Drum roll plesae. Here they are: the belles of the ball have arrived! Vator Splash San Francisco kicks off tonight and the voting has narrowed the competitors down to 10 finalists (from 173) who will be presenting on stage in front of a panel of VC judges.
Tonight these 10 startups will take the stage in front of an audience of some 400 high-tech influencers in Silicon Valley. The judges will vote for the overall Splash winner. The audience will vote for the winner of the People’s Choice Award.
They are, in no particular order:
Nooch: a peer-to-peer money transfer system that allows you to send money to anyone with your smartphone. No banking information required—you simply look up the recipient’s name and send your cash. There are no maintenance fees or monthly fees, you simply pay a fifty cent transfer fee for each payment.
BuildingLayer: a map-making solution for indoor spaces. Using BuildingLayer, anyone can locate a target building, upload custom floorplan graphics, add points of interest, and map out pedestrian routes so that people can find their way around your building.
Social Annex: a social media platform for e-commerce sites. Social Annex enables businesses to drive up referral sales by connecting with its customers via social networks like Facebook and Twitter.
Capseo: an online marketing solution that utilizes crowdsourcing to help a website build its influence. Capseo’s algorithms analyze a website, identify its flaws, and find the right people to improve the site’s Web influence.
StÜdill.com: bills itself as the “first nationwide online college textbook exchange service,” StÜdill will allow college students to transfer used textbooks directly to other students without going through the university system at all, thereby getting more value for their books than campus bookstores are usually willing to pay.
Froomz: an “OpenTable for venues,” Froomz’s online marketplace allows event planners to locate, compare, and book venues in real-time. Froomz helps users find venues for large and small gatherings, from small meetings and dance rehearsals to fundraisers and large-scale celebrations.
BilNeur: a “collaborative consumption” venture that allows businesses to offer up resources such as services, equipment, space, or even staff during slow periods in order to help keep up with overhead costs.
MOEO: a mobile game developer that creates sports-based games that are simple enough to be played with “one thumb after three beers.” MOEO’s first game, Hit-no-Hit, allows baseball fans to compete against their friends while watching a live MLB game.
FrontDoorSoftware: a laptop tracking and recovery program that works on Windows XP, Vista, 7, Apple Tiger, Leopard, Snow Leopard and Lion. The program is already being offered to students at major U.S. universities, including Brown, UCLA, UFL, and others.
MindGames: A developer of online trivia and knowledge-based games for people interested in music, sports, politics, and more. MindGames’ first product was a suite of sports-themed trivia games, and it partnered with the NFL Players Association to launch MindSports Football on Facebook.
