A local agriculture-technology startup has been selected by Google for Entrepreneurs to compete against 10 other companies at its upcoming Google Demo Day event, a startup pitch competition for entrepreneurs across North America.
Minneapolis-based Rowbot specializes in monitoring row crops like corn. Rowbot offers a small, self-driving machine that collects crop data and and travels between rows of corn, removing height constraints imposed by the rapidly-growing crop.
Local co-working company COCO (soon to be known as Fueled Collective) hosted a pitch competition last month to determine which startups it would submit for consideration to pitch at Demo Day in March. Five startups pitched at the event. A panel of three judges selected Rowbot as the winner.
The audience was also asked to pick a winner, and chose NightWare, an app that treats nightmare disorders through a smart watch application. NightWare arouses patients out of nightmares without waking them, and is helping veteran PTSD populations. Both were submitted to Google for Entrepreneurs for Demo Day consideration.
Previous Minnesota participants in Google Demo Day include Kidizen, Step One Foods and Player's Health. Tyrre Burks, founder and CEO of Player's Health, won the competition in 2016.
Google Demo Day is a pitch competition where entrepreneurs from across North America present their companies to a panel of judges and investors. Between 10 to 12 startups usually participate. A panel of judges picks a winner at the end of the competition. There isn't any prize money attached to the win, but startups at the event typically receive connections to potential investors and exposure on the worldwide startup scene.
COCO is one of 10 co-working companies in Google's North American Tech Hub Network. These hubs, along with other tech organizations, submitted one or more startups to be considered for the upcoming Demo Day, which is set for March 28 at Google's headquarters in Silicon Valley.
Google for Entrepreneurs selected the startups that would present at the event. To qualify for Demo Day, startups needed to be legally headquartered in North or South America, have raised at least $100,000 and actively seeking to raise $1 million to $5 million within six months of the event.
Here is a full list of the 10 other startups that will pitch at Demo Day:
- Amp.it representing Astia, an San Francisco-based organization seeking to level the playing field for women entrepreneurs.
- Bankjoy representing Detroit, Mich.-based coding school Grand Circus.
- Fathom.ai representing American Underground, a co-working company located in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina.
- Genivity representing Chicago-based startup incubator 1871.
- Increase representing AreaTres.
- Linked Senior representing Aging 2.0.
- Obsess representing Techstars.
- ShearShare representing Startup Grind.
- Skywatch representing Ontario-based Communitech.
- Unima representing Mexico City-based Centraal.
