2 Articles for 'Litmus'
- 2008/04/17 Yet another "Y-combinator of Korea" opens door (1)
- 2007/08/31 Litmus tries to be Korea's Y Combinator
Neowiz, a major internet company of Korea (providing games, chats, and other services), launched a web startup incubating/investment program called NeoPly (Link in Korean).
Neoply is a venture incubating program that provides backend infrastructure and mentoring service to promising web startups. Neoply is similar to an already existing venture support program by Softbank Korea, called Litmus (My previous post about Litmus is here).
I think Neoply carries significant meaning as it's being worked up by an established, first generation web company. Sometimes the best people who can guide fledgeling startups are actually the ones who had been there, done that.
Meanwhile, Litmus announced a partnership with Korea's #2 portal, Daum. With this partnership, Daum will provide technial (and other sorts of) support to Litmus startups; Also, some of those startups might even be able to deploy their product on Daum service properties such as blog or Daum Cafe (Web BBS service). This will be a boon to the startups, as often what they need more than money is the initial market traction.
Neoply is a venture incubating program that provides backend infrastructure and mentoring service to promising web startups. Neoply is similar to an already existing venture support program by Softbank Korea, called Litmus (My previous post about Litmus is here).
I think Neoply carries significant meaning as it's being worked up by an established, first generation web company. Sometimes the best people who can guide fledgeling startups are actually the ones who had been there, done that.
Meanwhile, Litmus announced a partnership with Korea's #2 portal, Daum. With this partnership, Daum will provide technial (and other sorts of) support to Litmus startups; Also, some of those startups might even be able to deploy their product on Daum service properties such as blog or Daum Cafe (Web BBS service). This will be a boon to the startups, as often what they need more than money is the initial market traction.
Softbank Korea Media Lab, a subsidiary of Softbank Ventures headed by Bobby Ryu (my good acquaintance and a former Samsung colleague), is rolling out a startup incubation + seed investment program called Litmus.
The picture above describes how Litmus startup incubation process works. When Litmus team receives a business plan, they review the b-plan thoroughly to assess potential and feasibility (hence the name Litmus); The business plans that have passed this initial stage get incubated through closed beta (yellow), open beta (purple), service open (blue), and "graduation" (red).
Litmus doesn't quite exactly have the collegerial, cool feeling of Y-combinator, but like Y-combinator it is firmly focused on early-stage startups. Softbank Ventures Korea, having raised some big venture funds, certainly have money to spend on capable startups. As far as I understand, they invest in companies outside of Korea too. If you are interested, you can send your business plan to lab at softbank dot co dot kr.
The four-step incubation program of Litmus
The picture above describes how Litmus startup incubation process works. When Litmus team receives a business plan, they review the b-plan thoroughly to assess potential and feasibility (hence the name Litmus); The business plans that have passed this initial stage get incubated through closed beta (yellow), open beta (purple), service open (blue), and "graduation" (red).
Litmus doesn't quite exactly have the collegerial, cool feeling of Y-combinator, but like Y-combinator it is firmly focused on early-stage startups. Softbank Ventures Korea, having raised some big venture funds, certainly have money to spend on capable startups. As far as I understand, they invest in companies outside of Korea too. If you are interested, you can send your business plan to lab at softbank dot co dot kr.
TAG Litmus, softbank, Venture
