Banking & Finance  December 3, 2015

Boomtown’s 4th class includes 6 Boulder startups

BOULDER — One local startup touted itself as “the Carfax of real estate.” Another aims to give web surfers a way to instantly buy the products they see in shoppable online videos.

In all, six of the nine startups graduating from the Boomtown accelerator’s fourth class on Thursday hailed from Boulder, adding to the pipeline of new ventures sprouting from the city’s technology scene.

The startups pitched to – and answered questions from – investors Thursday afternoon at Boulder Theater in advance of a public Demo Day event in the same spot.

Boomtown, founded last year, offers startup companies $20,000 and a 12-week mentorship program in exchange for a 6 percent equity stake. The accelerator, which also recently launched a HealthTech-specific accelerator, now has graduated 33 startups in four different cohorts. Of the companies from the first three groups, 90 percent still are operating and 78 percent are generating revenue, Boomtown officials said Thursday. The average Boomtown startup has raised $579,000 in seed capital.

Revaluate – founded by Chris Drayer and Tim Segraves – was one of the Boulder-based companies pitching Thursday, and has created a site where homebuyers can see a “home history report” and livability score for homes they might be interested in. The data is gleaned from dozens of government databases and offers information on things such as crime and noise complaints in a neighborhood, pest reports at a home and safety violations. Real estate brokers, meanwhile, buy exclusive rights to the leads generated in individual zip codes.

The other eight companies pitching Thursday included:

SideDoor, Boulder: A marketplace for homebuyers and sellers to purchase or sell homes online without a real estate agent. Founder: Shelley Janes.

Bold Betties, Denver: Provides an online platform that helps women plan for outdoor adventures and purchase the gear they’ll need for the trip. Founder: Niki Koubourlis.

FeedMob, Boulder: Makes a tool that enables app developers to buy ads directly in thousands of other apps. Founders: Andrew Tan, Sarah Hawley, Ken Lu.

Opal, Boulder: Makes a thin-film wearable technology that helps athletes gain insights into their workouts. Founders: Abby Peterson, Somair Riaz, Winston Chapel.

Nymbl, London, France and Boulder: Aims to combine medical science and wearable technology to improve balance for an aging population and reduce injury from falls. Jean-Pierre Farcy, Jim Cook, Tom Virden, Caroline Owen Jones.

Qwip It, Fort Collins: Allows users to easily create 11-second clips of their favorite videos and share them online. Founders: Amanda Proctor, Michael Bailey, Seamus Nally.

Shoelace, Toronto: Provides a platform that makes it easier and more affordable for small businesses to launch retargeting campaigns. Founders: Alexander Sloan, David Berglas, Reza Khadjavi.

Pixmoto, Brisbane, Australia, and Boulder: Meshes online video with e-commerce, making it possible for web surfers to instantly buy products they see in shoppable videos, helping retailers improve monetization of video assets. Founders: Simon Knapp, Peter Liu, Jack Wareham.

BOULDER — One local startup touted itself as “the Carfax of real estate.” Another aims to give web surfers a way to instantly buy the products they see in shoppable online videos.

In all, six of the nine startups graduating from the Boomtown accelerator’s fourth class on Thursday hailed from Boulder, adding to the pipeline of new ventures sprouting from the city’s technology scene.

The startups pitched to – and answered questions from – investors Thursday afternoon at Boulder Theater in advance of a public Demo Day event in the same spot.

Boomtown, founded last year, offers startup companies $20,000 and a 12-week…

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