George Favvas Plans to Leave Montreal for Silicon Valley, Joins Dave McClure’s 500 Startups Accelerator
Today, Dave McClure’s accelerator 500 Startups announced the companies participating in the first cohort, and there’s a bit of Canadian content. Specifically, George Favvas is planning to head to the Valley to start a new company. He has a cofounder as well, who is also moving to the Valley, but his name is not yet public. The new startup, Rewardli, is in the social commerce space, but they’re not releasing any details beyond that.
And we’ve also learned that Real Ventures is matching the 500 Startups investment in Rewardli. This is their third investment, and shows their interest in doing deals with partners outside Montreal. For Real this is very early stage, unlike their other two investments, DokDok and Fabric.
George is the founder of SmartHippo, which remains active, but is clearly not his immediate focus. He says he’s now 100% committed to getting Rewardli going as fast as possible. We expect news about SmartHippo in the near future.
George originally met Dave McClure at Startup Camp Montreal 6 where Dave was the keynote. They maintained a relationship and stayed in touch. After visiting the Valley a few times and putting together a pitch for Rewardli, George got into the 500 Startups accelerator program.
The 500 Startups accelerator program provides a small amount of capital and lasts for 3-6 months. Unlike Y Combinator, there’s no open application process, you need to get in through a referral from one of Dave’s mentors or portfolio companies (or connect with Dave directly). Speaking about mentors, 500 Startups has some great ones. The full list is here, and includes Rashmi Sinha (Slideshare), Sean Ellis, Stew Langille (Mint.com), Eric Ries. Another different from Y Combinator is that the startups all share a physical space. There’s a UX lab within the incubator, and everyone has to go into it once per week. George also noted that there are events, talks and workshops that often focus on core themes such as design, data and distribution.
George said that by the end of the program he expects to have iterated enough to have a Minimum Viable Product that addresses a real pain point, and then raise a seed round of financing.
Last week, Fred Lalonde from Hopper Travel suggested that the one thing he’d do differently in hindsight with his startup is move to the Valley and do it there. And now George is doing exactly that. There’s no question we’ll miss George in the local scene, but it shows you that it is possible to take a leap of faith, stay persistent, connect with top players in the Valley startup scene and make things happen. We wish George the best of luck, and look forward to hearing how their experience goes building Rewardli in California.
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