AngelPad, a mentorship program founded by a group of ex-Googlers, just hosted a demo day at its office in downtown San Francisco, uniting the program’s newest class of 13 startups with some of the biggest names in Silicon Valley investing. This is only the second group of startups to emerge from AngelPad since its creation last year.
Here are the startups that presented:
Shopobot (Dave Matthews and Julius Schorzman) helps people save money and make shopping decisions. The service searches your social network to find friends or coworkers that have expertise in the area you’re shopping so you get advice not from strangers but from people you know and trust. Shopobot also offers widgets that help consumers find the best deal.
Astrid (Tim Su and Jon Paris) is a productivity app for today’s social and mobile user. Already available as an Android app (boasting over 20,000 5-star ratings), Astrid’s todo list has advanced features baked in that not only remind users what they need to do, but actually motivates them to do those things and gives them the tools (via social groups) to get reminders and encouragement from family and friends.
Hopscotch (Danyal Anik and Salil Apte) is a “Web browser for the offline world.” The mobile QR reader provides users with personalized and relevant information when they scan QR codes in the world. Example: QR code on Coldplay ad returns music videos and photos (at a basic level) as well as content curated based on the user’s social graph (which friends would be interested in seeing the band live, where to buy tickets, etc.
Cloudbot (Colin Young and Agam Patel) is a powerful mobile and Web application that draws from all the user’s cloud services, like Facebook, Twitter and Dropbox. Whether you want to call a contact (without knowing their number) or make lunch plans with a colleague, Cloudbot wants to help get you there.
Kismet (Michelle Norgan, Kevin Stephens and Nelson Monterroso) wants to take the pain, insincerity and shallowness out of online dating.” By focusing on users’ data from social sites, including real identity, photos and frequented locations, Kismet thinks it can make smart matches.
Splash (Michael Powers and TC Chang) adds a social layer to mobile games. The startup noticed that avid social gamers interact with and help friends in the most enjoyable games, so they provide a tab module in any mobile game that brings the social aspects: see other people playing or things they’re saying and sharing.
Crittercism (Robert Kwok, Jeeyun Kim and Andrew Levy) is support platform for mobile application developers by mobile application developers. Available for iOS and Android, the platform helps developers build bug-free apps.
Stickery (Bjorn Lee, Jarrold Ong and Muhd Fadly Mahdar) is an educational game platform designed for very young students, like preschoolers. Apps made by Stickery are fun for kids, meet education standards, and provide feedback to parents so they can see how kids are performing. Games implement stories and rewards programs (hence, the stickers).
LocBox (Saumil Mehta) is a customer retention and acquistion system for local merchants. While location-based services and checkin-based reward programs are effective to some extent, LocBox wants to take things a step further by capturing customer information right at the point-of-sale. The startup installs an iPad and app at the client’s place of business, customers fill out information when they walk in (good for an instant deal), and, from that moment, the client has bolstered their list of contacts.
CompanyLine (Brett Hellman) is a communication platform for business groups. The service, which has (impressively) already replaced Google Groups internally at AngelPad, seamlessly integrates any third-party application, like Dropbox or WebEx, directly into conversations between colleagues. No more switching between email clients and a hundred other windows.
Feedgen (John Bruce, Jorge Soto and Keith Woody) is a social lead qualification platform. The services seeks to bridge the fundamental gap between marketing and sales with a priority inbox for leads. Sales people use the Feedgen dashboard, designed around email, to find well-curated contextualized ranked leads.
CoverHound (Basil Enan, Joel Hayhurst and Rory Joyce) provides a non-spammy online insurance shopping comparison service. Instead of gathering consumer information and selling it to tons of companies, CoverHound uses that data responsibly by building the user a profile and only giving third parties non-contact information. The service returns rates from reputable companies like Geico, Liberty Mutual and esurance. After the deal is done, CoverHound maintains its relationship with the customer and alerts them when they can get a better deal.
Secondleap (Michael Klocker and Stella Huh) is a recommendation engine for your career change. If you want to work in a different industry or field, googling how to do it and how much it will cost you will only take you so far. Having indexed and processed technology and data from Monster.com, CollegeBoard and others, Secondleap personalizes the experience of finding a new job, and the path to get there, for each user.
