DreamIt Ventures Philly 2012 Showcase brings seven startups to NYC

Seven Philadelphia-based startups traveled to the Big Apple yesterday to pitch a cast of New York investors at the Philly 2012 Showcase in New York hosted by DreamIt Ventures.

The companies — CloudMine, ElectNext, SnipSnap, Grassroots Unwired, Metalayer, Kwelia, and Spling — all participated in DreamIt Ventures’ Fall 2011 Philadelphia program and presented at Demo Day in December 2011. DreamIt hosted the showcase because a number of investors expressed interested in the December Demo Day, but were unable to attend, Kerry Rupp told Technically Philly.

All seven companies made company pitches, though, for some, the event was an opportunity to continue to pursue open rounds, while for others it was a networking opportunity to meet with potential investors and create relationships, Rupp said.

Some of the companies looking to fill open round include SnipSnap, which has $350,000 committed and was looking to raise $500,000, Grassroots Unwired, which is attempting to raise a $700,000 seed round, Cloudmine, which is raising $500,000 with $325,000 committed, Kwelia, which is raising $300,000, and ElectNext, which is raising $750,000 and is closing the rest of the round at the end of the month, Rupp confirmed.

The event came on the same day of news that the minority entrepreneurship program that DreamIt piloted in Philadelphia will be expanded to a year-long program called DreamIt Access.

ElectNext recently announced plans to provide a new “Act” section of the The Economist Group’s election app, Electionism, according to a press release, which will match Electionism users with closely aligned political candidate based on the issues most important to the user. Spling, who is not actively raising funding, is moving to New York City, as Technically Philly reported.

The showcase, held on the Mezzanine Level of 30 Rockefeller Plaza, was invite-only. Among the investment firms represented, Rupp told Technically Philly, were MAG Fund, DFJ Gotham, Nokia Growth Partners, Bain Capital, Lerer Ventures, Firstmark Capital and various angel investors.

Cloudmine, SnipSnap and ElectNext are the three companies currently at the Inquirer incubator.