This year, 125 startups competed for $175,000 in investment during the eMerge Americas Startup Showcase. They were selected from more than 200 entrants, said Ricardo Weisz, who helped organize the showcase, as he also did in 2014.
Weisz said there were a higher number of high quality companies this year, and more of them were local. “The audience was better too — more investors, clients, potential customers — [the startups] were all very happy with that,” he said.
Startups selected for the Showcases received mentoring, free eMerge tickets for their team, and could attend a full-day Startup Bootcamp at Venture Hive the Sunday before the Showcase. “Get to know each other, this is about finding synergies and cooperation and leveraging all the talent in this room,” Susan Amat, founder of Venture Hive told the startups. “eMerge is really about networking and leveraging connections long after the conference is over."
In addition to more pre-event activities, the other big difference this year: The judges had skin in the game. Each of the judges from each of the contests – early-stage, late-stage and university -- was expected to invest $10,000 in the winner. They all received company information a few days before the event and met with the finalists in addition to judging the pitches.
In an interview before the competition, Miami Heat star Chris Bosh said he was not yet an investor in any Miami tech companies — but now Bosh will have a stake in VSNMobile, a Fort Lauderdale company that has developed a technology for seamless 360-degree high-definition images. (During its pitch, VSNMobile demonstrated its V.360 -- think a 360-degree version of a GoPro camera, with applications for outdoor sports, security, video conferences and drone overviews.)
That’s because Bosh was a judge in the late-stage competition and VSNMobile (pictured below) won. The prize: a $100,000 in investment from the judges.
During the 9-minute pitch, VNSMobile said its 360-degree images can be viewed with a low-cost VR viewer it provides (shown below).
"It's a very big win for VSN. ... eMerge brought us exposure to a larger audience — potential business partners, investors and customers," Greg Page, director of marketing and sales for VSNMobil, told the South Florida Sun Sentinel after the win. VSNMobil, founded by former product designers from Motorola, Foxconn, Samsung and General Dynamics, has about 30 employees.
Winning the early stage competition was Symptify (shown below) of Sunny Isles Beach, which won a $50,000 in investment. Symptify is an online self-assessment tool that uses a customized algorithmic engine to help users educate themselves about causes of symptoms. Like a virtual doctor’s visit, Symptify uses professional medical sources to help a user identify potential conditions, possible remedies and where to go for help.
Winning the university track, which was new this year, was JOOX Music of University of Central Florida. Joox, an awards-based music stock exchange, won a $25,000 investment from the Miami Innovation Fund.
According to the eMerge Americas website, judges included Bosh; Adam Smith, Medina Capital; David Senerman, Groupo Arcano; Felipe Matta, Chile Ventures; Franc Nemanic, CrunchFire Ventures; Greg Ferrero, Goldman Sachs; Ivan Rapin-Smith, Watsco Ventures; Julian Mesa, Sabadell Bank; Luis Zaldivar, Palladium Equity; Melissa Krinzman, Krillion Ventures; Paras Jain, Macquarie; and Rhys Williams, New World Angels.
See the list of finalists who pitched to the judges here.
This Miami Herald video contains some cuts from the Startup Showcase:
- Nancy Dahlberg