18 Start-up Incubators Located in Silicon Beach & Southern California

Here is a list of silicon beach incubators located in the Santa Monica or Southern California areas. If it’s helpful to you, please feel free to share or pass it along. Cheers.

Amplify

URL: Amplify.la

Address: 1600 Main Street, Venice CA 90291

Investment Stake: $50,000 and $150,000 in seed funding, for a 5% to 15% stake in the company.

Founders: Paul Bricault

Details: Amplify is backed by investors that include Mark Burnett, producer of Apprentice and Survivor, as well as Paige Craig, Tim Draper, and some heavy-hitting VC firms, such as Accel Partners, BC Capital, Greycroft Partners, Rustic Canyon, and Tomorrow Ventures. GetBonkers, Look IO, TidePool, Invested.in, StackSocial, and The Kive Company are some of the notable companies that have come out of Amplify. Applicants will have access to high-profile CEOs, such as Josh Berman, co-founder and CEO of BeachMint.

Application Page: https://angel.co/amplifyla-amplify-la-accelerator-program/apply

 

Launchpad LA

URL: http://launchpad.la

Address: 1520 2nd St, Santa Monica, CA 90401, United States

Phone: (310) 562-3492

Investment Stake: On the first investment (usually $50k), we receive around 6% common stock of your company. The second investment (usually $50k), which is your option to take or decline, is offered as a convertible note with a maximum valuation cap. If you’ve raised significant capital already, we may adjust our offer as appropriate.

Founders: Sam Teller

Details: During the four month long program, entrepreneurs receive free office space,” a massive network of mentors, investors, & advisors,” and “tons of free perks.” Some of those mentors include Ara Katz, Head of Creative at Beachmint; Bill Gross, founder and CEO of IdeaLab; Geraldine Martin-Coppola, COO of Shoedazzle; Gil Elbaz, founder and CEO of Factual; Tony Adam, founder and CEO of Eventup. Launchpad has invested in 18 companies, 17 of which raised outside capital, over $30 million combined. Some of its alumni include JobSync, Atlas, Divshot, Tuition.io, Tradesy and Lettuce.

Application Page: http://launchpad.la/apply

 

MuckerLab

URL: Muckercapital.com

Address: 910 Colorado Avenue, Santa Monica, California 90401

Contact: William and Erik

Investment Stake: Each company receives up to $21,000 and, in exchange, MuckerLab receives, on average, a 6% to 8% stake in each company in the program.

Founders: Erik Rannala and William Hsu

Details: MuckerLab also gives its applicants access to mentors, which include: Aileen Lee, partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers; Ali Rosenthal, former Head of Business Development at Facebook; Amit Kapur, CEO and Co-Founder of Gravity; Brian Lee, Founder of ShoeDazzle and co-founder of LegalZoom; Greg Isaacs, Vice President of NFL.com; and Satya Patel, VP of Product Management at Twitter.

Application Page: https://angel.co/mucker-lab-2014/apply

 

Start Engine

URL: Startengine.com

Address: 604 Arizona Ave, Santa Monica CA 90401

Email: contact@startengine.com

Investment Stake: The accelerator invests $20,000, with a 6% to 8% equity stake, in each of the companies that it accepts.

Founder: Howard Marks

Details: Some of the mentors that applicants have access to include Brian Wong, CEO and co-founder of Kiip; Chris DeWolfe, former CEO of MySpace; Frank Monestere, President and COO of LegalZoom; Sizhao “Zao” Yang, COO of BetterWorks; Stacy Haitsuka, co-founder of NetZero; and Walter Driver, CEO of Scopely. GonnaBe, Tintup.com, PageWoo, Enplug and GoEmber.com are among Start Engine’s notable graduates. Current teams in Start Engine include TruBrain.com, DreamSha.re/Gum.bo, and Goodfit.co.

Application Page: Startengine.com Click “Get Funded” Link

 

USC Viterbi StartUp Garage

URL: http://vsi2.usc.edu/startupgarage

Phone: 213-821-2993

Investment Stake: The University does not take equity in any of the accelerator companies.

Founders: Paul Bricault & Ashish Soni

Details: Ten companies, who will work out of the Viterbi Startup Garage facility, will be chosen. They will be housed in USC’s Information Sciences Institute in Marina Del Rey for twelve weeks beginning May 28, 2013. 10 startups will be selected for the first class. Applications are open to any USC undergraduate or graduate students or USC alumni who has graduated in the past 5 years, though at least one member of the founding team must be an enrolled student in the USC Viterbi School of Engineering or a USC Viterbi alumni. Right now only digital media, internet, software and hardware companies are being accepted.

Application Page: http://www.f6s.com/startupgarage

 

Curious Minds

URL: Curiousminds.com

Address: 8560 West Sunset Blvd Penthouse 10th Floor, West Holllywood, CA 90069

Phone: 310-276-5900

Investment Stake: $30,000 to $200,000

Founders: David Gonen & Jonathan Gonen

Details: Curious Minds is a hybrid incubator-accelerator-angel investor firm designed for startup founders with entrepreneurship in their DNA. We nurture great ideas into Minimum Viable Products and then into independent revenue-generating companies. Their approach to business development is based on Eric Ries’ Lean Startup method. According to Ries, startups can reduce risks and expenses by iteratively building products that meet the needs of their early customers. Curious Minds helps entrepreneurs to apply these ideas to their own startups, ensuring traction, growth, revenue, and additional funding.

