Nine teams to participate in first year of StartFast

SYRACUSE — The StartFast Venture Accelerator in Syracuse has chosen the nine teams that will participate in this summer’s inaugural StartFast program.

The three month program, which begins Monday, will focus on helping the startups develop and validate a prototype product and secure enough funding for them to move forward with their work.

Organizers chose the nine teams from a group of more than 300 applicants around the world:

Mozzo Analytics of Syracuse and Philadelphia extracts links from a user’s Gmail account. The service offers an organized summary of the links searchable by people, topics, and time.

PadProof of Orlando, Fla. and New York City is a photo proofing app that allows purchases from photographers with a finger swipe.

BitePal of Ithaca is a restaurant deal service that works through cell phones.

Cayo-Tech of Tel Mond, Israel has developed a mobile application that can notify a user’s family and friends with information needed in an emergency.

RevoPT of Ithaca designs Web and mobile applications to make physical therapy more personalized and effective through home exercise programs.

Tivity of New York City is a social network for people looking to find, schedule, and share active lifestyle activities.

Streamspec of Syracuse and New York City is an image-based Internet advertising company.

CanVita of Denver and New York City provides visual and evolving resumes for the social Web.

YouGift of New York City is a platform for sending greetings and gift cards via social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

StartFast is part of the Global Accelerator Network. The network grew from the TechStars program that began in Boulder, Colo. in 2007. TechStars has since expanded to Boston, Seattle, and New York City and includes a separate program for companies working on cloud computing and infrastructure.

The network includes 45 affiliated accelerators around the world. StartFast is focused on software and Internet firms and those developing mobile apps. For more information, visit http://startfast.net.

The accelerator will be housed in 14,000 square feet at the Onondaga Tower, the former HSBC building, on East Jefferson Street in downtown Syracuse. The program will occupy the building’s entire third floor.

Each company chosen for the program receives $18,000 in seed funding. StartFast investors receive a 6 percent stake in exchange. The companies also get access to a number of in-kind contributions from national sponsors like Google and Rackspace through the  Global Accelerator Network.

The Seed Capital Fund of CNY (SCF) is providing 40 percent of StartFast’s $2 million in funding. The rest is coming from private investors. The initial funding round will allow StartFast to run for four years.

Organizers have raised 80 percent of the funding so far.

For more on this story, see Friday’s issue of The Central New York Business Journal.

 
Editor’s note: This story has been updated from an earlier version, which referred to the Global Accelerator Network by the incorrect name and to reflect the correct total of affiliated programs around the world.

Contact Tampone at ktampone@cnybj.com