More than 100 people will attempt to form working startups

By Allan Maurer
 
Start Atlanta aims to pick up where the similar Atlanta Startup Weekend left off, but with a more local emphasis and a serious attempt to sustain firms created over the weekend of January 29-30, the event’s organizers say. The event launches Friday night and doesn’t end until Sunday evening, with final presentations taking place at 5 p.m., and includes sessions with mentors and professionals in addition to team working sessions.

Jason Ardell, software engineer for Neybgor and Tourbuzz

Atlanta companies created during Startup Weekends in the past include Twitpay, (which will be a presenting company at the upcoming Southeast Venture Conference at the Ritz Carlton Buckhead, March 2-3), Scribbit, and Nexpense.

The already sold-out event was organized by a team that includes Stephen Rosenberg, co-founder of Brainpik; Jason Ardell, a software engineer for Neybgor and Tourbuzz; Jeff Costa, a solution architect with Virima/S2n; Jeremy Duvall, a contract software engineer for Deloitte; Ben Cherian, and Shane Ardell, a project manager at Digital Scientists.

Just the bottom of the venture creation arc

Rosenberg, who describes himself as a web entrepreneur and a self-described beach bum, cooking enthusiast, and geopolitical junkie, says, “The vision is to stitch together a supporting organization. We want to be just the bottom of the venture creation arc. We then want to move our teams to partnering organizations such as Startup Riot, which is reserving a spot for us, and then, when they’re a little more polished, Startup Lounge. Ultimately, we want to remove as many obstacles to success as possible so we can focus on value creation.”

He adds, “The weekend is not an end in itself, but a beginning.”

Stephen Rosenberg, co-founder of Brainpik

Jason Ardell says he sees a healthy startup culture in Atlanta. He notes that changes last year to the Advanced Technology Development Center program opened it up to many more startups, for instance. “They realized that entrepreneurship is changing and some don’t need office space or big investments, so they changed their model. They’re working with a lot more bootstrapped folks. It has been really well received by the Atlanta community.”

What does it take to be investment worthy?

It may be easier to launch a startup company than ever before, but to be successful a company does have to successfully sell something – especially if it does aspire to landing seed, angel, or venture capital. “It’s imperative to sell something if you’re eventually going to look for funding,” says Rosenberg. An angel investor told Start Atlanta founders that you needed to have $100,000 in revenue or a million users to “Consider yourself investment worthy.”

Eager to create companies, entrepreneurs and tech savvy programmers, engineers and business people gathered at Atlanta Startup Weekend in 2010

“You might not need quite that much to get a seed investment,” Rosenberg says.

Ardell points out that there is a “Catch 22″ of sorts in the way technology and the Web have made it so much easier to launch a company. “It has enabled people who are not entrepreneurs in the classic sense,” he says. “It allows a tech guy like me to launch products.”

But, he says, “My core thing is not learning how to sell or to find investments. It’s a challenge that I’ve struggled with in the past. Guys like me start the company, build the technology, and have no idea how to sell it.”

Working out the details of creating new firms from scratch resulted in companies such as TwitPay and Scribbit at Atlanta Startup Weekends. Start Atlanta is a rebranding of the event intended to help keep companies started at the event going

One of the ideas behind Start Atlanta – a rebranding of Atlanta Startup Weekend – is to “Provide guidance for entrepreneurs and partner them with some mentors so they can get some training and be able to sell,” Ardell says.

Rosenberg, on the other hand comes from the business side and MBA side of the ledger. “I’m blown away by the possibility of people coming together to collaborate and create things quickly,” he says. But he also wants any startups that evolve to have a shot at actual business success.

So, Siavage Law Group is helping them put together a basic legal agreement to make things easier down the road. “I’m not saying a Facebook will come out of Start Atlanta, but an agreement like this can solve some issues so that a company is viable it can turn into a Facebook and won’t be a nonstart.”

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