Startups showcase Impact-centric Innovations at NetApp Excellerator Cohort 3 Demo Day

Photo Credit : NetApp,

NetApp, a leader in data management and hybrid cloud, announced the graduation of its third cohort during the NetApp Excellerator Demo Day. The NetApp Excellerator program is the company’s flagship accelerator program designed to nurture data driven technology startups. The third batch of six startups focused on technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Cloud, Cyber Security, Analytics, applied in wide-impact areas like operations, marketing and healthcare.

As part of the third cohort, all six startups – CloudOptimo, InstaSafe, FirstHive, Praktice.ai, Cardiotrack and Zscore Technologies underwent a four-month long program to engage and benefit from NetApp’s technologies, platforms, tools, HR, marketing and legal support, and fine-tune their products using the expert knowledge provided by the team.

At the third Demo Day, the startups presented their products to a panel of venture capitalists, prominent industry leaders and top NetApp executives. NetApp provides an equity-free grant of $15,000 to each of the participating startups.

This year, NetApp took its accelerator program a notch higher as it welcomed international participants under its mentorship, Praktice.ai and Cardiotrack. Both of these startups are headquartered in Singapore and have a global customer base. In the backdrop of the event, Cardiotrack also launched a new app for patients. This app will help heart patients digitize their health records, get connected to specialists and control illnesses through real time monitoring and expert advice.

Ajeya Motaganahalli, senior director and leader of the NetApp Excellerator Program, said: “The NetApp Excellerator program has been successful mainly because we have consistently helped startups focus on value creation. Valuation and subsequent funding is a follow-on effect which is the most desired outcome for any startup.

"When we look at all our startups, not just from this cohort but also from the previous ones, it’s heartening to see how spectacularly well they are doing for themselves. After evaluating over a thousand startups and closely working and mentoring eighteen of them, we are able to look back with some degree of satisfaction that we have been able to make a difference in the deep-tech and B2B startup ecosystem.”

As another tangible example of value creation, FirstHive and Cardiotrack from this cohort have joined NetApp as strategic alliance partners, which means that NetApp will co-create solutions and go to market with them. They join BlobCity, SigTuple, Nanobi and Scalend from the last two cohorts. With this, six startups from across the program alumni have cemented their association with NetApp.

Samir Kumar, general partner, Inventus India, and a veteran venture capitalist, also commended the program, “Startups find it challenging to access large enterprises, who are potentially great customers for their solutions. Go-to-market was earlier learnt through trial and error due to a lack of suitable mentoring. Programs such as the NetApp Excellerator, with their global expertise, create long-term value towards the profitability of these startups. This has given new impetus to our confidence in tech-startup investments.”

The expert mentorship has already started bearing results, such as with Zscore, a participating startup that on-boarded three new clients during the program. Deepak Visweswaraiah, senior VP and MD, NetApp India, said: “NetApp has been winning against competitors many times its size through sheer will of innovation in data technologies. In this data driven world, it’s exciting to see such startups that are shaping the economy through wide-impact initiatives such as healthcare. Our aim is to bring together technology know-how and innovation, and our alumni have reaffirmed our success through theirs.”

As a testimony to the program’s success, NetApp Excellerator also received the Best Corporate Startup Accelerator Program Award at the Zinnov Confluence 2018 event in June 2018.

NetApp Excellerator Cohort 3 Startups at a glance:
Cardiotrack: An IoT- and AI-based heart health diagnostics technology that is changing the way heart health care is delivered. This handheld 12-lead digital ECG device captures patients’ heart health information anywhere, anytime.

Zscore Technologies: An AI analytics company with their own platform that could be deployed on top of existing business intelligence systems. Zscore’s mission is to ensure that organizations have trustworthy data that they can use to make decisions confidently.

Praktice.ai: Praktice.ai automates patient interactions at hospitals through speech and chat mediums, enabling hospital staff to handle almost 10x the number of patients.

FirstHive: A customer data platform that builds Unique Customer Identities by aggregating data from across all sources of customer interactions and customer transactions, and drives marketing RoI for consumer marketing focused large enterprises.

CloudOptimo: An intelligent cloud costs optimization platform which reduces the total cost of ownership of cloud infrastructure up to 80% while ensuring high availability and consistent performance.

InstaSafe: A software-defined perimeter-based cybersecurity provider that helps secure organizations, users and applications through an innovative Zero Trust Model.  

Fourth cohort registrations
NetApp Excellerator has now opened registrations for its fourth cohort. Startups will be chosen through a rigorous iterative selection process which will focus on their product capability, performance, in-depth technology know-how and alignment with the program’s objectives. Startups with interests in the areas of hybrid cloud, AI, IoT, data management and adjacent technology domains are invited to apply.