Local tech companies seek to strike it rich at SXSW

From Twitter to Foursquare, some of the most popular tech
companies have hit the big time thanks to an enthusiastic
reception at Austin’s annual South By Southwest,
a week-long music, technology and arts festival. Plenty
of Seattle companies and geeks are hoping the Northwest
can strike it rich down South this week.

“It’s a really big contingent, especially from the big
companies like Microsoft, Amazon, so there’s a lot of
Seattle representation,” says an exhausted Monica Guzman,
social media strategist and columnist with GeekWire.com.

There are thousands of companies competing for the
attention of tens of thousands of smart-phone toting
techies. Guzman says it’s a non-stop week of conferences,
meetups, demos and parties at what has evolved
dramatically from its early days as a music-only affair.

“Every year out of this conference spring all these new
apps with new excitement for new technology. It’s very
important for new products, new companies and especially
mobile apps,” Guzman says.

While trends like tweeting and checking-in took hold in
Austin in previous years, Guzman says the hot things this
year are what’s being called “ambient awareness” apps.
Most exciting for Guzman is one called “Highlight.”

“Highlight” connects all your social media networks and
tracks your locations all the time, so it can tell you
which of your friends or contacts is near you, how you
know them, what they are doing and other information
commonly shared via social network to help reconnect
virtual acquaintances in real life.

“There’s some definitely scary implications to it, but in
a place like South by Southwest where everyone wants to
network it’s very exciting,” Guzman says.

“Highlight” is just one of many companies swamping
attendees with gift certificates and other incentives to
try out their product and service in a frantic effort to
stand out among so many competitors and capture badly
needed buzz. Despite all the efforts, many will fail
to capture much of an audience either in Austin or the
rest of the world.

“Everyone dreams of really changing the world but if you
can’t jump from the geeks to everybody else your
capability to do that is pretty limited,” Guzman says.

It’s the dreamers who keep fueling SXSW’s meteoric
rise, and will continue to reinforce the festival’s place
as, perhaps, the most influential tech gathering anywhere.
Guzman predicts at least a few local companies will be
among the success stories emerging from this year’s
festival.