Application Page: https://angel.co/curious-minds-lean-lab/apply

 

Start Up UCLA

URL: http://startupucla.com

Email: startupucla@gmail.com

Investment Stake: Each team must have more than 50% of founders’ equity owned by UCLA students and/or recent alumnus (graduated within 2 years). UCLA will NOT take any ownership stake in the participating companies. Team members will be paid a fellowship.

Details: Startup UCLA is fostering entrepreneurship at UCLA and the greater technology community. Our programming includes speakers, recommendations for courses and an accelerator program during the summer. The Startup UCLA accelerator program is a ten-week bootcamp for software-focused startups. The goals of the accelerator are for the companies to launch their product, iterate, and then present during a demo day. These student-led companies are provided with on-campus office space, a financial stipend, legal services, hosting services, and world-class mentorship from entrepreneurs, investors and those with deep skill sets. Requirements for the summer accelerator are that you must have a software component in your startup, half of the founders’ equity must be current UCLA students or alums who have graduated within the last two years, and there must be at least one technical member on the team. Startup UCLA does not take equity in the companies. Applicants will have access to Aaron Hirschorn, the founder and CEO of DogVacay, Alex Quilici, the CEO of YouMail; Brian Lee, CEO and Co-Founder at The Honest Company; Hans Yang, General Manager at Zynga; and Mike Jones, the CEO of Science, and the former CEO of MySpace

Application Page: http://startupucla.com/application

 

OctaneOC

URL: http://www.octaneoc.org/

Address: 65 Enterprise Aliso Viejo, CA 92656

Phone: 949.330.6569

Email: info@octaneoc.org

Details: Octane offers two programs: Launchpad, which is its “hand’s-on, pro bono accelerator for start-up companies in the technology, life science, and clean tech industries. LaunchPad helps entrepreneurs turn ideas into successful businesses.” Capital connections, which connects early to mid-stage companies with venture capital, grants and other investment contacts. Octane is sponsored by companies including YouMail, FUGU, GluMetrics, HomeUnion, Ipplex and My Open Road. Octane has helped 110 companies receive more than $346 million in investment and equity exits. With LaunchPad’s help, over 82 companies have raised in excess of $172,000,000 in Seed, Series A, and Series B investments.

 

K5Launch

URL: http://k5launch.com/

Address: 4590 McArthur Blvd Newport Beach CA 922604

Investment Stake: Selected teams receive equity funding of up to $25k along with approximately $50k worth of legal, web, and PR services. K5Launch typically takes on average 6-8% position in a company. During the three and a half month accelerator program, the teams receive hands-on advice from real entrepreneurs and real-life successful CEOs and CMOs of startups. Specific training in Business model design, Customer Development, Go-to-market strategy and sales. K5 typically focuses on technology-oriented companies, especially those focusing on the mobile, social, local, and Internet marketplaces. Mentors include Farsheed Atef, a co-founder & CTO at Drumbi; Shervin Talieh, the founder and CEO of Drumbi; and Patrick Vlaskovits, author of The Lean Entrepreneur.

Some of startups to come out of K5 include Social Rewards,Verbling, Connectifier, Nanoogo and LightFish. K5 is run by successful entrepreneurs and investors, and provides an intensive three-month mentorship-driven investment program for Southern California based startups. We carefully select companies via our online application process, and use entrepreneurial mentorship along with pre-seed funding to help them build their product and prepare for their next milestone, most likely the next round of funding. Program graduates will have the opportunity to pitch to a network of investors and venture capital firms on our K5 demo days.

Application Page: http://k5launch.com/apply/

 

Idealab

URL: http://www.idealab.com/

Address: 130 W. Union Street Pasadena CA 91103

Phone: 626-585-6900

Founder: Bill Gross

Details: Founded in 1996, the incubator seeks “to infuse start-ups with the support they need to rapidly introduce innovative products and services,” by offering them such perks as office space and the accompanying office services, development and technology, product and graphic design, marketing, financial advice, human resources, competitive research, legal, accounting and business development support and services, advice on strategy, branding and corporate structure. Some of Idealab’s notable alumni include Tickets.com, Picasa, Internet Brands, Answers.com, Jobs.com, and PETsMART.com.

 

Science

URL: Science-inc.com

Address: 1447 2nd Street Suite 200 Santa Monica CA 90401

Details: The company has received funding from Rustic Canyon, White Star Capital, The Social+Capital Partnership, Tomorrow Ventures, Siemer Ventures, Philippe Camus, Jean-Marie Messier, Jonathan Miller and Dennis Phelps, who put $10 million into it collectively. Science is kind of a mix of incubator and accelerator, as it both creates and develops its own business ideas in-house, as well as acquires other Internet startups with the aim of scaling them. But it has no set timeline regarding exits or releases. Some of its alumni include EverySignal, HelloSociety and Marigold Media.

