Startup Weekend Santo Domingo, a company created in 54 hours

Santo Domingo. During the 16, 17 and 18 days of November, at the facilities of the Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo (INTEC) the Startup Weekend Santo Domingo was developed, an event where young entrepreneurs and enthusiasts from different universities and areas met to develop innovative business ideas within a period of 54 hours.

Startup Weekend is a non-profit organization, based in Seattle, Washington, USA, that holds such events during weekends for participants to develop prototypes of their ideas and present their demos for Sunday night. The organization has gained a great global impact, making more than 468 events in 90 cities around the world, for June of this year.

At the beginning of this edition in Santo Domingo, the attendees presented their best proposals to form teams and then focus on the validation, the practice of Lean Startup methodologies and the development of the product that should be minimally viable, in order to be an applicable business effectively in the local and global market.

The 10 companies created by the more than 50 participants, were evaluated at the level of business model, originality and innovation, by a jury made up of Orlando Pérez, Marcos Troncoso, Omar Pool and Tamara Vásquez. Of these, Bounce Tangerine, SnapBuy and Unibees were the winners in first, second and third place respectively.

The company Bounce Tangerine, winner of the first place, consisted in the creation of a community where users can recommend which are the best places night after night, for those users who do not know what to do in any city. Users are rewarded under various modalities, but above all, to recommend the most fun places to the community. The idea is to find fun every night.

The second place of the competition was awarded to SnapBuy, a platform that allows users to buy goods through any publication (magazine, press) using their mobile; while the third position was for Unibees, a web platform that facilitates the process of inserting students into the labor market, creating a direct link between companies and students.

The three winners received as a prize the constitution of their companies, Internet advertising, legal advice and free ecommerce, as well as tools to promote their services totally online.

Anne Sophie Tejeda, director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation of INTEC (CEI), expressed her commitment to continue organizing this type of events to encourage the development of high impact companies using the Lean Startups methodology.

In addition to the CEI-INTEC, the event that took place in the Auditorium Osvaldo García de la Concha of INTEC, also counted on the sponsorships of Microsoft, Codemera, Gikplus.com, Collective Pulse, Banco Popular, eCompany.com.do, Troncoso and Cáceres, BrandInc, Orange Dominicana and Doppler, eCollect.

The other projects presented were:

Educated Systems
It is a tool that helps parents, teachers and guardians monitor the child's educational performance. The intention is to create an app so that the child can learn through the game to feel comfortable and at the same time monitor their performance in various areas: mathematics, language, motor skills, among others.

Healthy Flow
They created a product based on moringa (snack) for its natural properties and for those interested in healthy life. With this, they sought to improve the performance and life performance of any person based on food, tips, among others. Additionally, the guys who created the Healthy Flow brand thought of manufacturing this product, connecting it with the goal of sustainability and helping agricultural producers and the green economy.

Yo soy
It is a platform of job profiles that allows future prospects to find employment and companies to obtain personnel resources. The intention is to improve the credibility of a prospect who has just left a job or an academic institution. Among some features available is that they will have "achievements" that an employee can earn through the platform.

Printiao
Virtual platform that allows printing documents remotely and from any device. Using cloud printing, users can send their documents to the service and send it to print to a network of printing centers near where it is located, to any part of the country or the world.

DiloWeb
Companies need to hear what their customers say to improve their services and the idea is a portal where users express their complaints, regardless of the type of organization. It includes a complaint monitoring service for organizations affiliated with the service and an immediate response for complaint solutions.

PingBlip
It is a social platform and gamified and that allows to get within an establishment, the best offer, the best product that the user is really looking for. Among the main functions are to get offers in places and commercial establishments via geolocation.