I had lunch with Cue Ball Group last Friday, a Boston-based VC firm. You may be aware that there’s quite a bit of money out there sitting on the sidelines. So I’m interested when I hear where people are placing bets and why.
Here are some of the portfolio companies we discussed:
- Miniluxe (think Starbucks meets nail salon)
- Cruxy (if MySpace had kept it real)
- Knovel (it ain’t sexy but it works)
- Epic Burger (soon to open in Chi-town South Loop, organic burger joint)
And some interesting ideas they’re keeping tabs on:
- 23AndMe. For only $999 discover to whom you’re genetically linked.
- radiusIM. Think Twitter with GPS.
- Naver. A Google-killer in action – it’s the localization.
Cue Ball was founded by Tony Tjan, who founded digital strategy firm Zefer back in the dot-boom; Red Herring wrote a case study series on them. Not sure whatever happened to the other management team members.