Diary of a Mobile Internet Startup -GeoMe

BARCELONA-Like most bloggers out there, it may come as no surprise to you readers that I also have a day job -and an exciting one at that! I run an emergent startup in the mobile space called GeoMe...so, what do we do?

We are planning to launch a Location Based Service this year that will offer best-in-breed services aimed at a specific target group. As much as I would love to tell you readers more about our concept, unfortunately at this stage everything is still hush-hush, but I did want to share my experiences in setting up the business in a kind of startup diary that some of you budding entrepreneurs may find useful...

BIRTH OF A MOBILE STARTUP

Our startup saw its first light in 2007, born out of a discussion in a bar between 2 of the founders and their desire to do something new using location on mobile. Subsequent discussions followed, then workshops were held with experienced mobile professionals and developers until the core concept took a definitive shape.

My role upon joining was to take this exciting opportunity and turn it into a business proposition for a whole range of stakeholders, be they mobile operators, potential investors, collaborators and other techy companies.

I would say that one of my challenges at this stage was to keep our focus, as inevitably every time we explained our concept to someone new, different ideas on how to develop things would emerge.

Our strengths right from the word 'Go' were the team we built up around our new concept and the clarity we had around our brand and market positioning.

THE FIRST 6 MONTHS OF LIFE

The first few months have been enormous fun but also an emotional rollercoaster for everyone involved-a lot of excitement would build up when we got great feedback for our concept and even verbal comittment to x, y or z. Then, stakeholders would take a long time to make a decision or miss agreed deadlines and somehow we'd be back to square one.

Then suddenly, we'd get a break and have big corporations open doors to us and our concept and we'd all be back on an emotional high again...maybe a familiar story not just for mobile entrepreneurs but all those setting up new ventures out there...nerves of steel definitely help in coping with the inevitable dose of uncertainty surrounding a startup.

TODAY

The future for GeoMe is bright, as time and time again we receive encouraging feedback to our concept and our demo from different corners of the world.

We are currently working on our website, so that we can share our vision with the wider world and get people to sign up for our beta version as soon as it is released -exciting stuff!

Other things are happening too, which I will share with you shortly -so keep your RSS feeds open!

Startup 2.0 Winner Declared -Zilok

BARCELONA -After a heated round of presentations (most of which were amusingly interrupted by the erratic functioning of the slideshow remote control), the 3 top European startups in this year's competition were announced.

In third place, to some surprise, came ifoods.tv, a cooking community with emphasis on video feeds based in Ireland. The company declared having only 3000 active members despite launching over 6 months ago and also competes in a densely packed market segment dominated by The Food Network. However, I did like their idea of awarding brownie points according to the type of contribution made by community members and the fact that this then entitled members to enter into prize draws.

In second place came socially responsible Unltdworld, a social network for do-gooders around the world attempting to redistribute wealth from the over- to the under-privileged elements of society. The concept was sound, though (like other attendees I was discussing this with) I failed to see what was unique about their proposition.

The clear winner was Zilok, a Franco-Belgian enterprise leading the way in the new market of P2P renting. With a strong management team, unique proposition and well-executed strategy, it was difficult to fault this company though some attendees did tut-tut at the fact that maybe they were not so much of a startup anymore...this old chestnut always pops up at some point, as the definition between a true startup and an established startup is not always clarified and the more entrepreneurially-minded would tend to prefer prize money to go to the startup that needs it the most..

Though not shortlisted for a prize, I believe that Talicious, a Hamburg startup established in 2007, deserves a special mention for most innovative concept, providing an online matchmaking service between talented people and talent scouts (and already breaking even, an achievement in itself)..check them out at Talicious.com.


Overall, a great event with heavy emphasis on web startups and with plenty of room to let in mobile startups in the future as the convergence trend from web to mobile becomes more prominent.

Startup 2.0 Finalists Announced

BARCELONA-After several weeks of online voting, startup 2.0, a European-wide competition of web 2.0 sites, has entered its final phase.The competition, organized by Alianzo Networks and La Caixa, has the objective to promote and reward European startups involved in 2.0 technologies.

Over 300 companies applied online for the contest, this now having been whittled down to 10 finalists who will be giving 5 minute elevator pitches in front of a prestigious panel of judges including Martin Varsavsky, Loic le Meur and Luca Conti.

The finalists are:

- iFoods
- UnLtdWorld
- Bubok
- Geospace
- AllRise
- Planetaki
- Talicious
- Learnit
- Zilok
- Wolpy

From a personal point of view, I'm particularly keen to find out more about Geospace, who offer a Location-based service via web and mobile...their website is in Hungarian, so it will be a case of discovering what services they have during their presentation.

The other startups have (mostly) websites in English, and are an eclectic mix of socially-minded enterprises to social travel networks and talent communities....I recommend you take a look and see what is boiling in the European startup pot for yourselves....