By Victor Karamalis Photos courtesy of ORIENTED
Los Angeles has always been known for the music industry and the Hollywood movie scene. But as you have seen here on Bubblicious, there’s also a ‘tech’ scene in ‘them thar hills’. And we’re not the only ones noticing (as seen from Nicole Jordan’s posts). People are having fun while networking their way at events such as the ORIENTED party at Shakas. But in addition as reported last week by Michael Arrington, Disney is developing an internal Internet Acquisition group in its Corporate Strategy Division that’s looking to make twenty early stage startup acquisitions within the next two years. That comes out to roughly one acquisition per month. They don’t have to look too far from their Southern California offices. So, I have had the opportunity to speak with a couple of early stage startup founders recently based out of the greater LA area and I am impressed with their unique niche services. Although these companies do not necessarily fit the initial space that Disney is searching, it shows that the LA startup tech scene has some future prospects that Southern California is becoming a hub of budding startups.
Starting with Mr. Kareem Hamdy, co-founder of Wizeefa (the Arabic word for Job: ), offers a service that connects foreign based job listings in places such as Dubai, Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait for free to mainly U.S. job seekers. I asked him how he came up with the idea. Mr. Hamdy, originally from the East Coast told me “I had been commuting between the U.S. and Egypt taking care of personal matters when I realized the beauty of the Middle East. Yet, I had financial obligations in the states. So I pondered, wouldn’t it be cool to help people live in another country but make an earning like that in America?” He researched for a while and came up with a service that focuses on job listings for Middle East based companies. Multi-national companies look for individuals that are willing to work overseas and pay handsomely well. Some ‘Ex-pat’ packages as they are known come with free homes with maid service and a personal car with a chauffeur at beckon call. With a staff based in Egypt and Los Angeles, he has just launched the site this week. The feel of site reminds me slightly like Indeed but its Middle East niche is clearly the unique value proposition and differentiator.
My final conversation later in the day was with company CEO Elmer Thomas of ThemBid. He and his company, based out of Orange County, demonstrated their services earlier this year at Techrunch 40. Thembid is the online marketplace where people go to receive regular services requests (from household services like plumbing to business services like web design and everything in between) and are expanding to other industries with a new product offering called ‘ThemBid White Label”. In the true spirit of Web 2.0, people make their bids and they can get clarifications on job requests online. The great thing about Thembid is that it has a rating system that its community to its own members so it keeps people honest and it gives credibility to each individual as well. As Mr. Thomas explained, “The White Label helps publishers increase advertising revenue by providing a tremendous value-add for local service providers. When a publisher can drive qualified customers to a business online in addition to regular print ads, it makes for a more compelling offer.”
Tags: Los+angeles michael+arrington techcrunch Kareem+Hamdy Elmer+Thomas Thembid Wizeefa ORIENTED disney karamalis