The big winner of 2023 Angel Oregon Technology is a startup bringing cloud storage and automation to media post-production work.
Remotely Studio developed a platform that helps teams collaborate and manage media as they edit final film and video projects.
The startup walked away with the $170,000 investment from the angel conference. AOTech, an Oregon Entrepreneurs Network program, helps founders become investment-ready and would-be angels learn how to invest.
The program began in April with several weeks of founder education. Nine of the 14 startups that applied for funding were selected. Of those, these three finalists went through full due diligence along with Remotely:
The angel investor group consisted of 15 investors and the Oregon Growth Board. Investors in the fund ran the due diligence process.
All four startups gave presentations at an event Thursday in Portland to celebrate the program's finale.
This is the third time Remotely Studio has participated in AOTech. Co-founder and CEO Jeremy Bricher told the audience the startup has had several beta customers, including large studios, and has fielded robust sign-ups for its early access program.
“As a multi-year participant in the OEN Angel Oregon Technology program it really teaches you how to build and pitch a scalable business over time. There is a right and wrong way to go through VC funding, and this type of information is not always available to entrepreneurs,” said Bricher and co-founder Jordan Snider in a written statement. “AOTech has really prepared us to pitch to the wider market as a whole, and this investment will launch us through the beta and to the full production release of our product.”
Two other awards were also given Thursday:
- Portland-based Fridie Outdoors received the Emerge Award, which is given in collaboration with The BFM Fund. The startup received a non-dilutive $5,000 grant from The BFM Fund, which invests in startups led by Black, Indigenous or people of color founders. The startup is building an app to help more people access the outdoors by sharing camping knowledge offline.
- Phosio was awarded a $50,000 investment from the Oregon Nanosciences and Microtechnologies Institute. Founder and CEO Omid Sadeghi was on hand to show off how the company’s coating performs on lenses compared to existing products. He noted the company has ties to OSU distinguished professor in chemistry Douglas Keszler, whose previous work was commercialized by Inpria, which an industry giant acquired in 2021.
AOTech, which assists software and hardware startups, is one of three AO events, along with Oregon Angel Food and Angel Oregon Life and Bioscience.
The next conference, OregonAF, gets underway July 12. It will culminate in a public marketplace and showcase Sept. 23 in Salem.
