A preeminent focus for the Internet Marketing Association is innovation and business growth. That emphasis is embodied in the annual IMA Startup and Pitch Challenge, with three disruptive companies making their case onstage before a panel of expert judges at the annual IMPACT conference.
This year’s winner at IMPACT17 in Las Vegas was Blue Matador, developer of a centralized log management and server monitoring platform for system administrators, DevOps staff and site reliability engineers. Representing the company were Founder & CEO Matthew Barlocker, Head of Business Development Cameron Smith and Content Marketing Specialist Philip Volmar. The prize was a $25,000 package of marketing and PR support.
The judging panel consisted of Jason Garcia, Vice President, Silicon Valley Bank; Aya Zook, Chief Business Development Officer, DefinedCrowd; and Susan Akbarpour, Co-Founder and CEO, Mavatar Technologies.
“We were interested in the large and growing market opportunity driven by an ever-increasing
dependence on technology and solving the pain points of downtime. Also, we liked the team and their perceived ability to execute on their idea,” said Garcia.
“At a high level, we applied the lens of market viability, caliber of team and product durability. After much heated debate, which speaks well to the quality of the pool, we thought Blue Matador had the best balance of those factors,” Zook added.
The Blue Matador platform of tools is integrated to generate a complete data picture and improve time-to-escalation and root cause analysis of application downtime. A single dashboard provides a holistic view of business infrastructure health and vitals for a seamless view of all data to help pinpoint root causes faster with predictive, AI-powered alerts.
“It’s a tremendous honor to have achieved the top spot from among such an amazing group of fellow innovators,” Barlocker said. “And we applaud IMA for hosting a showcase like this where early-stage companies can gain visibility with an audience representing thought leadership in Internet marketing.”
Also selected to compete in this year’s Challenge were Hykso and Bob’s Repair. Hykso has developed an app and handheld movement tracking device designed for boxing and mixed martial arts practitioners. Bob’s Repair provides a service that connects skilled contractors with customers in need of those skills.
“Our Startup Battlefield has become one of the most exciting and anticipated events at our IMPACT conference,” said IMA Chairman Sinan Kanatsiz. “Every year, we’re excited to discover and feature companies that are delivering disruptive and transformative solutions in a head-to-head competition judged by a distinguished panel of industry leaders.”
The Internet Marketing Association is one of the fastest growing professional organizations in the world and encompasses a wide range of educated professionals in sales, marketing, business ownership, programming, creative development and related fields.
For information on the Internet Marketing Association, visit www.imanetwork.org.
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About the Internet Marketing Association
The IMA is one of the fastest growing Internet marketing groups in the world, with more than 1,000,000 professional members in fields including sales, marketing, business ownership, programming and creative development. It provides a platform where proven Internet marketing strategies are demonstrated and shared to increase members’ value to their organizations. IMA is underwritten by corporate partners to provide an opportunity to learn, engage and define best practices without making a financial commitment. www.imanetwork.org