Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Launchpad LA Gears Up For New Class

Los Angeles-based Launchpad LA, the business mentoring and acceleration program which has been spearheaded by Mark Suster and Adam Lilling, looks to be gearing up for its third class. The group--which last ran a program in early 2010--has recently opened up an application page for its 2011 Winter Term, and has been sending out invites for a launch event in early November. According to the group's web site, it will kick off the next class in November 2011, and continue until early spring 2012. Launchpad LA's prior startups have been seeing lots of funding activity lately, including rounds for Pose, MovieClips, and GumGum; and Sometrics, one of the group's startups, saw an exit to American Express in September. The launch comes as there has been a sudden increase in interest in bringing the accelerator/mentorship format to the region. The interest in accelerators has been spurred by the success Y-Combinator, TechStars, and others have had in getting companies funded and off the ground nationwide.

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