Tim Tuttle by Tamara Bell
Through ingenuity, innovation, and inventiveness, the 48 companies presenting at the fifth annual SXSW Accelerator proved that they deserved a spot in tomorrow's final round and a chance at the Grand Prize titles.
Overall, the event allowed early stage companies to increase their visibility while getting specific feedback from a panel of judges consisting of industry experts, venture capitalists, and high profile media influencers.
Here are the finalists in each of the six categories, and highlights from the day:
Finalists
News Technologies: InfoActive, Phone2Action, and Watchup
Social Technologies: Koozoo, Plotter, and Yabbly
Mobile Technologies: Desti, Par Works, and Syntellia
Innovative Web Technologies: Memoto, TrueAbility, and Wanderu
Entertainment and Gaming Technologies:MakieLab, Syndio Social, and Tista Games
Health Technologies: Careport Health, Docphin, and Neurotrack
Highlights
- Touch screen technology is so 2012. From social sharing across multiple devices to health related applications, in the near future, consumers will have the option of searching and disseminating information to their networks through technology controlled by gestures and voice commands.
- In a world where "we need it now" is increasingly required to keep up with fast-moving events, several companies in both Mobile Technologies and Innovative Web Technologies are working to deliver content in "real time" to expand users' productivity at both work and play.
- Lastly, the proliferation of mobile devices has made it difficult to keep track of where our favorite music, videos, and photos are at any given time. Using cloud storage, several companies demonstrated ways users can access all their information from any device no matter where it originated.
Congratulations to the 18 finalists who will be returning tomorrow to present again before a panel of judges, starting at 9:30 am in Hilton Salon A/B. Judges will announce the final six Grand Prize winners at 6:00 pm.
For more information about Accelerator, go to our website at http://sxsw.com/interactive/startupvillage/accelerator and for a full listing of the day's SXSW Accelerator programming for Tuesday, March 12, go to http://sxsw.com/interactive/startupvillage/accelerator/schedule.
Contributed by Tamara Bell
