In Spring 2014, Dell for Entrepreneurs announced its first-ever class for the Founders 50, an exclusive group of emerging companies that have technology as a critical backbone and are poised for rapid growth. Just recently, it announced the new Founders 50 Fall 2014 cohort, which for the first time includes a global contingent representing five countries – the U.S., UK, Canada, France and the Netherlands. These high-growth start-ups are companies to watch and were chosen based on their record of disrupting their respective industries through innovative products and creative solutions.
As with the first Founders’ group, Dell will provide these organizations with access to resources, solutions, mentorship and exclusive marketing efforts to help them continue to grow their businesses. The Spring 2014 group has already shown impressive results from this mentoring relationship, having collectively raised over $2.2 billion in capital and having been backed by a number of notable angel investors and venture capital funds.
“Zoom has experienced rapid growth over the past six months,” said Eric Yuan, founder and CEO of Zoom, a member of the Founders 50 spring class. “We have surpassed 25 million participants, 20,000 business customers and 1,700 higher education customers. Dell has provided incredible support for this growth, from providing servers for our scalable infrastructure to offering marketing opportunities for us through the Founders 50.”
When Founders 50 companies complete their two-year term, they become Founders Club Alumni, joining other companies that have participated, including Skyera, CloudFlare and Mass Relevance.
Dell’s Founders 50: Fall 2014
Click through for the 50 companies named to Dell’s Founders 50 Fall 2014 cohort. These high-growth start-ups are companies to watch and were chosen based on their record of disrupting their respective industries through innovative products and creative solutions.
Analytics
DCIG, LLC (TX) – DCIG is a group of analysts with IT industry expertise who provide informed, insightful, third-party analysis and commentary on IT technology. DCIG independently develops and licenses access to DCIG Buyer’s Guides and IBG. DCIG also develops sponsored content in the form of blog entries, case studies, head-to-head product reports, special reports and white papers.
CityScan (IL) – CityScan, a Chicago venture-backed software company, is leading the field in intelligent data collection and integration for smart cities and utilities. Its patented process integrates private and municipal data with the most advanced 3D visual data collection methods available, resulting in improved efficiency operations while reducing overall costs. The technology provides clients a solution to manage their assets, ensure businesses are operating within local ordinances, and provide a safe environment for their residents.
Big Data
Quantified Communications (TX) – Quantified Communications applies data science to communications. Its proprietary Enterprise Language Management and Professional Communication Analytics platforms use predictive analytics to help improve messaging, delivery, consistency and communications effectiveness.
Switch Automation (CA) – The Switch Automation team is a software development group that has been in-market in home and building automation for more than 10 years, and has delivered a significant number of projects in multi-residential, commercial building automation, home automation and energy monitoring. For the past three years, it has invested its efforts and experience in the market and technology to develop the Switch Platform, a cloud-based SaaS platform that is entirely hardware agnostic and truly scalable. Switch is hosted on Microsoft Azure and can scale to millions of customers and projects with Big Data requirements.
insightXM (CT) – insightXM works with your data to mine pertinent data to help grow your business. It focuses on developing in-depth audience acquisition data, identifying your key social influencers, identifying sponsorship opportunities, and mapping the outcomes of your events.
Cloud and IT Services
Mercury Technology Group, Inc. (CA) – Mercury Technology is a cloud services provider delivering reliable and cost-effective Oracle Outsourcing Solutions. Services focus on proactive management of your Oracle Application and Database systems, maintaining high performance and resolving issues before they affect your business.
Silver Peak Systems (CA) – Silver Peak is a software company focused on accelerating data mobility between data centers, branch offices and the cloud. By accelerating data, businesses are able to consolidate data centers and quickly migrate data to new locations; back up and recover more data across the WAN; centralize servers and storage without affecting application performance; and collaborate in real time using voice, video and virtual desktops. Silver Peak also increases visibility and control of the WAN and lowers ongoing bandwidth, making our data acceleration solution strategic to both your top and bottom lines.
Crowdsourcing
AHHHA (CA) – AHHHA is a crowdsourcing website where you are able to post your AHHHA moment, work with the online community to transform your thought into a tangible product, and then help someone else’s idea become a reality.
Education
Dewsly (MO) – Dewsly provides communication software for schools, teachers, parents and students to stay in touch and communicate important information. The software allows users to collaborate and continue the experience with students and parents outside the classroom with discussions, photos, videos and reminders. Users can also create groups for athletics, fine arts, clubs or organizations and allow the community to lend their support.
Health Care
CareLink360 (TX) – CareLinke360 provides a platform for real-time contextual location tracking, secured communications and document sharing for health care providers.
ClickMedix (MD) – ClickMedix is a global mobile-connected health (mHealth) social enterprise founded by faculty and students from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard and Carnegie Mellon University to address global health care challenges, including lack of access, lack of funds, and lack of medical resources. Its mission is to bring affordable and quality health services to under-served populations by connecting patients to doctors through mobile technologies and community-based health providers to achieve continuous heath care delivery to patients.
