Startup Monday

Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders, plus other local technology happenings. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

Imagine a world where every person in every city or town or village in every country had access to fast, affordable Internet.

Satellite company OneWeb is working to make this vision a reality by launching a constellation of nearly 700 low-orbit satellites, and it’s moving to Rosslyn.

Last month, the company announced it is leasing 6,000 square feet of office space at 1400 Key Blvd, meaning OneWeb’s central operation will be moving to Arlington in the near future.

“Washington is one of the key international hubs for the aerospace and satellite industries, and the area’s deep talent pool will be a tremendous asset as we continue to expand our operations, including finding a site for a network operations center and a satellite operations center,” said OneWeb CEO Matt O’Connell about the move.

The space is part of Monday Properties’ Ground Floor, where other startups and “early stage” companies have also landed.

OneWeb is currently based on Jersey, one of Britain’s Channel Islands. The idea for worldwide Internet access first started in 2002 when founder Greg Wyler started a telecommunications company to bring low-cost cell phone and Internet service to people in Rwanda.

Still, Wyler knew he had to build many more satellites and bring them closer to Earth to achieve international communication, faster speeds, affordable costs and, ultimately, universal access. OneWeb is the means by which he hopes to finally do so.

“This is an enormous long-term project and our goal is to provide reliable high-speed internet access to all communities around the world who don’t currently have access,” O’Connell said. “We believe connectivity is a fundamental layer for societal and economic growth.”

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Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders, plus other local technology happenings. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

Crystal City startup incubator Eastern Foundry is preparing for its second Foundry Cup, a themed competition for startups. Due to increased interest, the deadline to apply for the competition — which was originally scheduled for mid-January — has been extended to this Friday.

“There is a great deal of interest in this year’s Foundry Cup,” said Director of Partnerships and Events Lauren Schmidt. “Promising submissions have been rolling in steadily since we announced and because of a rather large influx of interested startups this January, we decided to extend our deadline.”

This winter’s event is called Foundry Cup: Portable Power. There is no application fee, and any startup working in or with an idea in this realm are welcome to apply.

According to the competition’s website, Eastern Foundry is seeking startups that create “effective off-grid power solutions” for men and women working and living in some of the world’s most challenging places. These can include FEMA first responders, military, USAID workers, hikers on isolated trails and more.

“The Foundry Cup is more than a competition and networking opportunity,” Schmidt said. “It creates a forum that brings together leaders and entrepreneurs with diverse backgrounds and across generations to tackle one of the largest problems in the world right now.”

The competition is looking for ideas that are eco-friendly and cost-effective, specifically with the potential to decrease government spending on fuel and other power sources.

It’s also looking for entrants from virtually anywhere, not just locally. While Schmidt said most applications so far have been from the D.C. area, they’ve also received some from the West Coast, other countries and students from universities.

The inaugural Foundry Cup was held in June 2015, during which startups were challenged with finding ways to detect and treat Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and fourteen finalists competed for the $10,000 first place prize.

This year, Schmidt said things will be a bit different.

The competition was shortened from 72 to 48 hours to keep entrants focused on displaying their best components and features on “Demo Day.” The new schedule also includes more time for networking, allowing competitors to interact with each other, government officials and other established business leaders.

While Schmidt said they expect at least 50 applications by Friday’s deadline, only 10 finalists will be selected, making this winter’s installment of the Cup more competitive. Those finalists — along with the venue — are expected to be announced on Feb. 15.

From then until Demo Day on March 25, the finalists will work to develop their ideas and prepare to present them to private business owners, government contractors, military and civilian agencies. The finalist startups will compete for $10,00 first place and $5,000 second place prizes. There will also be a “People’s Choice” award of $1,000.

Though it’s only the second installment of the competition, Schmidt said Eastern Foundry is hoping to make the Foundry Cup an annual event for startups to work to address timely and critical issues facing the world’s population.

“For this competition, we are hoping to advance and promote game-changing approaches to versatile, go-anywhere power sources that are long lasting and durable,” she said. “Our longer-term goal is to create a reliable and effective forum for exposure and discussion on how generations of innovators and startups are solving the world’s most pressing challenges.”

Photos courtesy of Eastern Foundry

Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders, plus other local technology happenings. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

After completing two Congressional internships, Arlington resident Tiroune Oates was determined to build a better way for visitors to tour the United States Capitol Building.

Oates’ solution is a virtual reality mobile application called CapApp. Still in development, the app will contain the history of the building and give guests a closer look at the artwork and artifacts in it. This includes the frescos that cover the inside of the rotunda, which loom nearly 200 feet above Capitol visitors’ heads.

The 23-year-old wanted to put all this information in the hands of the people when he realized not everyone who visited the Capitol was having an equal or even enjoyable experience. After speaking to both tour guides and visitors after their tours, Oates observed people in the Capitol were mostly neutral about their time there.

