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Dozens of technology startups from the D.C. region are set to participate in a networking event for “Red Hot Companies” on Wednesday (July 20).
This is the seventh year that DCA Live, an events company, is holding “Red Hot Companies,” recognizing fast-growing startups. It is set to be held at the rooftop of Sands Capital Management, at 1000 Wilson Blvd in Rosslyn.
Among the 41 participating startups, a number of them are based in Arlington, such as the fitness software company SweatWorks from Ballston, the marketing company for Amazon businesses Amify and the wireless communications company Federated Wireless, according to the event’s webpage.
DCA Live has planned a short program to congratulate the startups in attendance and to thank the co-hosts of the event, then participants are set to network among themselves.
“I have found that almost nobody really wants a program at all, people just want to talk to each other,” Doug Anderson, DCA Live founder, said.
Other organizations and companies co-hosting the event include Arlington Economic Development, Marymount University, the accounting firm KPMG and various venture capital firms. ARLnow is the event’s media partner.
DCA Live chose to host the event in Arlington because Rosslyn is convenient to the “main centers of business life in the region,” including downtown D.C., Tysons and Bethesda. Moreover, the tall buildings in Rosslyn provide a “great setting” for events, Anderson said.
“You just get a great view of D.C. and all the iconic monuments,” he said.
DCA Live chose the companies based on nominations from the technology community. Some of the companies selected this year are older, like the energy management company GridPoint which was founded in 2003, while others have only a few years under their belts, such as ShiftMed, an app developed in 2019.
Although DCA Live did not give out specific guidelines to nominate companies for the event, it hoped to look for startups that have shown “significant growth, momentum, energy, innovation, new products, new capital, new employees,” Anderson said.
“We really also try to collectively promote the region and celebrate the tech ecosystem here,” he added.
The local startup community as a whole generally caters to other businesses or the government and only a few of them target individual consumers, Anderson noted.
“The one common thing around D.C. high growth companies is they’re solving big problems, whether it’s cybersecurity, whether it’s education, energy, healthcare, health IT,” he said. “They’re not doing [consumer] apps, they’re not doing consumer websites. We’re just not known for that around here.”