Tiatros Inc. (CA) – Tiatros Inc. is dedicated to harnessing and integrating new technologies that allow doctors, patients, clinical researchers and families to collaborate in ways that improve the practice of medicine. Designed by field leaders in medicine, biomedical engineering, bioinformatics, clinical research and business, Tiatros allows better health care to be delivered to more patients at a lower cost.
Visbuzz (UK) – Visbuzz is an extremely simple way for people who don’t use computers to make and receive video calls to and from their family and friends. A single touch of the Visbuzz screen puts familiar faces within easy reach.
Blue Marble Game Co. (CA) – Blue Marble Game Company combines engaging digital games with a comprehensive, secure and scalable database (DeepOcean) that obtains precise human performance metrics and delivers them to clinicians via a browser-based clinician UI, essential for effective neurogaming.
Televero Health, Inc. (TX) – Televero collects near-instantaneous health and wellness data and displays them in graphical form, giving people visual cues about how they might improve their well-being. Near real-time, individualized feedback is key to positive change. Televero’s analytics platform can provide the tools needed to identify potential problems before they occur.
Vivify Health (TX) – Vivify is a flexible platform designed for remote care anywhere, regardless of your role in population health.
Clinical Ink (PA) – Founded in 2007 as The eSource Company, Clinical Ink is guided by a mission to eliminate paper documentation in clinical research. With the goal of eliminating the problems and complexities associated with traditional paper-based technologies and workflow practices, Clinical Ink is committed to making clinical research easier for sites, sponsors, subjects and regulators. By easing the burden of clinical research, Clinical Ink dramatically reduces clinical trial costs, complexities and cycle times.
Hardware
Third Dimension Technologies (TN) – TDT’s Angular Slice 3D Display technology goes beyond traditional stereo displays and provides a fully immersive 3D user experience. See imagery in spectacular 3D without the use of cumbersome glasses or headgear. Move around the display to change perspective and to see around objects in a scene with no dead zones or flipping. No need to dim room lights or close the shades; the optical design provides exceptional brightness even outdoors in bright sunlight.
Marketing/Media
Clypper (Neth.) – Clypper is a mobile video push application. By one-on-one video communication, you engage, excite and connect with your target group.
FEM Inc. (CA) – FEM inc. is a media technology company that delivers engaging, relevant video experiences for any website or app. It delivers high-performing content recommendations to your diverse audience, which means more video views and more revenue for you.
NextUser (CA) – NextUser is a B2C open-marketing platform that connects silo’d user data, enabling communication channels to work in concert, increasing conversion and lifetime user value.
Phocabby (CA) – Phocabby has created a platform for brands to offer engaging campaigns that span both the offline and online world, creating a true omni-channel reach that drives conversion or simply entertains and promotes your brand, venue or product.
Superdense (NY) – Superdense believes a commitment to creativity and innovation produces outstanding apps and websites. It takes an integrated approach to development and design and works hard to create functional, beautiful and intuitive interfaces that users will remember.
Phunware (TX) – Phunware is a pioneer of multi-screen as a service (MaaS) – the only fully integrated services platform that enables brands to engage, manage and monetize their anytime, anywhere users. Phunware has introduced category-defining experiences that challenge the outer limits of the most advanced connected devices for the world’s most respected brands.
Nanotechnology
ACTnano, Inc. (IL) – Advanced nanoGUARD (ANG) is a proprietary nano coating that makes electronic devices super-hydrophopic and oleophobic, which can have a significant impact on the performance and reliability of electronics. ANG is a nano-scale technology that is ideal for most electronic devices and precision electronic components such as PCBs and other SMT applications, stainless-steel components, micro-fluidics, and other highly sensitive electronics components requiring a repellent treatment.
Retail/E-commerce
Quarterly Co. (CA) – Quarterly is a new way to connect with the people you follow and find interesting. We spend so much of our lives connecting with people online that we forget the value of tangible interactions that happen in the real world. Quarterly wants to bridge that gap by allowing anyone to subscribe to influential curators and receive physical items in the mail from them. It’s like a magazine, but instead of receiving words on a page, subscribers receive actual items that tell a compelling story crafted by the curator.
Skinnyprice (CA) – Skinnyprice works with e-commerce websites to provide savings to consumers. Consumers click the Skinnyprice button located near the add-to-cart button, watch an advertisement, answer a verification question, and then unlock a discount they can decide to accept or pass and try again.
Security
Authentication Industries (France) – Authentication Industries is developing new technologies for the security market, focusing on preventing document forgeries, product counterfeiting and identity theft.
EyeVerify (KS) – EyeVerify Inc. is the creator of EyePrint ID – transforming a picture of your eye into a key that protects your digital life. Eyeprint ID is a highly accurate biometric technology for smart devices that delivers a password-free mobile experience and secure authentication at a glance. This patented solution uses the existing cameras on mobile devices to image and pattern match the blood vessels in the whites of the eye.
