RocketSpace - Guest blog by Duncan Logan

Isolation is the silent killer of many startups. There are currently thousands of people working away at home on great startup ideas hoping to be the next Facebook or DropBox or AirBnB who don’t realize that an enormous amount of the success of these companies was due to the chance meetings and input from the amazing ecosystem that exists in Silicon Valley. We are all influenced by our surroundings and hence the popularity and success of incubators like YCombinator, KickLabs and 500Startups where meetings aren’t left to chance and the environment is carefully controlled.

RocketSpace is a focused technology hub. As an accelerator we focus on post incubator, seed funded technology companies who are approaching the rapid growth phase. The quality of the companies, the quality of the founders and the quality of the ecosystem we manage is critical to us. If we cannot accelerate this growth, but also raise the success rate of the companies within RocketSpace then we have failed.

It has been clear that an enormous part we can play in helping startups succeed is connecting them to the appropriate people or companies at the appropriate time. Typically these involve Angels, VC’s, Bankers and Lawyers but we see more and more interest from Fortune 1000 companies who realize that tapping into the innovative culture of startups can give an enormous benefit. Indeed there is a symbiotic opportunity as those Fortune 1000 companies can often accelerate growth and propel a startup to success.

It is fitting that Microsoft along with Bing and The BizSpark Team are in the first wave of companies signed up to The RocketSpace Corporate Ambassador Program. Few companies invest so much time, effort and money into the startup ecosystem as Microsoft and through their extensive network they offer a great platform to the RocketSpace ecosystem.  Alongside Microsoft we welcome Pearson Media, owners of Pearson Education, Penguin Books and The Financial Times to the program. The way we create and consume media is changing rapidly offering fantastic opportunities to startups and having an industry pioneer and heavyweight in our camp is essential.

We will announce more in due course but we feel this program will prove yet another differentiator of the RocketSpace Ecosystem which currently supports over 120 startups including many success stories like, PocketGems, Uber, Zaarly, Bababoo, Beatport and Cruisewise.

Published: 11/14/2011 11:45 AM

Tag: GEW