Rackspace Startup Program

During an interview promoting his robot battle film “Real Steal,” actor Hugh Jackman noted, “I would love to have a robot at home.” Mr. Jackman would feel right at home this week as Robot FIESTA invades San Antonio as part of the Alamo-FIRST Regional, March 27 through March 30 at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, La Villita Historic Arts Village and HemisFair Park in downtown San Antonio.

Frederick “Suizo” Mendler is the COO and co-founder of TrueAbility™, a cloud-based technical assessment tool that allows system administrators to demonstrate their skills in a real environment. Spanning a 10-year career in the tech world, he honed his diverse problem solving skills, his ability to take ownership of a business, and building relationships while helping others along the way, and is ready to move to the next phase of his professional portfolio within his own startup, focusing on his passion for service and leadership.

Information and technology are disruptive. But data-driven disruption is what will ultimately break down the barriers of closed, inaccessible, unaccountable government. The OpenGov Foundation is a scrappy little tech non-profit working to open government and developing and deploying tools that help people participate in their government and hold it accountable.

During SXSW Interactive, thousands of technologists from across the globe come to Austin to find out about the next big things on the tech horizon, share their knowledge as technology thought leaders with others, network with like-minded geeks and reserve their nocturnal hours for some of the most stellar parties on the planet. Within this subset of technologists are the developers, who are creating and building the architecture, infrastructure and software that allows you to run things on the web today.

Rackspace has gone top shelf this year during SXSW Interactive 2013, taking over Champions Sports Bar & Restaurant in the heart of festival activity. Events are taking place daily, and one must-see is the Rackspace Winner’s Circle. Inside the Winner’s Circle, the Rackspace Startup Program has assembled an eclectic group of startups to show off their businesses in a live setting. We are spotlighting startups that are using open cloud technologies to build their businesses. So take some time, head over to Champions, and step into the Winner’s Circle to visit with startups that are doing amazing things on the Rackspace Open Cloud!

Yesterday, Rackspace kicked off The Open Cloud Experience at SXSW Interactive with an exclusive MVP reception at Champions Sports Bar & Restaurant in downtown Austin – our SXSW headquarters. A line of cloud enthusiasts and party-goers wrapped around the block, with the venue hitting near capacity before dusk.

I have had the pleasure of working with Robert Scoble since the inception of the Rackspace Startup Program back in 2011. He is the Rackspace champion of entrepreneurs, which takes him around the world studying and creating media about world-changing startups. He’s is a social media sensation, with over 4 million followers on Facebook, Google + and Twitter. His official title at Rackspace is Startup Liaison Officer, and he is the driving force behind Small Teams, Big Impact, which he directs from the San Francisco office, in the heart of Silicon Valley.

Seven teams that created startups in just 72 hours while on a bus headed to San Antonio pitched their ideas yesterday to a panel of celebrity tech judges at Rackspace’s Castle headquarters. The top two StartupBus Buspreneur Battle finalists will compete tonight at the StartupBus All-Star Finals against two teams from the StartupBus Alumni bus and two teams selected by an online audience. The final competition is tonight at Champions Sports Bar & Restaurant in Austin, which is Rackspace’s headquarters during SXSW Interactive.

Startup mania has taken over Central Texas as SXSW Interactive officially kicks off tomorrow (Friday, March 8) in Austin..Startups from all over the globe will converge on the Lone Star State, including entrepreneurs who arrived at Rackspace yesterday participating in StartupBus, where groups of Buspreneurs created, built and pitched their startup ideas in the span of a Spring Break road trip.

The story begins in the summer of 2010 in Tampico, Mexico during the FIFA World Cup. Two soccer fans, passionate about the game they were watching in the comfort of their own home, were hungry and wanted to order food in. It was at that moment when they realized how difficult it was to find a restaurant that delivered food in their neighborhood. That experience created the spark that became SeMeAntoja, a social network to order food online.