Rippleshot (IL) – In 2012, the company’s founders came together to change the fight against fraud by creating Rippleshot. They take a Big Data machine-learning approach that is familiar to search, genetics and advertising and apply it in a novel way for the payment processing industry. They focus on merchant behavior instead of consumer behavior, and monitor millions of merchants and their transactions, searching through the data for subtle behavioral patterns that indicate the early stages of a data breach. They also use sophisticated statistics and modeling to distinguish between real breaches and nearby stores that share many of the same patrons, resulting in very accurate assessments.
Cyphort (CA) – With the advances in cyber attack techniques and highly motivated skilled adversaries, going it alone against today’s advanced cyber attacks is not an option. Cyphort believes that it takes an ecosystem of partners to defend organizations from these threats. As such, it is working with a broad set of partners including technology partners, managed-services providers, systems integrators (SIs), solution providers and value-added resellers (VARS) to provide protection from advanced threats to companies world-wide.
Key Cybersecurity, Inc. (VA) – Key Cybersecurity, Inc. is the developer of CyberMerlin, a deep-hash algorithm and vision-technology-forensics solution that is designed to proactively identify illicit files and the associated activity of “bad actors” on commercial, federal and K-12 enterprise networks. The solution searches for unknown and known files not typically addressed by existing safeguards and countermeasures. CyberMerlin automatically monitors, detects and provides alerts as well as compiles forensics reports for investigators and law enforcement entities.
MAFAZO LLC (OH) – MAFAZO Digital Solutions provides training and development to strengthen your security posture.
Software
Xockets (CA) – Xockets builds hardware and software acceleration into appliances for Big Data processing. Traffic management, high-speed memory and dense computational capacity enable these solutions at a fraction of the server and power resources required for the standard approaches.
LayerX Technologies (TX) – LayerX Technologies is a leading provider of advanced data analytics software for the IT industry. Its solutions are used across multiple IT domains to provide rich insight into application performance and the underlying network layers. Whether premise- or cloud-based, single or multi-vendor, server or virtualized, standard or custom, it uses its patented platform to perform cross-data correlation and give a complete picture of the overall performance.
Fastly (CA) – Fastly is a content delivery network (CDN). When your users click on your site requesting a piece of information, Fastly routes their requests to the closest point of presence for lightning-fast delivery and improved performance.
Humm Systems (TX) – The Humm portal helps you gather feedback about your service or organization and amplify the positives by sharing great feedback instantly on social media channels. Humm also delivers interactive data that allows you to examine trends and track employee performance over time, then quickly share or print the data.
TRX Systems (MD) – TRX Systems, Inc. is the developer of NEON, delivering mapping and location indoors, underground, and in dense urban areas where GPS is not available or is unreliable. NEON delivers accurate 3D indoor location through the use of advanced sensor fusion, ranging and dynamic mapping algorithms.
mindaptiv (CO) – mindaptiv develops revolutionary adaptive software products that will transform our world. It turns every device into a semantic intelligence (SI) machine. In other words, its technology takes patterns and turns them into objects with attributes and behaviors, within the context of time and space. For example, illumin8 technology takes all inputs – pictures, video, text, spoken language, and sensor data – then converts them into a universal semantic language. Later, those semantic language definitions are translated back into images, video, behaviors and language.
Vault Solutions, LLC (NH) – Symantec Enterprise Vault continues to lead as one of the market’s most powerful solutions for e-mail and content archiving – enabling users to fully manage, store, and discover the value of this content.
Software Motor Corp (CA) – Software-defined electric motors – In Stealth Mode
ConvergeIO (CA) – Cloud computing
Travel
BedyCasa (France) – BedyCasa has been a pioneer in homestay rental since 2007, putting hosts who have a room to rent in touch with travelers, students or people away on business trips who are looking for cheaper accommodation, with security, ease in booking, and a more human experience.
Web Hosting
Nexcess (MI) – Whether you’re a Magento operator bent on maximizing revenue with its 13X performance boost, or a WordPress fanatic who rests easy having an expert care team that understands how to scale with your success, Nexcess is the host to consider.
CloudNine Discovery (TX) – CloudNine has traditionally operated as a wholesaler of eDiscovery services and has served as the back-end for several large eDiscovery firms and large consulting firms.
SanApptX (TX) – SanApptX is a leading provider of storage solutions, virtualization solutions and professional technical services. SanApptX delivers expert technical, IT and business services through its innovative approach to virtualization and network support.
Cloud Dynamics, Inc.. (CAN) – Cloud Dynamics Inc. is a Toronto, Canada-based pioneer of cloud computing technology, offering enterprises, service providers, governments and government entities highly agile, vendor-agnostic and highly secure solutions to manage and operate cloud IT environments.