Over the weekend, six teams competed in the second annual Startup Weekend in Athens, where a duo was declared winners of a $1,000 prize.
The winning startup, an app called RapChat, will allow users to create messages in raps and send them to friends in a similar format to the photo-sharing app, Snapchat.
“I had that idea for a month or two,” said Seth Miller co-founder of RapChat, and a junior studying management information systems. “Everything we won from this will go toward developing the product even further. We really wanted to incorporate trends that are really big right now like hip-hop.”
Kyle Perkins, a Startup Weekend judge and founder and lead designer of digital game and animation company Lightborne Lore, said all participants that took part in the weekend’s events were “extremely impressive.”
“RapChat was very forward thinking and that’s not very easy to do,” Perkins said. “We thought it was pretty innovative, especially with the short amount of time they were given.” Perkins said.
Starting Monday morning, students will have access to the beta version of RapChat. Anyone can download the free app on Rap-Chat.com and give feedback on what improvements should be made to the app.
OU School of Visual Communication alumnus, Brandon Logan, helped develop RapChat with Miller.
“This weekend definitely made this happen,” said Logan, co-founder of CreMedia, a video production and website design company. “We worked really well together and I see a bright future ahead for us.”
Last year’s winners of Startup, FlashCrop, went on to create a study aid app which was released Fall 2012. The app now has 500 users.
Having competed in StartUp before, the competition gave them an experience that was beneficial for the future, said Richard Rodman, co-founder of FlashCrop and a junior studying entrepreneurship and business.
“In the end we ended up with something that gives you the opportunity to come up with a great solution for problems,” Rodman added.
Andrea Gibson, director of research communications at the Office of Research Communications said she thought Startup Weekend went very well.
“I think the teams did an excellent job creating their ideas. They are so optimistic about the opportunities.”
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