“I loved the time I spent on the hill, so it was unfathomable to me that anyone had a less than perfect experience,” he said. “It was upsetting. It prompted me to talk to people more to find out what the issues really were.”

One of Oates’ responsibilities as an intern was giving constituents tours of the Capitol, so he started to feel for himself what the tours were missing.

“As interns, we felt really embarrassed when we took out our notebooks or when someone asked a question we felt like we couldn’t answer,” Oates said. “I knew there were problems with the quality of information given and the quality of the tours themselves.”

“Then I thought, if this was all in an app, pulling out a phone to quickly find information that was accurate and share it would be much less cumbersome,” he continued. “I thought an app lent itself to an easier retelling of information and would greatly improve the overall experience at the Capitol.”

Now living near Shirlington, Oates is continuing work on building the app with developers. Much of this work has been trial and error as it’s the finance and philosophy major’s first thorough venture into technology.

“For the last year or so, I’ve taken every chance I get to learn the basics of coding or network with people in the business so I can better communicate with my developers and make the app as comprehensive as it can be,” he said.

Eventually, the CapApp will also be customizable for tourists, staff members and student groups alike. Oates believes these personal features, the virtual reality element and the instant accessibility to everything in the Capitol will put his app bounds ahead of the existing visitor guide apps coordinated by the Architect of the Capitol.

More than that, Oates said the decisions he made while creating the app were all based on accounts of tour guides he grew close to. He said he continues to make frequent trips to the Capitol to get feedback from these people, who have become reliable friends.

“When I first had the idea, it was because I needed it and knew it would be helpful,” he said. “But this app quickly became more than that. It was built based on the stories of all the people who could use it best, and their suggestions have been incredibly helpful.”

“It’s a really exciting project for me, and it’s been a good three weeks,” Oates said. “The results of this Kickstarter campaign will help me figure out where to go next. The possibilities for the app are great, and I’m excited to see where it goes next.”

When it’s first released — which Oates hopes will be sometime this year — CapApp will be free and available for iPhone.

Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders, plus other local technology happenings. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

A software company based in Ballston is working to make its flagship association management application as efficient as possible via the cloud.

Fonteva, Inc. was founded in 2010. It focuses on “easy-to-use and innovative” software for associations, universities and governments to help streamline an organization’s management of members, alumni or resident services.

Its flagship customer relationship management (CRM) software is called MemberNation, a service for member-based organizations that create and manage subscriptions and services using online portals.

The application is completely built on the Salesforce platform. Using cloud technology, Salesforce serves as a host for other developers to solve management problems as they see fit, using and integrating the infrastructure into their own product.

MemberNation has been on the market for about three and a half years and targets both trade and professional associations. It can be credited with much of the company’s recent growth, making Forbes’ Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in America. Last year, Fonteva was ranked No. 1527. The company made the top 500 in 2014, making the list — alongside a handful of other Arlington-based businesses — at No. 286.

Arlington proved to be an ideal location to encourage this growth. Its proximity to Washington, D.C. not only put Fonteva among a hub for the types of associations MemberNation primarily targets, but it also allowed them to recruit talent from the greater Metro area.

Most recently, one of Salesforce’s own joined the Fonteva team to help continue building and expanding MemberNation’s capabilities.

Chris Noone is now Fonteva’s Vice President of Business Development after being a Salesforce partner managing the company’s public sector.

“The Fonteva founders really saw an opportunity to build on the success of Salesforce and wanted to use it as a platform because of its ability to scale,” Noone said, describing the company’s beginnings. “They saw a niche space and an opportunity to go after this market. I saw what they were doing, I loved the idea, I saw the opportunity for growth, and I decided to jump on board.”

One of Noone’s first tasks is preparing to launch four new product lines based on MemberNation.

“We’re working on four different feature sets for our flagship product so that all the benefits of the cloud can come to realization,” he said.

One of the products, called Spark Framework, is Fonteva’s own platform for building new software and applications. The others are called Engage, Charge and Assemble Events and are applications that will provide additional accessibility, e-commerce, event planning and management services.

As Fonteva continues to expand and build on MemberNation’s capabilities, Noone said they’ve recently chosen to do so with product extensions available on the company’s own application marketplace to preserve the integrity of their original product.

“We want to initiate our own marketplace so if we want to keep innovating, we don’t have to make our base product slower or larger,” Noone said. “It’ll also allow us to provide our customers with options for the features they want.”

In his first week officially on the job, Noone shared his excitement for MemberNation’s success, but even more for pursuing new opportunities for Fonteva’s services.

“We’ve barely tapped the market, so we’ve got a long way to go to gain leadership in that space,” he said. “We’re constantly looking for new challenges, so it’s much more about messaging and focusing on a new customer base, but it’s not changing our delivery.”

“We don’t ever want to lose focus on what our true calling is,” he added.

Photos via Fonteva.com

Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

Last week, we took a step back to check in with previously featured Arlington startups that have experienced growth over the last year, including OnYou, GoGlove and Cards Against Urbanity, the game brainchild of the founders of fellow startup GreaterPlaces.

