Starwood Hotels to offer mobile event apps
Adv:
Jun 09, 2015
Adv:
STAMFORD, CT– Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc today announced its referral partnership with Cvent, a leading cloud-based enterprise event management platform and PSAV, a technology service provider, to offer CrowdCompass by Cvent mobile apps to planners who are booking meetings and events at its properties worldwide. “We are always looking for new ways to enhance the meetings and event experience at our properties,” said Jonathan Kaplan, Starwood’s Director of Sales, New Business and Digital Programming. “With the option of having a customizable app with CrowdCompass by Cvent, attendees can go paperless and view real-time content like event agendas, speaker bios, presentations and property information right from their mobile device.”
Kaplan continued: “Meeting attendees also may be able to use the app to create personalized schedules, share contact information with other attendees, connect with others via social media and receive push message communications instantly from onsite meeting planners.”
Since 2013, Cvent and PSAV have partnered to bring CrowdCompass mobile apps to corporate meeting and event planners and hoteliers. “Starwood often leverages technology to enhance their guests’ experience, from using innovative tools such as a smartphone app for checking in and Apple Watch for keyless room entry” said Matthew Donegan-Ryan, director of mobile strategy at CrowdCompass by Cvent. “Providing CrowdCompass mobile apps is one more way for Starwood to transform the experience and engagement level of meeting attendees at Starwood hotels and resorts across the globe.”
“Mobile apps for events have become an essential tool for bringing content and attendee engagement directly to an individual's personal device. PSAV is thrilled to be combining our strategic partnerships with both Starwood and CrowdCompass by Cvent to continue offering a best-in-class mobile app to our customers,” said Stewart Young, Vice President, Strategic Accounts at PSAV Presentation Services. Today’s launch comes on the heels of Starwood’s ProMeetings app, which allows meetings planners who are SPG or SPG Pro members to submit on-property requests – from an extension cord, coffee service, a change in lighting and everything in between – directly to associates who can fulfill requests in real time. The app, which is expected to fully roll out in 2016, is currently in pilot at several Starwood hotels around the world, including W Singapore - Sentosa Cove, The Westin Singapore, Sheraton Atlanta Airport, W Atlanta Midtown, and The Westin Charlotte.

Starwood Hotels to offer mobile event apps

has partnered with cloud-based event management platform
Cvent
and technology provider PSAV to offer CrowdCompass by
Cvent
mobile apps for planners who book meetings and events at Starwood properties worldwide. Starwood director of sales, new business and digital programming
Jonathan Kaplan
said: "We are always looking for new ways to enhance the meetings and event experience at our properties. With the option of having a customisable app with CrowdCompass by
Cvent
, attendees can go paperless and view real-time content like event agendas, speaker bios, presentations and property information right from their mobile device. "
"Meeting attendees also may be able to use the app to create personalised schedules, share contact information with other attendees, connect with others via social media and receive push message communications instantly from onsite meeting planners," he added. CrowdCompass by
director of mobile strategy
Matthew Donegan-Ryan
said: "Providing CrowdCompass mobile apps is one more way for Starwood to transform the experience and engagement level of meeting attendees at Starwood hotels and resorts across the globe. "
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PSAV Presentation Services vice president strategic accounts
Stewart Young
added: "Mobile apps for events have become an essential tool for bringing content and attendee engagement directly to an individual's personal device. PSAV is thrilled to be combining our strategic partnerships with both Starwood and CrowdCompass by
Cvent
to continue offering a best-in-class mobile app to our customers. "
The partnership follows the launch of Starwood's ProMeetings app, which allows planners, who are also SPG members, to submit on-property requests such as coffee service, lighting changes, and more. The app, which is currently being tested at several hotels around the world is expected to roll out in 2016. (c) 2015 ITP Business Publishing Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Provided by SyndiGate Media Inc. (Syndigate.info)., source
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Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide : to offer mobile event apps for planners

