Columbus Tops 175 Cities around the Globe as Central Ohio Startup Wins International Pitch Competition

Central Ohio entrepreneurs, inventors and investors came out in force this week to show the world the strength of the region’s startup community as part of the first ever multi-city MeetUp dedicated to startups.  West Coast entrepreneur and angel investor Jason Calacanis, moderator of the weekly podcast, This Week in Startups (TWiST), organized the event which was designed to bring together startup groups from around the world to pitch their group’s best and brightest startups before a worldwide audience to compete for the designation of Best New Startup. 

Powell-based Resort Rentals by Owner (RRBO.com) took top honors in the global business competition, beating out eight contenders locally to represent Columbus and then besting 10 other startups representing other cities.  This was a night when the Central Ohio tech community had an opportunity to show the world what it can do.  Columbus distinguished itself by having:

• The most number of people sign up for the Meetup - 115 people voted to make Columbus one of the 10 cities out of 175 worldwide which was selected to participate in the Webcast during the 2 ½-hour live event.  This was more than any other city including Boston, New York, Chicago, San Francisco or Santa Monica/LA where TWiST and the Webcast originated. 
• The most number of local startups vying for the honor of presenting to the worldwide audience - Nine local startups presented their three-minute/three-slide presentations for consideration.  From these, RRBO.com was selected to present live during the Webcast.  Most of the other cities only had three startups under consideration.
• The most number of participants on hand for the Webcast event - More than 60 people attended the live Webcast event held at TechColumbus. 
• RRBO.com being selected as the Best Startup - Out of nine startups locally, RRBO.com was chosen to represent Columbus to compete among Top 10 startups from other cities selected to pitch during the Startup Meetup.  From this field, RRBO.com was chosen by event participants as the Best Startup. 

Locally the event was organized by Kevin Gadd, director of IT Commercialization for TechColumbus. Gadd learned of the multi-city Startup Meetup event when it was first announced just two weeks ago.  He immediately signed Columbus up and put the call out for entries and participants through various channels.  From there the tech community took over. 

“I was amazed at the speed and the success of how we were able to mobilize the tech community,” says Gadd.   “The first few days the number of people who voted to have Central Ohio as one of the featured Meetup locations shot us out front of all other metros – a position we maintained for the most part until voting ended.”   (Santa Monica overtook Columbus briefly by less than 10 votes during the last day of voting, but Central Ohio came back and edged them out in the final count.)

“This was the perfect example of all those formal and informal networks involved in technology and entrepreneurship in the region coming together and helping put Columbus on the map,” says Gadd.  “It just shows we’re doing something right here in Columbus.” 

The multi-city Meetup and the award-winning pitch by RRBO.com’s cofounder and COO Bob Kington, will be featured this Friday on the TWiST Web site. 

RRBO.com is a newly launched online marketplace that enables resort timeshare owners to rent their units to vacation travelers, while managing and guaranteeing payment.  As it happened, the site went live on the very day of the Meetup.

“With RRBO.com launching this week, being featured on TWiST will be a great opportunity to introduce our business to venture capital firms, and the innovative product to consumers,” says Kington.

“This Meetup required me to refine the pitch that our company uses in telling our unique story which is something entrepreneurs need to do when presenting to potential investors,” he says.

“This Meetup also helped me pitch our company in a short timeframe, which is something entrepreneurs need to know how to do when presenting to potential investors,” he says.

According to Gadd the three-minute, three-slide format created an opportunity to help mature the business person.  “We’re always working with entrepreneurs to mature their business concept; this allowed us the chance to focus on the entrepreneur and his or her ability to condense the proposition into an abbreviated context and present it under considerable time constraints, in front of a larger-than-normal audience and amidst a host of distractions.  It was a very good exercise, even for those who weren’t selected to represent Columbus.”  

Watch a recap of the event here (skip to minute 42 to see the broadcast from TechColumbus)