2006 as techstars llc . headquarters boulder colorado key people david cohen co founder and ceo brad feld co founder david brown co founder jared polis co founder website www.techstars.com techstars is a mentorship driven startup accelerator founded by david cohen brad feld david brown and jared polis that holds 13 week programs for startups in boulder new york city boston seattle san antonio austin chicago la atlanta detroit minneapolis london tel aviv cape town and berlin . 1 2 it is considered one of the best startup accelerators in the world . 3 4 5 6 7 fewer than 1 % of the companies that apply to techstars are accepted . 8 as of mid 2016 techstars has accepted over 800 companies into its program . collectively these companies have raised over 2 300 000 000 usd . 9 program mentors include foursquare ceo dennis crowley tumblr ceo david karp hubspot co founder and cto dharmesh shah and fred wilson of union square ventures . 10 11 12 a notable competing accelerator is y combinator to which it is often compared . 13 14 15 contents 1 history 2 structure 3 notable alumni 4 references 5 external links history edit in 2006 techstars was founded in boulder colorado by david cohen brad feld david brown and jared polis . techstars held its first program in 2007 with ten companies . 16 of the ten two were acquired that same year three achieved positive exits by 2012 and two currently generate millions in annual revenue . 17 in subsequent years techstars expanded to four additional cities boston in 2009 ; seattle in 2010 ; new york city in 2011 ; a cloud program in san antonio in 2012 ; and austin in 2013 . 18 19 20 21 techstars has since expanded into many other locations worldwide 4 . in january 2011 the firm launched the global accelerator network which links 22 similar programs internationally . 22 23 the network was launched in conjunction with president barack obama s startup america partnership . 24 in september 2013 techstars made its first acquisition with namelayer a repository of high quality tech focused domain names . it now offers these domain names to its program participants . 25 structure edit startups can apply for techstars program and their viability is judged by the program s directors . 26 in exchange for 6 % common stock each company accepted into techstars receives 20 000 plus a 100 000 convertible note access to the techstars network and a three month support program 27 which is conducted in three phases . 28 mentorship is one of the highest values of joining techstars according to the handshakin video series 29 notable alumni edit distil networks 30 good.co 31 32 graphic.ly 33 34 infinit 35 intensedebate 36 leanplum 37 lore 38 lua mocavo 39 40 moni 41 murfie 42 next big sound 43 onswipe 44 orbotix 45 46 sendgrid 47 shippable 48 shuttlecloud 49 simple energy 50 sketchfab 51 52 socialthing 53 streamroot 54 tradingview 55 zagster 56 57 references edit rusli evelyn . heirs to old money plunge into tech . the new york times . april 4 2012 . innovations & ideas . the denver post . february 4 2007 . updated these are the 15 best accelerators in the u.s. . techcrunch . aol . 10 march 2014 . the 15 best startup accelerators in the u.s. . inc.com . how to make the most of your startup accelerator program experience . techcrunch . aol . 7 may 2015 . 7 key things you need to know about an accelerator like techstars venturebeat entrepreneur by mo marshall . venturebeat . the best startup accelerators of 2015 . forbes . 17 march 2015 . chafkin max . future techstars step forward . inc. . april 2 2012 . techstars alumni companies . techstars . mentors . techstars . bilton nick . techstars nurtures start ups with mentors . the new york times . april 8 2011 . jeffries adrianne . techstars ny more selective than the ivy league . the new york observer . november 24 2010 . yuliya chernova . techstars graduates survival rates what the numbers show . wsj . disrupters disrupted . the economist . 14 may 2015 . y combinator beats the odds in tech investing . bostonglobe.com . myers courtney boyd . techstars the next great incubator unleashes 11 startups in nyc . the next web . april 16 2011 . bigelow bruce v. lessons from techstars david cohen on building a startup culture 7 takeaways from the xconomy san diego dinner . xconomy . february 3 2012 . results results techstars . olanoff drew . the eleven companies relocated to san antonio to join the first techstars cloud . the next web . april 11 2012 . thomas mike . techstars program to jumpstart san antonio s investment community . the san antonio business journal . april 4 2012 . dickinson boonsri . microsoft just picked 11 startups to build amazing apps for kinect . business insider . april 2 2012 . techstars network . techstars . global accelerator network spencer malia . alphalab now part of techstars network . pittsburgh business times . january 31 2011 . techstars buys namelayer to save its startups from awful domain names venturebeat deals by ricardo bilton . venturebeat . popper ben . how the quiet adam rothenberg became number two at hot startup incubator techstars ny . venture beat . march 12 2012 . fields jonathan . uncertainty turning fear and doubt into fuel for brilliance . portfolio hardcover 2011 . patterson irina and candice arnold . 1 . sramana mitra . march 7 2011 . david cohen co founder managing partner of techstars . handshakin video series . retrieved 2015 12 27 . techstars grad distil.it lands 1.8 m to help your business put a stop to bots web scraping & content theft . techcrunch . aol . 24 january 2013 . 2 . crunchbase shu catherine . good.co wants to put employees in good company . techcrunch . august 22 2014 . cheredar tom . graphicly shutters ios & android comic book apps to focus on self publishing service . venture beat . april 5 2012 . vuong andy . colorado startups becoming tech stars . the denver post . april 10 2010 . leswing kif . infinit revisits personal peer to peer file sharing . june 9 2014 . retrieved january 25 2015 . kincaid jason . automattic has acquired intensedebate s enhanced comment system . techcrunch . september 23 2008 . seattle 2012 alumni leanplum how techstars helped . retrieved october 4 2016 . pando coursekit is now lore rebrand reflects expansion beyond college courses with new investment from peter thiel . pando . techstars alum mocavo grabs 4m to help you find your ancestors venturebeat deals by sean ludwig . venturebeat . mocavo acquired by findmypast a new chapter begins . mocavo blog news announcements & more from the world s largest free genealogy search engine . techstars london unveils first cohort applications increased 4x post springboard merger . techcrunch . retrieved 15 february 2015 . kyle alspach 6 february 2012 . an unusual techstar murfie seeks to build huge cd store . boston business journal . ruth joao pierre . xconomis of the week . xconomy . april 12 2012 . baptiste jason . fundraising from 1 000 to 1 000 000 . april 8th 2012 . 3 . crunchbase . orbotix sphero is rolling to an apple store near you . techcrunch . june 29 2012 . dizik alina . 6 time management tips from accelerator programs . fast company . march 14 2012 . techstars seattle startup shippable raises 2.05 m for continuous integration platform built on docker . techcrunch . dec 10 2013 . shuttlecloud . crunchbase . may 31 2012 . retrieved july 16 2013 . america s most promising social entrepreneurs 2012 . bloomberg.com . 21 june 2012 . liam boogar february 25 2013 . with 20 000 users on board sketchfab raises a 370k angel round for its youtube of 3d . rude baguette . sketchfab raises 2m to scale its youtube for 3d files . balderton capital . december 5 2013 . reisinger don . aol acquires lifestreaming service socialthing . mashable . august 14 2008 . semyon dukach august 14 2014 . techstars boston 2014 class . techstars . stan bokov july 16 2015 . social network for investors tradingview raises 3.6 m . finextra . moschen isabell june 6 2013 . the two wheeled amenity . new york times . schiller ben . a self contained bike share to make college or your office park more fun . co.exist . external links edit techstars.com retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title techstars & oldid 742570421 categories business incubators of the united statescompanies based in boulder coloradoinvestment companies of the united statesmentorshipsstartup acceleratorscompanies established in 20062006 establishments in colorado navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages add links 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