Founded in October 2011, UpTo is a 10-person team based in downtown Detroit’s M@dison building that built a social network for calendars. The calendar works a lot like Facebook -- someone might post a cocktail hour with time, date and location or a sporting event so users can join them.
StartUp The Conversation is an occasional series on Deadline Detroit that features local startups and small businesses. Deadline Detroit submits questions and businesses respond in writing.
What does your company do?
UpTo is doing for the calendar what Instagram did for the camera – we’re making it more social and more useful.
How?
UpTo is a mobile app available for iPhone and Android. Users follow friends and family to see plans they're sharing, and follow public streams to see what's coming up in sports, music, movies and more. All of this information is seamlessly organized in a single, social feed of upcoming events, making it simple to discover and share future plans. Additionally, organizations can host their event calendars on the UpTo platform and also embed their social event stream onto their website.
How will you know it's working?
Half a million events have been shared on the UpTo platform, and we now have more than 2,000 public streams, including streams for the music releases, TV premiers, sports teams and many local organizations, such as Pure Michigan, D:hive, ComePlayDetroit, local schools, and many more.
How will you make money?
UpTo is pioneering the “Intent Graph,” enabling marketers to provide relevant messaging to consumers based on their intent. UpTo will also be launching premium stream publishing tools for partners during the second half of 2013.
What change are you hoping your company brings about?
Life is full of missed opportunities. Some of them we find out about after the fact. Others we never find out about at all. At UpTo, we’re turning missed opportunities into unforgettable moments by reimagining the calendar as we currently know it.
Why Michigan?
We are incredibly proud to be a part of the emerging Detroit tech renaissance. There is an energy in Detroit right now that is difficult to grasp unless you’ve experienced it for yourself. Add that to the incredible access to talent coming out of Michigan’s great universities, and the question becomes “Why not Michigan?”
Who are the brains behind UpTo's creation?
- Greg Schwartz, CEO: Formerly Founder of Mobatech and director of digital business at Warner Music.
- Dave Webber, CTO: Formerly founded and ran a software development company called simplData building web and iOS solutions for Fortune 500 companies.
- Mat Piccinato, mobile lead: Formerly lead mobile developer for Quicken Loans.
- Chris Kaufman, chief of product design: Formerly VP of user experience at Shift Digital and director of interactive Design at Quicken Loans.
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