The Techstars Austin Class of 2021
Jan 11, 2021
By Amos Schwartzfarb, Managing Director of the Techstars Austin Accelerator
We are very excited to kick off the Techstars Austin 2021 program. This will be the 9th Techstars Austin program (and 11th counting our Impact programs run by Zoe Schlag). The class this year is simply incredible, made up of some really extraordinary founders solving real world problems and bringing tangible value to their customers and shareholders.
Similar to past years, this year's program will have a heavy focus on business fundamentals. Using the Levers framework, from my forthcoming book (Levers - The framework for building repeatability into your business), we’ll will work with the teams daily to figure out 5 core and fundamental things:
W3: Who do you believe your customer will be and how do you prove we are right with data
Revenue Formula: What do you think your business model will be and what are all the drivers you need to execute on to prove you are right
Validating Assumptions: How do you prioritize all the work from points 1 and 2 so you are moving quickly in the right direction
KPI’s: Once you know what we are doing, how do you measure it to see we are heading in the right direction.
Financial Model and Plan: With steps 1-4 done, building a data driven financial model and plan to run the business.
This year's class will culminate into a virtual Demo Day and Investor Week in late March.
We’re especially excited about the fully virtual aspect of this year's program, as we think it will allow us to be incredibly focused on building some great businesses. While we will lose some of the social element that comes along with officing in tight quarters for 3 months, we believe we’ll more than make up for it on the focus and business building side of things.
We also have a great new addition to the team this year with Caroline Tosbath joining us as Program Manager. Caroline previously ran the mentor program at Capital Factory where she learned the value meaningful relationships can have on founders’ lives and businesses. Shea will continue to help make significant connections for our founders in her new role, as well as run the operations of our program. She is an incredible addition to our team - welcome Caroline.
Presenting the Techstars Austin Class of 2021!
BallBox, Inc.
BallBox is building the infrastructure of the future where people can access packages they've bought online, rent products they want to try, and purchase products they need on the spot, all in one secure kiosk.
Enlightapp
Enlight helps teachers become experts on their students by allowing students to share their uniqueness through self-created student profiles.
Fêtefully
Fêtefully is a wedding & event planning platform that leverages personality algorithms and automated workflows to streamline the event planning process to make a luxury service accessible to an underserved market while also giving professional planners a way to earn money in their spare time.
hampr
hampr is an on-demand, laundry service that will pick up your laundry and return it fresh and folded, right to your front door, within 24 hours.
Kousso
Kousso’s platform delivers data-rich home profiles to simplify homeownership.
Livo
Livo works with residential rental property managers to enhance the "first-come-first-served" process by increasing flexibility for both the renter and property manager.
Mowies
Mowies is a Content Market Network, an ecosystem. Create, share, sell.
https://www.mowies.com/categories
Nutritional Freedom
Nutritional Freedom is a platform helping women to ditch diets and get healthy for good.
https://nutritionalfreedom.co/
SocialMama
SocialMama connects women to the mom friends that they need, and experts they trust.
Talk Howdy
Talk Howdy is a platform used to organize online communities and virtual events for people with shared interests.