Earlier this year we saw not only Startup Camp Sydney 2 but the auction of all projects that came out of the weekend.

At auction, all projects met their reserve price and were sold. Below is some information on who bought what and why:

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ACTIVITY HORIZON - US$2500

Activity Horizon was bought by team member Ryan Cross. I asked Ryan why he bought the site and this was his response:

I bought Activity Horizon for a few reasons. It was an idea that I feel has tremendous potential and have wanted to develop since 2003, but felt that it needed more resources than I could provide on my own. Startup Camp showed me that l could achieve a LOT in a very short period of time, and that you don’t need endless pools of resources to launch a company. Also, when we have showed the company to other people its been really encouraging how many of them have commented about its potential - often their first response is, “Cool! how do I get my activities listed?” - and I’ve also had talks with a couple people that want to invest in the project.

Finally, since the site was launched just a couple weeks ago, its been amazing how many people are already using the site quite actively. Overall its been a very strong response. I was hoping to secure the deal for much smaller amount, but the small bidding war that continued late into the night on Wednesday made sure that I paid full market value though and inadvertently proved that this was a valuable idea. $2500 (~AUD$4,000) is a great result for a weekend worth of work and is a testament to the great team members I had, but I am sure that will be a very small amount if the company is successful.

Since this has been a really unique experience, and I am really excited about this project pushing me to new limits I am going to be blogging the experience on 48hrstartup.com and be as open as possible so that other people can see what is really involved with starting a company.

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THREE FEEDS - US$500      

GIVEDO - US$1900

EPIC TWEET - US$600

Three Feeds, GiveDo and Epic Tweet were all purchased by the Northern Territory Institute for Community Engagement & Development (NTICED). I contacted  J. Easterby-Wood, Partnering Director at NTICED, and he was kind enough to answer a few questions:

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Why did you purchase the projects?

I felt that epic tweet and three feeds had some synergies that if tied together could be quite handy for some ideas we have been floating within the team, and let’s face it just the domain name epictweet was worth the price!

Givedo has potential not only because of its simplicity but a big part of our success and philosophy is about making change for the better not because it is a good thing to do but because it is a must. Corporate citizenship for us is not about trying to tie in some stretched outcomes but rather looking at the ways in which we can contribute at our core business level and along the way because of this we have become the best in the world at what we do with 33 International and national ICT excellence awards to back it up. Givedo will be a part of our strategic plans this year.

Do you think you got a good deal?

We got an awesome deal!, given the level of skill and expertise and particular individuals that were part of the design of these ideas/start-ups, that we can now tap into, the ROI is fantastic.  Can say without doubt best value for money on the market in quite a while and for those that missed the auction…really just too bad!  Couldn’t quite figure out the petneedsloving or whatever it was but each to their own.

What are your plans for the sites?

We’re still working on some of the plans and others we can’t tell you about just yet but will certainly keep you posted as events unfold.  We are arranging to meet with the three teams involved over the coming weeks.

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ITRAFFICAPP - US$4000

iTrafficApp was another project bought by the Startup Camp team that developed it.

I spoke to team member Graham Dawson about the winning bid.

The team bought it on our own behalf. One member wanted to withdraw so we paid him his share, and are now planning to continue working via a company structure with the remaining six.

We won with a bid of US$4,000 - after outbidding an unknown external bidder at $3100.

How much the member who opted out was paid has not been officially released, but you’d think as an equal share equity owner they were paid something like US$500-600.

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MYPETNEEDSLOVE - US$676

The least amount of information exists about what happened to MyPetNeedsLove. Latest word is that it was purchased by an Argentinian company, but that hasn’t been confirmed.

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So what’s to learn from these auctions?

1. The auction process works. Where teams want to get out, they can. Where teams want to buy a whole project, they can. Where not all team members want to remain, the system allows individuals to get out, too.
2. Apart from the obvious educational benefits of the Startup Camp process, it would seem that a good project has the potential to make team members a bit of cash on the side. Not bad - getting paid to learn.
3. The fine tuning process appears to be working and Startup Camp is proving to be incredibly valuable for the local startup scene

I notice Startup Camp Sydney 3 is already being planned so we shouldn’t have to wait too long to see what other iterations Bart and Kim have in mind for the process and what projects come out now that it’s clear that if teams make something valuable, people will pay.