As part of our Sacramento Inno coverage, the Business Journal for the first time compiled a list of Startups to Watch in the new year. These startups are poised to make big moves, either in growth, funding, technology or development. We're highlighting 13 startups, generally with fewer than 100 employees, about 5 years old or less and that have raised less than $50 million. The group includes a diverse mix of companies throughout the region.
Startup to Watch: Sircles
Social media startup Sircles is a recommendation site that is inherently positive. Roseville-based Sircles developed an app that allows users to recommend everything from restaurants and retailers to movies to their circle of friends, but it doesn’t allow for reviews, which can sometimes be negative on social media. By design, the site only allows positive recommendations.
The company raised over $3 million in multiple equity crowdfunding efforts on crowdfunding site Wefunder, and its app gets 4.6 stars on the Google Play store for Android apps.
The premise of the company is that a person trusts the recommendations of his or her circle of friends and family, as opposed to reviews by random strangers. The app has multiple categories, and during parts of the pandemic, when many stores were closed, the app’s users started using it to recommend video games, movies and other entertainment. Users can browse recommendations of their circles. Sircles is free for consumers to download and use, and it offers subscriptions to businesses that want a presence on the site.
