10 Startups Aiming To Change The Way You Work
These budding businesses aim to change the way organizations operate, with tools and services targeting the enterprise.
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Microsoft, Google, Apple, and other giants of the technology world are constantly trying to build tools and services to help the world become more productive and efficient.
These bigger companies have the resources to achieve their goals and global reach to tell the world about their innovations. However, they may have some competition from fledgling businesses working to create new productivity tools.
The startup culture continues to thrive. Venture capital investments totaled $58.8 billion on US-based startups in 2015, as reported by Pricewaterhousecoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. This is the second-highest annual amount over the last 20 years.
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To some, the idea of working at a startup can sound enticing. The idea of creating something from nothing and building a legitimate business has driven the dreams of many entrepreneurs and tech workers like software engineers and developers.
However, it's not all fun and profit for startup employees. You have to have the right attitude and personality to fit into the challenging and risky culture typical of a newly-minted businesses.
While some startup founders target more narrowly focused markets like flower delivery and men's razors, others are targeting the enterprise with services integrating new technologies including artificial intelligence, data analytics, and cybersecurity.
Here, we take a look at some of the startups working to change the way people work. Would you try any of these products or services? Which do you think have the most potential?
Viv is a startup with the goal of creating an artificial intelligence service to compete with the likes of Siri and Cortana. Developers can plug into the global platform to build an intelligent, conversational interface for devices, services, and things.
The assistant is designed to become smarter by learning over time. Unlike Siri, which can only answer questions designed by Apple employees, Viv will have fewer limitations and will be able to answer a broader range of questions. Its creators, one of whom helped create Siri, intend to have Viv learn users' individual preferences and use a broad range of connections to answer (almost) any question thrown at it.
Viv was three years old as of January 2016. It's backed by $30 million in funding.
Developers and IT managers can monitor apps and data with Datadog, which gathers metrics and events across the DevOps stack, including automation tools, databases and common server components, monitoring and instrumentation, SaaS and cloud providers, and source control and bug tracking.
In addition to a summary dashboard for a broad overview, Datadog provides metrics and events for further analysis. Users can view graphs across their data sources in real-time, view information specific to host or device, or customize views either interactively or in code. They can also search to overlay metrics across different sources, focus on the right code changes, and correlate and find the root cause.
Managers can use the tool to improve visibility, see who responded to different alerts, annotate changes, and notify their teams of edits made.
Datadog was founded in 2010. It has earned $147.9 million in six rounds of funding, with the most recent being $94.5 million in January 2016.
At a time when everyone can share information online, it's useful for businesses to be vigilant about their online reputation. Mention is a startup focused on the idea of helping brands keep track of who is talking about their company online and how their business is being perceived.
The tool monitors online sources for mentions of your company or specific keywords, so it's easier to stay updated on relevant content across the Web. Alerts, or "mentions," for these conversations happen in real-time so you can react quickly to both positive and negative content. It also allows you to connect with social media app Buffer for access to a variety of social networks at once.
Through Mention, you can view the most significant people discussing the keywords you specify. This is helpful for finding subject matter experts and growing your community through professionals active in the field.
Mention is three years old and has 350,000 active users. It received $800,000 in seed funding in 2013.
Wade & Wendy is a startup working to bring AI to the hiring process with software designed to help scan for and hire new employees. The two virtual characters are "artificial personalities" created to grow new relationships by talking with you.
"Wade" was created as a career advisor to help people find new opportunities. "Wendy" was designed as more of an internal employee and she has more knowledge of a company and how it works. She vets job candidates and aims to help hiring managers by placing those who complement each business's mission and culture.
Wade & Wendy was founded in 2015. It received $1.5 million in seed funding in October of that year.
Looker's product is a self-service big data analytics platform designed to make business data easier to understand. With Looker, businesspeople can more easily interact with data scientists, ask questions, and conduct research.
The platform is founded on a unique data modeling layer businesses can use to describe and transform raw data so it can be understood. When you connect Looker to your database, it automatically describes your data to create the foundation of your data model.
