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Many companies have made considerable progress since graduating from the Founder Institute. Held in conjunction with the Founder Showcase, the Founder Institute Graduate Awards recognizes the companies that have acquired the most traction across the team, product, user adoption, and investment in 2013.

Last week we held a private, VIP Awards Luncheon, with attending Founder Institute Graduates, Directors, and Mentors from all six continents where we operate. 

The Founder Institute has over 1100 Graduate Companies, and today, we'd like to make public the winners of the Founder Institute 2013 Graduate Awards: 


Best Overall Company Award, AND Best Female CEO Award: Realty Mogul

Realty Mogul, led by CEO and Co-Founder Jilliene Helman, is a real estate crowdfunding platform that allows investors to browse and screen real estate investments, view details of an investment, and sign legal documents online.

Realty Mogul made incredible progress in 2013, including winning the Founder Showcase, closing a $500,000 seed round, and growing their userbase by multiple orders of magnitude. This progress in 2013 helped Jillene and the company close a $9 million Series A in early 2014.

As a result, Realty Mogul is the first Founder Institute Graduate to take home two awards: the "Best Overall Company Award", AND the "Best Female CEO Award". 

Realty Mogul is a graduate of the Los Angeles Founder Institute

Congratulations to Jilliene!  

Best in Asia Award

Appota is the first mobile content distribution platform in Vietnam for developers and game publishers to effectively distribute their content to smartphone communities.

Appota experienced a large amount of success in the past year, having scored the "Startup of 2012" title at Vietnam Startup Retrospective. In addition, they also recently acquired an undisclosed series B funding to continue to grow as one of Southeast Asia's leading mobile content platforms. 

Appota is a graduate of the Hanoi Founder Institute

Best in Australia Award

Cashtivity is an education company which provides an innovative collaborative platform built entirely of apps to make it fun and easy for kids to learn how to build businesses.

Among Cashtivity's recent successes is acquiring a $50,000 Commercialisation Australia grant to help fund a U.S. expansion, and a spot onstage at the international Women 2.0 Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. 

Cashtivity is a graduate of the Sydney Founder Institute

Best in Latin America Award

ComparaMejor is an independent comparison website that specializes in financial products and insurance policies.

ComparaMejor has gained widespread press for its unique and innovative services, and has been featured on such media channels as SFGate and El Universal. In addition, the site has closed over US $1M in funding, and is showing impressive growth. 

Comparamejor is a graduate of the Bogota Founder Institute

Best in EMEA Award

2Houses.com is an online platform that helps separated parents communicate, schedule, and organize around their children.

2houses is currently in the middle of a crowdfunding campaign to help expand their products and services. 

2Houses is a graduate of the Brussels Founder Institute

Best in Western U.S. Award

Whale Path is a research platform where companies can order business research from qualified and reputable top-tier students.

In 2013, Whale Path secured an initial round of finance from four venture firms: 500 Startups, Kima Ventures, Plug & Play Ventures, and UTC Links. In addition, Whale Path was accepted into 500 Startups' Batch 8, and continues to grow their user base at a very fast rate.  

Whale Path is a graduate of the Silicon Valley Founder Institute

Best in Eastern U.S. Award

CauseVox helps nonprofit organizations realize their fundraising goals through crowdfunding.

In 2013, CauseVox launched version 2.0 of their site, which represented a major overhaul in terms of the platform's underlying technology and design. As a result, CauseVox was able to grow rapidly and secure major organizations using their platform, such as IDEO, the Prostate Cancer Foundation, and the Jeremy Lin Foundation. 

CauseVox is a graduate of the New York City Founder Institute

Most Disruptive Award

Spikes has created the world's most secure browsing to help enterprises address the biggest security threat facing their networks today. Spikes is disrupting the enterprise security market through the virtualization of the browser. 

In 2013, Spikes secured a $1 million seed round from Javelin Venture Partners, and their unique service has also been profiled across countless media channels - including in BusinessWeek last February.

Spikes is a graduate of the Silicon Valley Founder Institute

Most Innovative Award

ReadyPulse is an enterprise software platform that utilizes patented technology to surface high quality, authorized social content from brand ambassadors. This innovative platform allows brands to leverage user generated content in their brand advertising and social media campaigns. 

ReadyPulse continued to sign new customers in 2013, and recently raised a $2 million series A round from Divergent Ventures, Harmony Capital, and other investors. 

ReadyPulse is a graduate of the Seattle Founder Institute

Best for Social Good Award

Girltank is an online crowd-funding platform that enables females to share their social incentives with the world, and increase visibility for donors and investors. The Founder Institute is a big proponent of increasing the number of female founders in technology startups, and Girltank is making big strides and helping this important cause. 

In April of 2013, Girltank was recognized as a “Mother of Innovation” and awarded a $50,000 grant by Toyota to honor their creativity, drive and determination in fostering social good.

Girltank is a graduate of the Santiago (Chile) Founder Institute

Congratulations to all of the winners!

Other high performing graduates who were nominated for awards included 8th Color (Brussels), BeOnPrice (Madrid), BetterWeekdays (Chicago), Capsuling (Berlin), Cipherpoint (Denver), Comparamejor (Bogotá), Cont3nt (Washington DC), DigitalGroundUp (Chicago), Djengo (Brussels), Donation Match (San Diego), Entryless (Silicon Valley), Feetz (San Diego), Festomat (Zagreb), Food Orbit (Sydney), Geomoby (Perth), girltank (Santiago), GoPlaceIt (Santiago), Green Kid Crafts (San Diego), iGenApps (San Juan), iGiveFirst (Denver), Innoviet (Vietnam), Itembase (Berlin), Travelcar (Jakarta), Kindara (New York), Labonoteca (Medellin), Litesprite (Seattle), Logrado (Silicon Valley), Movielala (Silicon Valley), Nexercise (Washington DC), Parcelmix (Lisbon), Peerby (Amsterdam), Pethub (Seattle), Piggybackr (Silicon Valley), Pouch (Jakarta), Puzzazz (Seattle), Pypna (Barcelona), Retailigence (Silicon Valley), ReTrusted (Kuala Lumpur), Slidefish (Sydney), Syllabs (Paris), Terviu (Santiago), Udemy (Silicon Valley), Vault Dragon (Singapore), Vibease (Singapore), Vinolovers (Washington DC), Wedding Party (Silicon Valley), WeTipp (Rome), Whiz Meal (Singapore), Writer.ly (Seattle), Yton (Vietnam), Zipmark (New York), and Zirtual (Silicon Valley).

 

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