Startup Buzz: WeWork Builds Its Largest West Coast Location in San Diego

The downtown co-working community is expected to house 1,700 members

Follow the Money

Industry, an online job search platform for the service/hospitality industry, raised a $2.3 million seed round to help with national expansion as well as growing the team and the product. We first told you about Industry in September, and the company is quickly becoming a go-to platform for the hospitality industry. The platform is also being used to cast chefs for the television shows Hell’s Kitchen and Top Chef. This is a company to watch.

WeWork Brings Its Largest West Coast Location to San Diego

WeWork, an international hotspot for co-working and collaboration, is opening its doors in San Diego in December. At 600 B Street downtown, the company will take up 6 floors in the building including an outside terrace. The space will offer 1-6 person offices and dedicated desks, as well as hot desks—non-dedicated space for use by members. They are planning for a community of 1,700 members here. If you are looking for signs that San Diego’s innovation community is thriving, this is certainly one. WeWork also seems to be thriving with 126 locations in 39 cities across the globe. Since their founding in 2010, WeWork has raised $1.69 billion in 8 rounds from 12 investors.

San Diego is a Music (Tech) Town

We have life sciences, chip makers, drone builders, and brewers, but did you know that San Diego is also home to a cluster of music tech? A few months ago we told you about Ossic, that develops 3D audio headphones for entertainment and VR. They are currently part of the Abbey Road music accelerator. You may have heard of Rock My Run, an app that uses biometric data to sync music to a runner’s pace while working out. A few other names worth mentioning are Gig Town, Music Loft Apps, and StagePlot Guru.

Gig Town is a platform for performers to book gigs directly with venues. You can also use the app to find new music and see who is playing where. Music Loft Apps is driven by professional musicians and teachers helping people learn to play music through tools, and by connecting them directly with teachers. And the makers of StagePlot Guru just relocated their company, Active Media Production Group, from Salt Lake City to San Diego. Its flagship product is StagePlot Guru for iPad, the most downloaded stage plotting app in the industry. As they’re growing, they have brought in interns from UCSD to grow local talent. And that, my friends, is a cluster.

Water Metering Technology Wins the Night at Evonexus Fall Demo

In a survey conducted after the pitches at Evonexus’ Fall Demo Night, Water Pigeon co-founder Sarp Sekeroglu won the vote for best pitch. Water Pigeon developed a more cost effective way to accomplish automatic reading of water meters. They developed a lid to replace current lids on the meters instead of having to replace the entire meter. Turns out this technology can be subbed in for less than half the cost of full replacement and in 1/10 of the time.

Startups Become a Political Football, Literally

On Monday, San Diego Chargers owner Dean Spanos and Mayor Kevin Faulconer announced that a new Connect-All startup accelerator would be part of the stadium facility plan, Measure C, which will be voted on in the November election.

Pivots and Opportunities

October 30: Final day to apply for Hive Program in San Francisco
Hive is hosting three Hive Global Leaders Programs this Fall in San Francisco (Nov 18-21, Dec 16-19, and Feb 10-13). You can download information here and apply at hive.org/apply.

Be There or Be…

The Makers of the San Diego Central Library are hosting a livestream of the Lean Startup Conference 2016 from San Francisco. The livestream will take place in the Downtown Central Library starting at 9:30am on November 2 and continuing into the conference’s second day on November 3.