Below are profiles of the three finalists for the $100,000 Business Plan Competition. All three firms presented to a panel of venture capitalists at the Summit in Tech Valley on May 14, 2007.
Celery LLC (winner)
Andrew J. Gibson, Chief Executive Officer
212 River St.
Troy, NY 12180
518.833.6807
Formed in 2004, Celery LLC has developed an easy and affordable way for people to send and receive email and color photos without a computer. The company married its custom software application to off-the-shelf fax technology and designed a business model to profitably sell and service Celery’s customer base. Celery utilizes an existing telephone line, and there is no need for the customer to have a dial-up or cable modem connection. It has developed a product that is easy to use and available at a much lower cost than alternative applications. The company has sold systems in 45 states, Puerto Rico and Canada. This is the second consecutive year that Celery, LLC has been named a finalist in the $100,000 Business Plan Competition.
PrecisionCare Software
John J. Sheehan, President
243 Main St., Suite 270
New Paltz, NY 12561
845.255.6097 x201
PrecisionCare Software is a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) developer of web-based electronic medical record solutions for community-based healthcare providers with a focus on corporate compliance to ensure billing accountability and audit protection. This estimated $1.2 billion market is burdened by heavy regulation and documentation requirements. PrecisionCare’s unique SaaS enables community-based healthcare providers to focus on consumer care instead of documentation, significantly improve the quality of services they provide, drastically reduce operating costs and avoiding costly Medicaid audits. PrecisionCare has successfully bootstrapped and raised angel capital to develop and sell its SaaS approach to more than 65 customers.
Veratag, LLC
John Schneiter, Chief Executive Officer
Albany, NY
518.330.8047
Veratag, LLC is a start-up company whose mission is to offer an alternative to encryption for security conscious applications. Veratag manufactures nanoscale MEMS devices which create unique electronic "fingerprints" or signatures for RFID tags as well as other electronic security applications. These devices eliminate the need for costly and crackable encryption systems. The signature is an analog signal that can be used for unique identification, authentication and counterfeit prevention.