Waze Takes Winning Spot at Innovate!2010 Tel Aviv Pitch Slam(TM)

SAN FRANCISCO and TEL AVIV, Israel, April 19 /PRNewswire/ -- Produced by Guidewire Group, the world's leading analyst firm focused exclusively on startups and emerging markets, Innovate!2010 is a global competition to identify and promote the top 100 technology startups via a series of over 20 regional Pitch Slam events. At each Pitch Slam, semi-finalists in the competition are evaluated by a panel of expert judges using Guidewire Group's proprietary G/Score™ assessment methodology.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20100419/LA88563LOGO)

The ninth Pitch Slam in the Innovate!2010 series took place at the Leonardo Basel hotel in Tel Aviv on the 12th of April. The panel of judges included Kaushal Chokshi (Chairman and Founder, Quickstart Global), Nathan Lipson (Director of Strategy and Editorial Development, The Marker), Ran Reske (Associate, Norwest Venture Partners), Raya Volinsky (Business Development and ISV Group Lead, Microsoft), and Oded Zehavi (Regional Director, Israel and South Africa, PayPal). Twelve semi-finalists competed in the Pitch Slam, and Waze took winning honors at the event -- guaranteeing itself a spot on the prestigious Innovate!100 list. Waze is a free mobile navigation application that allows drivers to build and use live maps, real-time traffic updates and turn-by-turn navigation to improve their daily commute.

Innovate!2010 partners with companies like Alacatel-Lucent, BestBuy, Cisco Systems, Comcast, eBay, EMC, HP, HSBC, IBM, LG Electronics, Microsoft, O2 Litmus, Oracle, PayPal, RIM, SAP, Sony and Verizon and serves as a platform for these corporations to quickly identify and partner with high-potential startups.

Congratulations also goes to the Tel Aviv Pitch Slam semi-finalists: CloudShare (runner-up), The Gifts Project (runner-up), Conceptic, Favit, Genieo, Gizmox, ID-U Biometrics, Secure Erasure, Sparkeo, Tucoola, and VisualBee. These companies remain in the running to be named to the Innovate!100 list and to compete for a share of over $1M in Innovate! Challenge prizes of cash and in-kind awards.

The full schedule, up-to-the-minute Pitch Slam news and content, including videos from the event, can be found at www.Innovate100.com.

About Innovate!2010

Innovate!2010 is a global competition to identify and promote the top 100 global technology startups. The program enables the most promising startups to gain access to resources and opportunities to accelerate the growth of their companies. Innovate!2010 also enables its partners, including technology and telecommunications vendors, government agencies, professional services providers, technology scouts and investors, to identify and engage hundreds of highly vetted, fast-growing startups and raise their brand profile in the global startup community. Innovate!2010 sponsors and partners include leading organizations like Alacatel-Lucent, BestBuy, Cisco Systems, Comcast, DifferenceEngine, EMC, HP, HSBC, Hearst, IBM, LaPoste, LG Electronics, Microsoft, O2 Litmus, Oracle, PWC, Quickstart Global, PayPal, RIM, SAP, Silicon Valley Bank, Sony, SWIFT, Turner Broadcasting, Verizon, and the City of Zaragoza; as well as European and U.S. economic development agencies, and dozens of leading angel and venture capital investors.

About Guidewire Group, Inc.  

Guidewire Group is a global market intelligence and advisory firm passionate about technology

entrepreneurship. Our exclusive focus on early-stage companies and emerging technology markets drives insight and opportunity to our clients and community. At the heart of our offerings is the G/Score™, a proprietary assessment tool that brings clarity and focus to the art of transforming ideas into successful enterprises. Developed over the course of more than 20,000 startup interviews, the G/Score has proven to be a reliable predictor of startup viability and promise. Our G/Score data helps technology investors, customers and platform vendors rapidly qualify and respond to startup deal flow from even thousands of startups. Our G/Score assessment tools help startups, investors, service providers and government agencies to identify and benchmark competitive strengths and weaknesses, and our Studio G business acceleration programs helps startups achieve their growth objectives with clarity of purpose, speed and efficiency.

For more information, contact Vanessa McDonald, [email protected], +44 (0)754 032 5319.

SOURCE Guidewire Group, Inc.

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