SANTA MONICA, CA — (Marketwired) — 09/25/13 — The Siemer Silicon Beach Summit, and its co-hosts Siemer Ventures, Manatt Digital Media, Grant Thorton, Trinet, and SocialRadius, today announced that as part of the annual WaveMaker Awards, it will be awarding one startup the “Big Kahuna Award,” a new prize valued at $160,000. The award recognizes the company that best demonstrates the potential to achieve unusually rapid scale and success. The Big Kahuna Award reflects the Summit-s beachside location and the iconic “surfer” culture of the Southern California tech hotbed. This year-s WaveMaker Awards will take place at the third annual Summit, Oct. 2-3, at Shutters on the Beach in Santa Monica.
On Thursday, Oct. 3, nominated startups will have the opportunity to demo their companies and technologies in front of 500 of the most influential leaders in digital media and emerging technologies from around the world. Competitors each have a few minutes to pitch their company to investors, venture capitalists and visionaries in the tech community for the chance to win in their industry category as well as the new Big Kahuna award. The winner will be announced at the closing awards ceremony at 6:30 p.m. that evening.
The recipient of the Big Kahuna Award will receive $75,000 in a cash convertible note at 0 percent discount to a future round without any cap on conversion valuation. These funds will be committed by Siemer Ventures and Manatt Venture Fund, two of the most active institutional investors in Southern California:
$50,000 convertible note from
$25,000 convertible note from Manatt Venture Fund
There will also be an additional $85,000 in professional and business services from companies specialized and dedicated to the global tech ecosystem:
$25,000 from L.A.-based law firm
$25,000 by accounting and consulting firm
$25,000 from cloud-based HR service provider
$10,000 by social media marketing agency
“The goal of the WaveMaker Awards portion of the Summit is to help young entrepreneurs bring their ideas to life in front of a global audience,” said David Siemer, managing partner of Siemer Ventures. “We recognize the vital role of early stage digital media and technology innovators, and we want to help these companies gain exposure and ultimately flourish.”
This year-s exceptional group of 40 judges come from tier-one investment funds from around the globe. Notably, these include Mark Yi of Intel Capital, Sim Blaustein of BDMI, Brian McLoughlin of Upfront Ventures, Mark Fernandes of Sierra Ventures, Patrick Burtis of Amadeus Capital, Austin Noronha of Sony Ventures, Manish Patel of Highland Capital, Bill Woodward of Anthem Ventures, Andrew Clelend of Comcast Ventures, Niko Bonatsos of General Catalyst, Matthew McCall of New World Ventures and Vishnu Menon of Warburg Pincus, among others.
Judges will vote for stand-out, early-stage companies to determine award recipients. Judges will select one winner in each of the six industry-specific categories and decide who will receive the Big Kahuna Award and other awards of distinction.
Nominees for this year-s WaveMaker Awards are now announced at:
“We are here to celebrate early stage digital media and technology innovators and individuals who have played a significant role in the Silicon Beach community,” said Hale Boggs, chairman of Manatt Digital Media and the Manatt Venture Fund Investment Committee. “We take great pride in our community and hope to see nominees and winners experience rapid growth over the next year.”
Jesse Draper, the creator and host of “The Valley Girl Show” and CEO of Valley Girl, Inc., will MC the ceremony, which concludes the Siemer Silicon Beach Summit 2013.
Now in its third year, Siemer & Associates- invitation-only Summit draws 500 of the most influential leaders in digital media and emerging technologies from around the world for two days of thought-provoking discussion, relationship-building and celebration. Founders and CEOs of innovative tech powerhouses swap views with established media executives, industry visionaries and private equity and venture capital investors during over 60 company presentations and multiple panels and roundtable sessions.
The Summit concludes with the heavily anticipated Siemer WaveMaker Awards ceremony, honoring exciting young companies poised for rapid growth along with industry veterans who nurture our continually evolving industry. Judges are drawn from our network of seasoned investors and industry insiders.
Siemer Silicon Beach Summit is thankful to the following sponsors: Siemer & Associates, Manatt Digital Media, Grant Thornton LLP, SVB (Silicon Valley Bank), Social Radius, TriNet Group Inc, Shamrock Capital Advisors and PNC Business Credit.
Sura Hart
You must be logged in to post a comment Login