bhatti
Investments : $ 8 million from Clearstone Venture Partners and Opus Capital
Number of employees : 25
via techhh.com
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Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/18332/
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