Melbourne Accelerator Program Hands $110,000 to 6 Promising Australian Startups

David Wei (Venuemob) at right from MAP12 congratulating (from left to right) Joseph Valente of Ebla, Dean Magee of The Price Geek and Adam Neumann from Ebla on their acceptance into MAP for 2013.

Just a couple of months back we said that the Melbourne Accelerator Program (MAP) opened applications for its 2013 intake. Today, it officially unveils the six teams who have been selected. They are:

1. The Price Geek: This platform aggregates data from eBay, Amazon, and Craigslist, and presents it in a form of information analytics to guide online shoppers in their decision making. At present, the startup, which is made up of a hacker, hustler, and designer, already has 50,000 users, generating more than A$15,000 ($13,800) in eBay sales.
2. Ebla: This is an online publishing platform that allows lawyers and those in the legal profession to contribute their expertise and cite cases or legislation. It’s currently working with a number of universities, barristers, and law firms to find the right market fit.
3. Client Catalyst: For most businesses, it can be frustrating getting a bad lead. Client Catalyst aims to change that by delivering high quality inbound phone calls to local businesses. It creates mobile websites for its customers and runs advertising campaigns on the site that focuses on getting businesses useful calls. At the end of the month, it will send you statistics such as the date, time, duration, and phone number of every call sent, so you will be able to effectively measure your return-on-investment (ROI).
4. SwatchMate: The SwatchMate device is built with property renovators in mind. With this, colors on surfaces can be matched to a paint color library, ensuring color consistency. You can even purchase the paint directly on the app itself. Sounds pretty useful for interior designers!
5. 2Mar Robotics: This startup designs and builds a wheelchair-mounted robot arm to help people who have quadriplegia (with limited or no mobility in their hands). They can control the robot arm using voice commands, and the arm has the ability to learn movements and to be loaded with third-party applications.
6. Cortera Neurotechnologies: With co-founders hailing from UC Berkeley and the University of Melbourne, the startup designs and builds implantable medical devices that help with diagnosis and treatment of incurable neurological conditions. It aims to deliver products that improve patient care, quality of life, and advanced neuroscientific research.

The six Australian teams were given the go-ahead on May 20, and will officially start at the Melbourne-based incubator today. The program will end October 31st. On top of shared office space and mentorship, the startups will also each receive A$20,000 ($18,400) – a total of $110,000 – with no equity taken in return.

MAP seems to be pretty excited about its new intake of startups, and as MAP Manager Rohan Workman says “who knows, we may see innovations that can revolutionize new tools for people with quadriplegia come out of this program.”

For more information regarding the program, you can visit its website here.

(Editing by Anh-Minh Do, Paul Bischoff, and Steven Millward)