Technology is rapidly changing everything we do.
Mary Meeker, a former Wall Street analyst who's now a prominent Silicon Valley investor, highlighted a number of innovative companies in her recent presentation about the future of the Internet.
We pulled out the game-changing startups she mentioned and added few others. The following startups are re-inventing the way we share photos, make payments, develop ideas, get around, learn, and more.
Re-Inventing Photos: Snapchat is an app that lets users send photo messages to friends, but the images can't be viewed more than once. More photos are shared on Snapchat per day than Instagram.
What it is: A real-time photo messaging app where you decide how long your friends can view sent pictures before they're forever deleted. If they take a quick screenshot, you're notified.
When it was founded: May 2011
Who founded it: Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy
How much it has raised: $14 million from Lightspeed Venture Partners, SV Angel, and Benchmark.
Why it's important: More than 150 million pictures are shared on Snapchat per day – that's more than Instagram. And about one-third the volume of Facebook.
Re-inventing Video: Dropcam is a home camera that lets you view the footage from multiple devices. More video is uploaded per minute on Dropcam than YouTube.
What it is: A home video monitoring camera and software that's easy to set up and that stores footage in the cloud. Users can drop in on their home cameras from mobile devices or the web, and save clips of the footage. It's used by parents to monitor babies, as a security camera, and more.
When it was founded: January 2009
Who founded it: Greg Duffy and Aamir Virani
How much it has raised: $17.8 million from Mitch Kapor, David Cowan, Ben Narasin, Salil Keshpande, Felicis Ventures, Accel Partners, Bradley Horowitz, Menlo Ventures, and Bay Partners.
Why it's important: Dropcam is making surveillance cameras affordable and available to everyone. It stores footage in the cloud, so the tapes are never lost or damaged. More video is uploaded per minute than YouTube. YouTube uploads 100 hours of video each minute.
Re-inventing Audio: SoundCloud lets people upload, collaborate on, or listen to sounds. It has 180 million monthly users and 11 hours of sound are uploaded per minute.
What it is: A platform that lets people upload, share, listen to, or collaborate on audio files. You'll find everything from strange noises to complete tracks on SoundCloud.
When it was founded: 2007
Who founded it: Alexander Ljung and Eric Wahlforss
How much it has raised: $63.3 million
Why it's important: SoundCloud doesn't have quite the upload volume of YouTube or Dropcam, but it still has an impressive 11 hours of sound being uploaded to it each minute. As many as 180 million people use it each month (or 8% of the Internet).
*This is a KPCB company
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