2015《财富》“独角兽偶像”冠军诞生

    要站在200多位精通技术的陌生人以及3位著名的评审人面前，在严格的时间限制内展现你的初创公司，绝对需要非凡的勇气和魄力。不过这就是《财富》科技头脑风暴大会期间一项历史悠久的传统。我们把它称作“独角兽偶像”评选。

    而在今年，我们敢说，候选人的展示要比以往更加成熟老练。

    首先登场的是Accion Systems共同创始人和首席执行官娜塔莉亚·布里科纳。该公司正在设法克服大规模使用航天卫星所需应对的最后挑战之一：有效的推进方式。从目前的情况来看，制造鞋盒大小的人造卫星相对简单和实惠。（让我们面对事实：这样的节日礼物会让无人机自愧不如）。不过布里科纳表示，如果没有可行的推进系统，它就无法停留在轨道上，而是会落向地球，变成一个燃烧的铝球。

    布里科纳表示，她和另一位创始人路易斯·佩尔纳在麻省理工学院就读博士时研制出一种新的离子推进器，让这一问题而迎刃而解。

    第二个登台的是Mark43共同创始人和首席执行官斯科特·克劳奇。他承诺，使用该公司为警察局研发的革新系统，将大幅降低犯罪率。克劳奇和他的团队与城市警察局携手，在犯罪区域实地考察了几千个小时。随后，他们开发出了一个软件平台，能在车里给警官和其他急救人员发出救援信息。

    他向观众发问，如果一家公司的销售对象是政府，会有谁愿意给这家公司投资呢？然而，该公司的潜在顾客多得惊人。仅仅在美国就有1.7万个警察局，他们花费了无数资金来购买很多时候起不到作用的软件。而Mark43今年就赢得了一个大客户：华盛顿特区警察局。

    3号选手，Area 1 Security共同创始人和首席执行官奥伦·法尔科维茨宣称，他开发了全球首个反网络钓鱼程序。法尔科维茨表示，97%的网络攻击都始于网络钓鱼——而公司平均要在200天后才能意识到安全漏洞。他的方案是什么？Area 1会向公司提供所需的工具，阻止这类网络入侵，或是在它们尚未造成太大的损害前将其扼杀。

    下一位是Nylas公司共同创始人和首席执行官迈克尔·格里尼克。格里尼克表示，想要用软件来管理你的电子邮箱，最简便的方法就是使用Nylas。他将电子邮件恰如其分地称为“你生活中的数据库”，并自信满满地对观众表示，他的开发平台能够解决电子邮件最大的局限性：大小、兼容性和安全性问题。当他萌生出这个想法时，许多人告诉他“这是不可能的，它不可能实现——在我看来，这绝对是一个好迹象。”不过，有些人已经改变了想法：Nylas在今年1月的A轮融资中募得了800万美元。

    最后一个登台的是Mattermark公司共同创始人和首席执行官丹尼尔·莫里尔。她怀抱着“梳理全球商业信息”的崇高目标。莫里尔表示，她的团队从两年前就开始研发帮助风险投资家发现新公司的工具——并在这一过程中“发现她们的工具有助于人们解答关于销量、营销、银行业务的问题，还能应用到更多新场合中”。莫里尔还借这个活动趁热打铁，现场在App Store中发布了公司的第一个iPhone应用。

    康卡斯特风投公司总经理艾米·班泽、Foundry Group总经理布拉德·菲尔德和NBA前总裁大卫·斯特恩三位组成了评审团。他们向每位选手都提出了尖锐的问题。不过最后的决定权属于观众，他们将通过手机投票。

    胜利者是谁？是Accion的娜塔莉亚·布里科纳，她的幻灯片展示太出色了。

    值得一提的是，大赛奖品虽然比不上B轮融资，却也不寒酸。设计公司Herman Miller会给获胜者提供一套高档的办公家具。这正是每个初创公司都需要的。（财富中文网）

    译者：严匡正

    审校：任文科

    It takes a special kind of courage, and gumption, to stand in front of 200-some-odd tech-savvy strangers—and three distinguished judges—and pitch your startup company to the crowd, all while a time clock ticks away. But such is the time-honored tradition at Fortune’s Brainstorm conference. We call it “Unicorn Idol.”

    And this year, dare we say, the pitches were more sophisticated than ever.

    First up was Natalya Brikner, cofounder and CEO of Accion Systems, which is developing a way to overcome one of the last challenges to the mass adoption of space satellites: an effective means for propulsion. As it stands now, it’s relatively easy and inexpensive to build a shoebox-sized satellite. (Let’s face it: it’s a holiday gift that puts a drone to shame.) But without a viable propulsion system, said Brikner, it can’t stay in orbit and will turn into a fiery aluminum ball as it falls to earth.

    That problem, said Brikner, was solved when she and her cofounder, Louis Perna, developed a new form of ion propulsion during their time as Ph.D. students at MIT.

    Next up was Scott Crouch, cofounder and CEO of Mark43, who promised to take a bite out of crime with his company’s revolutionary new software system for police departments. After spending thousands of hours on the ground in crime zones with urban police units, Crouch and his team developed a software platform that could give officers and other first-responders life-saving information in their cars, he said.

    Why would anyone invest in a company that sells to the government, he posed to the crowd? The number of potential customers is surprisingly enticing: In the U.S. alone, there are 17,000 police departments—and they’re spending untold billions of dollars on software that mostly doesn’t work. And this year Mark43 landed a big client in that universe: the Washington, D.C. police force.

    Contestant No. 3 was Oren Falkowitz, cofounder and CEO of Area 1 Security, who developed what he called the world’s first anti-phishing program. Ninety-seven percent of cyberattacks begin with phishing, said Falkowitz—and, on average, companies don’t learn about the security breaches until 200 days after the fact. His pitch? Area 1 would give corporations the tools they need to prevent such incursions before they happen or disrupt them before they do much damage.

    Next came Michael Grinich, cofounder and CEO of Nylas. Nylas, said Grinich, is the easiest way to build apps on top of your email—which he rightly called “the database of your life.” His developer platform, Grinich gamely told the crowd, could solve some of email’s biggest limitations: problems around scale, compatibility, and security. When he came up with his idea, many people told him “it was impossible and that it wouldn’t work—which I thought was a really good sign.” Already, though, some have changed their minds: In January, Nylas raised $8 million in Series A financing.

    Up last was Danielle Morrill. The cofounder and CEO of Mattermark had no less lofty a goal than “organizing the world’s business information.” Morrill said her team started out two years ago building tools to help venture capitalists discover new companies—and in the process “discovered that their tools made it easier to answer business questions for sales, marketing, banking and many more emerging use cases.” In a fitting kicker to the evening’s event, Morrill launched the company’s first iPhone application into the App Store on stage.

    The judges—Amy Banse, managing director at Comcast Ventures; Brad Feld, managing director at Foundry Group; and David Stern, former commissioner of the National Basketball Association—asked some tough questions of each contestant. But in the end the decision was up to the crowd, who voted on their phones.

    The winner? Accion’s Natalya Brikner, whose PowerPoint deck was out of this world.

    The prize, it ought to be mentioned, fell short of Series B funding—but wasn’t too shabby either. Design firm Herman Miller offered the winner a slate of high-end office furniture. Just what every startup needs.