But these companies aren’t the only ones in Arlington that are thriving and deserve a head nod in a year-end check-in, starting in the world of mobile technology.

A little more than a year ago, EdgeTechLabs founder Shaun Masavage resigned from his job at the Office of Naval Research to work full-time on DrinkMate. Though the smartphone breathalyzer originally only worked for Android phones, the iPhone compatible version of the product will be available this month.

Masavage said much of 2015 was “quite the year of development” and is planning to roll out other new products in 2016. In the near future, the company is also planning to move into the Crystal City WeWork space from its existing office near Clarendon.

Another mobile application-based startup was still in development when it was first featured, but Notify AnyWhere recently launched its application for Android and web platforms.

“The primary focus of Notify AnyWhere was to be able to provide a single platform to reach millions of people irrespective of their access to Internet or other networks,” founder and CEO Ajay Maheshwari said in an e-mail update.

He added this purpose hasn’t changed, and the app consolidates all means of communication — social media, e-mail, text messaging, and automated voice calls — to notify users via a single platform to reach these masses of people. It’s still free to download, and paid packages are available for users who plan to share messages via the app.

In addition to the United States, Notify AnyWhere now has subscribers in Canada, South America, the United Kingdom, China, India, and other parts of Europe and Asia. Some of these include paying subscribers who have utilized the app for everything from election campaigns to weather and other emergency alerts.

The Notify AnyWhere team has grown significantly, and Maheshwari said so have opportunities for the app, including interest from FEMA and the U.S. Department of Justice.

“With the exponential growth we have seen in 2015, we are more focused and determined to achieve our goals,” he said. “Giving back to the community in whatever way we can is our mantra and that keeps us motivated and energized.”

Technology-based job search company Snagajob also has exponential growth to report for 2015, more specifically in the last six months.

The employment website and application has attracted more than 65 million job seekers, 15,000 employers and features more than one million job opportunities, according to company spokeswoman Lauren Dyke. Snagajob has also made in-house improvements, hiring 100 of its own job-seekers — also known as “snaggers”  — and launching two new updates to its mobile app for Android and Apple.

“I am proud and humbled by how much we have grown in such a short amount of time,” CEO Peter Harrison said. “I am confident this incredible momentum will only continue into 2016 as we accelerate our development of innovative products, expand our workforce, and increase our strategic alliances.”

With such growth, the company has quickly filled its Arlington office and has spread its 300 total employees between Arlington and Richmond as it celebrates 16 years since first launching.

Some things, however, you can’t totally rely on technology for. Moving is one of those things, and Rosslyn-based startup ValueCrates wanted to make that process as painless as possible when it first launched in the summer of 2014.

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Editor’s Note: Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow.com, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups and their founders. The Ground Floor, Monday’s office space for young companies in Rosslyn, is now open. The Metro-accessible space features a 5,000-square-foot common area that includes a kitchen, lounge area, collaborative meeting spaces, and a stage for formal presentations.

Success in business isn’t always easily defined as it varies from company to company, industry to industry, market to market. This is especially true for startups, as success often relies on using trends and feedback to grow and explore new opportunities, even if they’re different than the ones that inspired the company in the first place.

ARLnow has profiled several startups who have done this. After first being profiled a year ago, some of them experienced positive growth in 2015 and have plans to continue to grow in 2016.

One of these is OnYou, a company that created a magnetic armband phone case specifically designed for runners, bicyclists and other fitness buffs. While the magnets in the armband are strong enough to keep smartphones safe and in place during such activities, the phone can easily be detached from the armband and used, for example, to change the music or answer a text message.

This summer, OnYou co-counder Scott Bauer — who started the company while he was still in grad school at George Mason University — reported that after running a successful Kickstarter campaign. the company won a business competition in April 2015. By July, OnYou was selling products from its own website and shipping products directly to customers.

According to their Facebook page, OnYou has upgraded its armband design and will be unveiling new products after the new year.

In another sector of the wearable cellular technology world, GoGlove has also moved from the pre-sales of a successful Kickstarter and is selling the product from its own website and on Amazon. The Bluetooth gloves allow wearers to answer their cell phones, change music or control apps without taking a phone out of their pocket.

“Feedback from initial sales have been great,” GoGlove co-founder Michael Conti said. “A lot of buyers have e-mailed us saying that it was a huge hit as a Christmas gift.”

Since the company was first featured about a year ago, they’ve developed other Bluetooth products. Bluz — a Bluetooth development kit that operates via the cloud — now has its own Kickstarter and is available for pre-sale. Conti added they’ve also been contacted by other companies interested in integrating the wireless technology into their own products.

Another startup that’s realized new opportunities in their segment this year is Cards Against Urbanity, a parody card game that has now proved as the most effective means of connecting planning firms and the people with the most concerns — the residents.

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