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Chicago-based InRentive got a nice surprise at last week's second annual Google for Entrepreneurs Demo Day — a $100,000 investment from AOL co-founder Steve Case.
Case invested $100,000 in four female-founded startups that participated in the pitch competition, notably highlighting them in his ‘Rise of the Rest’ concept — that great startups exist outside of the well-known Silicon Valley and New York areas.
“These are impressive companies with amazing potential and are exactly the types of companies that I am excited to invest in," Case said in a statement. "It is great to find such companies being led by the four women who appeared on-stage at today’s competition. I am mindful of the diversity challenges that still face the startup world, and I am proud to support these women launching their startups.”
This announcement follows a similar one Case made at the first ever Google for Entrepreneurs Demo Day in 2014 when he surprised the ten participating entrepreneurs with a $100,000 in each of their companies.
InRentive provides real estate professionals with a streamlined way to manage their content, analyze listing performance and market apartment units, condos and single-family rentals across multiple listing services and social media platforms. The platform began when founder Melissa Moline, who has an extensive background in the Chicago real estate market, saw that apartment buildings were buying leads (potential renters) from brokers at high rates — up to one and a half months’ rent — but those leads mostly came from Craigslist, a place known as well for apartment listings as it is for scams. She saw a chance to reinvent a tired process.
The Demo Day featured 12 selected startups to pitch their companies to an audience of investors, and receive feedback from judges, which included Case, Ann Winblad from Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, and Blake Byers from Google Ventures.