Application Page: Email info@science-inc.com

 

LACleanIncubator

URL: http://laincubator.org/

Address: 411S Hewitt St Los Angeles CA

Phone: 212-375-8980

Investment Stake: While LACI doesn’t invest money is companies but does “significant time and expertise. And we go to bat for them, putting our network to work. That’s why we think of the teams we incubate as ‘Portfolio Companies.'”

Founder: Fred Walti

Details: Program benefits: It accepts companies that are early-stage, meaning “somewhere between the garage and serious investment,” though it does also accept smaller companies that are changing focus, “turn-arounds,” companies that are launching new projects, and international companies looking to enter the US market. Companies have access to mentors that include Josh Bigelow, CEO of Syncromatics; Doug McPherson, General Counsel and V.P. of Corporate Development at Idealab; Jonathan Fram, CEO of Nularis; and Steve Glenn, the founder and CEO of LivingHomes.

Application: http://laincubator.org/companies/apply-now/

 

Originate

URL: http://www.originate.com/

Address: 10990 Wilshire Blvd Suite 140 Los Angeles CA 90049

Investment Stake: For early-stage startups, Originate invests capital for a share of equity. The process takes two to four weeks.

Details: Originate alumni include Ploom, Snapspot, Yowza, Rootz and jQuery.

 

EvoNexus/CommNexus

URL: http://www.commnexus.org/

Address: 4225 Executive Square, Suite 485, San Diego, CA 92037

Phone: (858) 768-5056

Investment Stake: They provide services entirely free of charge. Our incubator companies are under no financial or IP-related obligation to EvoNexus when they graduate.

Details: Program benefits furnished office space, domain experts and mentors, opportunity to leverage a network of business and VC contacts. EvoNexus has 22 companies currently incubating, and 10 successful graduations to date. Its companies have raised $144 million in total venture funding raised and created over 600 jobs. Alumni include: FatSnunk, Dealstruck, Breadcrumbs and GoFastCab.

Application Page: http://www.commnexus.org/evonexus/apply/

 

BeGreatPartners

URL: http://www.begreat.co/

Address: 5900 Wilshire Blvd 21st Floor Los Angeles CA 90036

Phone: 855-247-8585

Investment Stake: Be Great Partners invests on average, $25,000 to $50,000

Founder: Lin Miao

Details: Program benefits include Medical, Paid time off, Meals, Parking, Retirement plan, Entertainment.
Mentors include Gautam Guptam, the co-founder and CEO of NatureBox; Michael Orza, the founder and CEO of Webair; Jeff Avallon, a co-Founder of IdeaPaint; Darcy Webb, the founder and CEO of PayVia.
Portfolio companies include Naturebox, Kively, Taste Of Blue, Skinny Bikini and Friendbuy.

Application Page: http://www.begreat.co/join

 

The Design Accelerator

URL: http://thedesignaccelerator.com/front-page/overview/about/

Address: Pasadena CA

Details: The Design Accelerator focuses on early stage design and technology businesses with opportunities to use great design as a critical disruption point. We use proven low-cost startup management techniques to spur growth. We believe that our design driven startups will create outstanding returns for our investors. The Design Accelerator and its seed-stage investment fund are for-profit entities created by Art Center College of Design in partnership with Caltech. We have seated our first set of startup companies in June, 2013.

Application Page: http://thedesignaccelerator.com/front-page/application/getstarted/

 

FastStart Studios

URL: http://www.faststartstudio.com

Address: 1550-D Rockfield Blvd, Irvine, CA 92618

Phone: 949-837-4151

Investment Stake: FastStart Studios wants to help bring work to America, apply to see if you can get into the second round of their funded program.

Founder: Michael Sawitz

Details: Through a selection process start-ups and early stage companies are invited to take part in the FastStart.studio Accelerator Program. These businesses are given office space, support services, mentors.

Application Page: http://www.faststartstudio.com/apply

 

Disney Accelerator

URL: http://disneyaccelerator.com/ 

Location: Los Angeles, CA

Details: Disney Accelerator, powered by Techstars, is helping today’s technology innovators turn their dreams for new media and entertainment experiences into reality. Through Disney Accelerator, select companies will gain access to the range of creative expertise and resources of The Walt Disney Company to help them develop their innovative new entertainment experiences and products. Disney Accelerator is a highly selective, immersive mentorship and investment program for technology-enabled startups in the media and entertainment space. Ten startup companies are being selected to gather in the Los Angeles area for three months to incubate their ideas and build new consumer media and entertainment products. Companies receive access to stories, characters, resources and relationships from across The Walt Disney Company, such as The Walt Disney Studios, Disney Animation, Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, ESPN, ABC, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts, Disney Consumer Products, and Disney Interactive. Also receive support from and access to Techstars’ vast global network of mentors and alumni — an amazing collection of entrepreneurs, investors, and innovators interested in helping participating companies succeed

February 12 – Applications Open
April 12 – Application Closed
June 30 – Program Begins
October 14 – Demo Day

Investment Stake: Each participating company will receive $120,000 in investment capital.

 

*Special thanks to KMoreno for helping compile this information.