It was a game changing moment for 10 tech startup teams at the StartEngine headquarters in Westwood last night. It was the first event of its kind in Los Angeles and judging by the reception of the crowd, it looks to be the beginning of a strong movement that will finally bring the technology wave to Los Angeles. This is the vision Howard Marks and Paul Kessler had when they created StartEngine, one of 6 pioneering startup accelerators in the Los Angeles area, and now they have their first class of graduates: Brandstand, GonnaBe, Hypemarks, Outlisten, PageWoo, PROnoise, SandalBay Life, StarBates, thrdPlace and WeLink.

It is amazing to have witnessed the progress, pivoting, development, partnership forming and networking that has gone on in these past 80 days (we still have 10 more to go!) These teams have worked round the clock to have working products and viable business models, and last night proved we have the attention of the tech community. With 300 plus rsvps we had to close the invite list and the room was filled to capacity. It was standing room only and the crowd was packed with leading tech CEOs, CTO’s, angel investors and prominent VCs. It was an amazing platform for these young companies to be seen by today’s major technology influencers. The teams were hand selected by Howard and Paul for their ideas and skills along with their solid foundation as teams. But these qualities alone are not enough to make an incredible idea successful and this is why an accelerator program is so important. Those who are lucky enough to be accepted into the future StartEngine classes, will have a huge competitive edge to succeed and will immediately expand their network deep into the technology and investor community.

Our PageWoo team is honored by the opportunity to stand strong with this first StartEngine class and we are thrilled by the positive response from our sponsors, partners, investors and mentors. The path to funding has been paved and we are excited about the next phase.

Last night proved to everyone involved that Angelenos are committed to making Los Angeles the new hot place for technology and we have the engineers and visionaries to make it happen. The future of tech shines brightly for the City of Angels.

 

Posted by Duffy-Marie Arnoult, Director of New Media, PageWoo