Rise New York is a facility in the Flatiron District of New York City. It provides a nice modern space for small conferences. The Captivate event was held there last night for a gathering of 100 or so entrepreneurs and investors. Captivate was produced by the German Accelerator. The German Accelerator supports German startups to enter the U.S. market. They provide startups with hands-on mentoring in Silicon Valley, San Francisco, and New York City.
My friend Jim Kollegger, CEO at Genesys Partners, is also a mentor and CEO of German Accelerator New York. Jim asked me to be the guest moderator for the event. The evening was similar to Shark Tank. Three German startups each got five minutes to tell their story. A panel of three venture capitalists questioned them and gave advice. At the end, the audience used a smartphone app to vote for the best presentation. The three companies were:
- Keeeb. Has a very powerful knowledge management cloud service to provide discovery and collaboration for large companies.
- favendo. Helps brick and mortar retailers increase sales through GPS-like location-based service in the store.
- NightAdvisor. Empowers venue managers to create and manage advertising campaigns with a simple web interface.
All three companies were innovative and made good a presentation. The winner of the vote was Keeeb. Disclosure: I am a board member and investor at Keeeb.