You can use Looker to monitor sharing and reporting activities to keep information secure or to manage performance. Looker doesn't extract subsets of data, but analyzes data wherever it is.
Looker was founded in February 2012. It received $48 million in Series C funding in January 2016.
Red Canary is a business trying to make cybersecurity more accessible for all organizations and not only those with large security budgets. Many companies lack the funds to hire skilled security analysts but need their expertise to protect their data and customers.
Users have access to a portal displaying threats throughout the organization so managers have quick access to activity on each endpoint. There's also the option of tagging endpoints by region, purpose, business unit, or other descriptions to receive alerts when that type of threat is detected.
Threats are identified with binary analysis, behavioral analysis, analytics, and threat intelligence. Threat analysts at Red Canary also review potentially malicious events to confirm the presence of threats, eliminate false positives, and collect necessary data for incident response.
Red Canary was founded in 2014. It received $2.5 million of seed funding in March 2015.
Zoomdata is another new company jumping into the big data game. It aims to provide a simpler and more collaborative way to visualize and interact with data in order to solve business problems.
Zoomdata's platform was built to eliminate the complexities that normally prevent users of BI and analytics apps from maximizing the potential for their data. Businesses can use it to analyze data from traditional databases and newer sources like search, NoSQL, Hadoop, and streaming data.
Businesses can also embed the visual analytics they generate into any application. The client side of Zoomdata was built using JavaScript, HTML5, CSS support, and WebSockets, so it can be used on devices from desktops to mobile devices.
Zoomdata was founded in 2012 and recently received $25 million in new funding.
Tribe provides a shared workspace in the cloud that allows you to interact with employees inside and outside your business. The company is trying to bridge the gaps across productivity documents like email messages, spreadsheets, and checklists to improve collaboration.
Tribe works within your email so there is no need to download software. Users create new tasks by sending messages or cc-ing messages in their email. If you're sending a message to someone who isn't using the app, Tribe scans your email and generates data the recipient needs to know.
Tribe has also recognized that, no matter which app companies use to collaborate, employees always use email when they interact with people from other organizations. This is why Tribe is built on email interaction -- so different collaboration tools can talk with one another.
Tribe Pro, a project management tool that lets you import/export from Excel, capture deliverables during a meeting, and view your workload for a starting price of $10 per month.
Tribe launched in 2015. It received $300,000 in seed funding in July of that year.
goTenna is aiming to keep employees connected regardless of where they are, even in remote locations without access to cellular service or WiFi.
Its device is a small digital radio with an antenna that wirelessly pairs to an iOS or Android device via Bluetooth. The radio combines with an app that generates a signal and coordinates with other units in its range. You can use it to communicate with one or more people holding a goTenna for one-on-one chats, group discussion, or broadcast to those nearby.
GoTenna was founded in 2012. It most recently closed on $7.5 million in Series A funding in March 2016.
Attracting young talent can be a problem for businesses. Peanut Butter is a new startup focused on helping companies hire and retain millennials with an alluring benefit. It arranges modest student loan contributions to employee student loans.
The startup claims that 85% of college-educated millennials would accept a job when student loan repayment is offered, and that 36% would be willing to stay longer with an employer if loan repayment as offered. The percentages were based on a study that surveyed 400 qualified respondents. A loan repayment program would increase the number of applicants, lessen the cost for companies to hire, and shorten the hiring timeline, according to the company.
Peanut Butter was founded in 2015. The company did not provide funding information by press time.
Attracting young talent can be a problem for businesses. Peanut Butter is a new startup focused on helping companies hire and retain millennials with an alluring benefit. It arranges modest student loan contributions to employee student loans.
The startup claims that 85% of college-educated millennials would accept a job when student loan repayment is offered, and that 36% would be willing to stay longer with an employer if loan repayment as offered. The percentages were based on a study that surveyed 400 qualified respondents. A loan repayment program would increase the number of applicants, lessen the cost for companies to hire, and shorten the hiring timeline, according to the company.
Peanut Butter was founded in 2015. The company did not provide funding information by press time.
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