This is not an exhaustive list, but it does cover the startups that won awards as well as my personal favorites.
Launch Festival 2015 Awards
My favorites are underlined.
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Best Hardware: Rise Robotics (about) – Invents, develops, and manufactures novel power components that are affordable, lightweight, and efficient
I’m not a hardware guy, but they seem to have made an impressive device. -
Hackathon Winner: PreHire (now known as Interviewed) (about) – Software; Automated job simulations to help managers screen applicants
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Hackathon Finalist: The Interview Club (about) – Software; Makes it easy for the expert to conduct the interview and give valuable feedback
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Diamond-in-the-rough: VideoStitch (about) – Software; Panoramic video stitching software for the virtual reality market
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Incubator Winner: Recurrency (now defunct; founder started Clipisode) (about) – Software; Crowdfunding site where you support and connect with the creators you love, every week
Surely I can find some way to put this to work for me…
My Other Favorites (sorted by my ranking)
Demo Pit finalists that launched on-stage
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Cloudponics (about) – An Internet-connected automated hydroponic growing system
If I had $1000 and a big grow light, I’d love to grow some food indoors with this. I could even take trips out of town without worrying that my plants aren’t getting what they need.
Other on-stage launches
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RocketBook (about) – Best implementation of digitized note-taking
Not sure that I would use it, but I know there are plenty of people who would. -
Unoceros (about) – Like Folding@home for your Android phone, except it pays you and only runs when your phone is plugged in and on Wi-Fi
Don’t expect to make a substantial amount of money unless you’re in a third-world country. The amounts are the same, but USD$5/month makes much more of a difference elsewhere.
Other startups from the Demo Pit
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Castle.io – Security for developers; monitors your login system and stops account hijacks in real-time
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Kode – Connects people who lose things with people who find those things
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Colatris – Takes the hassle out of app translation and localization
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EdRepublic – Matches up developers and recruiters with advanced analytics
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EntrepreneurWiki – A wiki about famous entrepreneurs as well as education for new ones
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Sameroom – Bridges different business chat platforms together: IRC, Campfire, HipChat, Flowdock, Kato, Slack, and Gitter
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LinkTexting – Helps your desktop users text themselves a download link
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Little Bird – Helps you market your business to influencers
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Umano – Audio recordings of your favorite news articles
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WakaTime – Time tracking and other analytics for programmers
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QuotaDeck – No more cold-calling; fill your sales funnel with personal introductions
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Tilofy – Discover, watch and share the most relevant and timely content around any location
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Sortd – Trello for Gmail
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ClipCard – Brings all your cloud storage apps together into one search box
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Minbox 3 – File sharing, nay, file collaboration
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FunCaptcha – A new, secure, fun CAPTCHA that pays you to make use of it
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Loop – A new climate control system that lets each room control its own temperature without a commercial damper system
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The Rude Law Firm – Patents | Strategy | Business Law
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happyfox – A new, better live chat platform (along the lines of LivePerson, Kayako, LiveZilla, etc.)
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Yabberz – A solution for out-of-control web comments
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Projector – Web conferencing and presentations on your phone/tablet
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what3words – A new global addressing scheme where every 3m x 3m square has a three-word address
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Credacious – Adds tools to Twitter (and eventually Facebook and Reddit) to help you judge and discuss credibility of content and create your own credible content
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CryptoPhoto – Photo-based login security system
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Injector – Smartphone-based identity manager that interfaces wirelessly with computers
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AdStage – Manage online ad campaigns across multiple platforms from one place
My favorite sponsors
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connect
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icehouse
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microsoft
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ringcentral
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silicon valley bank
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adyen
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red bull
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go.co
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dreamhost
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shopify
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get invited
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.club
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radialpoint
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braintree
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producthunt
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joicaster
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atlantic.net
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truecar
Other Random Related Stuff
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Conducttr – Immersive storytelling, gaming and marketing software