On Wednesday, a cohort of 13 D.C. area-based startups met on Pennsylvania Avenue in an office overlooking the nearby White House, at the offices of Cooley LLP. The global law firm, which focuses on providing legal services and products to clients in the technology sector, hosted a premier pitch competition in its swank Washington headquarters.
The event attracted a crowd of more than 100 prominent investors, attorneys, journalists, developers and tech entrepreneurs from around the country on a rainy, grey day in the District.
The rules were simple and the atmosphere was casual, while most held high expectations of what would come. Each startup executive had three minutes, a pitch deck and were offered the important opportunity to attract interest from D.C.'s elite investment community. Every participant was in the process of raising a round of venture capital, and their pitch was catered to accomplish this goal.
The presenting startups came from a wide array of industries, ranging from an organic food producer to a cybersecurity firm that specializes in threat intel notifications. The startup founders, themselves, seemed equally diverse. In fact, it appeared the companies had just one thing in common: the majority hailed from the D.C. area.
DC Inno got a chance to record today's presentations in an effort to introduce some new names and companies to watch.
Here's the 13 startups that turned heads at Cooley's premier pitch-off:
Lumi (Charlottesville, Va.)
Presenter: CEO Hillary Lewis
HR Avatar (Oakton, Va.)
Presenter: CEO Mike Russiello
Syncurity (Herndon, Va.)
Presenter: Advisor John Jolly
[EDITOR NOTE: Syncurity requested removal of video]
ProductShop (Reston, Va.)
Presenter: CEO Russ Rands
MomentSnap (Washington, D.C.)
Presenter: President Ashish Gambhir
Energicity Corp. (Washington, D.C.)
Presenter: CEO Nicole Poindexer
FundRx (NYC)
Presenter: co-founder Zeshan Muhammedi
[EDITOR NOTE: FundRx requested removal of video]
Caarmo (McLean, Va.)
Presenter: CEO Vinay Raman
SnobSwap (Washington, D.C.)
Presenter: Elise Whang
MyQVO (Washington, D.C.)
Presenter: CEO Gerald Meggett
SurpriseRide (Washington, D.C.)
Presenter: CEO Donna Khalife
Sherpa (McLean, Va.)
Presenter: CEO Sandrine Ennis
ParkMyCloud Inc. (Sterling, Va.)
Presenter: Jay Chapel
[UPDATE 11/13: two firms requested the videos of their pitches be removed, as they were not aware they were being recorded and contained sensitive company information.]
