TECHdotMN: News about Minnesota Startups

The 9th production of MinnDemo will take place on Thursday, January 13, 6:00pm at St. Thomas’ Schulze Hall.

MinneDemo happens roughly 2-3 times per year to showcase real, working technology products made in Minnesota. In January, ten companies will give 7-minute demos of functional hardware and/or software. In addition to the Minnesota tech buzz, the event is known for facilitating some of the best startup networking in town.

Organizers Ben Edwards and Luke Francl have moved the event to St. Thomas from its previous location at Intermedia Arts in Uptown. “We’ve had such a huge level of interest in this event that we’ve needed to move it around as space has become an issue. We’re always looking for better venues,” said Ben. In the past the event has been held at Chang Mai Tai, Acadia Cafe (before it moved), O’Gara’s, and Intermedia Arts.

Updated 1/5/10 12:45 – The 10 demonstrations include:

• Inveni: a discovery engine where users receive highly personalized recommendations based on their custom taste profile and facilitates effortless sharing and socializing with friends (Aaron Weber).
• Qonqr: an augmented reality combat game, winner of Startup Weekend Twin Cities (Scott Davis, Justin Peck)
• Passy-Pass: a is password generator and storage device, written up by the Make blog (sigflup).
• Zipnosis: Doctor e-diagnosis tool with mobile component. Winner of Minnesota Cup Student Division in 2008.  (Ben Peirce & Jon Pearce)
• Daybreak Heroes: a new social game for the iPhone, integrating some revolutionary ideas into the blossoming social game genre (Evan McMahon)
• Evolve: is a new way to experience multiplayer gaming (Adam Sellke)
• Event Burn: an online service that makes social media more useful by finding and summarizing the good stuff (Dan Frankowski)
• LitLift.com: a free novel writing application that’s helping hundreds of authors make the most of their limited writing time (Brad Marsh)
• Sophia: makes knowledge easier to share, easier to find, and easier to organize. Sophia lets you teach what you know and learn what you don’t (Steve Anastasi).
• Minnesota Hockey Hub: Bringing pro level functionality to the masses via the SPORT NGIN platform (TST Media/Carson Kipfer)

Sponsors for the event include: ipHouse, New Counsel, Split Rock Partners, CrashPlan, The Star Tribune, Livefront, and St. Thomas MBA Programs & Schulze School of Entrepreneurship.