Get ready for the clouds
Adv:
Jun 01, 2015
Adv:
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc. today announced its referral partnership with Cvent, a leading cloud-based enterprise event management platform and PSAV, a technology service provider, to offer CrowdCompass by Cvent mobile apps to planners who are booking meetings and events at its properties worldwide. “We are always looking for new ways to enhance the meetings and event experience at our properties,” said Jonathan Kaplan, Starwood’s Director of Sales, New Business and Digital Programming. “With the option of having a customizable app with CrowdCompass by Cvent, attendees can go paperless and view real-time content like event agendas, speaker bios, presentations and property information right from their mobile device.”
Kaplan continued: “Meeting attendees also may be able to use the app to create personalized schedules, share contact information with other attendees, connect with others via social media and receive push message communications instantly from onsite meeting planners.”
Since 2013, Cvent and PSAV have partnered to bring CrowdCompass mobile apps to corporate meeting and event planners and hoteliers. “Starwood often leverages technology to enhance their guests’ experience, from using innovative tools such as a smartphone app for checking in and Apple Watch for keyless room entry,” said Matthew Donegan-Ryan, director of mobile strategy at CrowdCompass by Cvent. “Providing CrowdCompass mobile apps is one more way for Starwood to transform the experience and engagement level of meeting attendees at Starwood hotels and resorts across the globe.”
“Mobile apps for events have become an essential tool for bringing content and attendee engagement directly to an individual's personal device. PSAV is thrilled to be combining our strategic partnerships with both Starwood and CrowdCompass by Cvent to continue offering a best-in-class mobile app to our customers,” said Stewart Young, Vice President, Strategic Accounts at PSAV Presentation Services. Today’s launch comes on the heels of Starwood’s ProMeetings app, which allows meetings planners who are SPG or SPG Pro members to submit on-property requests – from an extension cord, coffee service, a change in lighting and everything in between – directly to associates who can fulfill requests in real time. The app, which is expected to fully roll out in 2016, is currently in pilot at several Starwood hotels around the world, including W Singapore - Sentosa Cove, The Westin Singapore, Sheraton Atlanta Airport, W Atlanta Midtown, and The Westin Charlotte.

Booking meetings with Starwood Hotels?  Get ready for the clouds

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The problem, Shanley said, is that this data is hidden in emails or Excel spreadsheets and is time consuming to pull together into reports and charts. Shanley started thinking about the idea that would become Notion around the time CrowdCompass was being acquired by Cvent. “I started thinking about how to build continuous improvement into teams,” he recalled. The idea percolated and he eventually discussed it with Kevin Steigerwald , a former user experience designer at CrowdCompass. The two decided to start Notion. The team now includes four people, including co-founders Shanley and Steigerwald. The product has been under development for the last year and a half as the founders started talking to customers to understand workflow pain points, he said. Tapping their own networks, they spoke with teams within Fortune 100 companies in addition to small and mid-sized firms. Notion aims to help teams communicate information more efficiently. Data is sourced from the teams and trends can be identified and matched against metrics. Teams can then better tell their story to the rest of the company, Shanley said. The company plans to sell into companies team by team and spread from the bottom up instead of going in at an executive level. Notion has an alpha product ready and is starting to sign early users who will work with the tool through the summer. The company has a pipeline of about 50 teams interested in participating. These teams are coming from mid-sized companies up to enterprise level, Shanley said. The company intends to have a beta version out by the fall, with general availability expected at the end of the year. While the company is self funded, Shanley is now talking to investors. Thanks to the success of CrowdCompass, those talks are easier than before. Some previous investors have already indicated they want in. New people and funds have already expressed interest, he said. So what’s different this time around as he builds startup No. 2? “You get to refine all the rough edges. There is a clear path to execution now,” he said. “When you do it the first time you sweat all the details. Now you know where to spend your time and how to get it done.”
This time around, there is also a conscious effort to establish processes earlier to lay the groundwork for a significant company. CrowdCompass is now up to about 200 people. With that experience Shanley and the team know what a company looks and feels like at different points of its life. This allows them to get policies and procedures in place to stay ahead and get to the next level because once a company starts to really scale it just gets harder to put those elements in place. “We are not just building a product, we are building a company with an eye to scale,” he said. Industries


CrowdCompass co-founder unveils next startup venture

More than 400 Portlanders joined us at the PDX TechCrawl After Party. There’s something cool brewing in Portland, Oregon. The Rose City startup community came out in force last night for the  PDX TechCrawl , as hundreds of Portland’s geeks had a chance to tour some of the city’s hottest startups like Puppet Labs and CrowdCompass. We had a fantastic time hosting the final leg of the crawl, where we had the opportunity to meet countless entrepreneurs and engineers from the Portland area. A big thanks to GeekWire annual sponsors  Filter  and  Frontier Communications  for helping us put on the fun event. We’re headed down to  TechFestNW  today, so check back on GeekWire for our reports from the tech conference. In the meantime, we caught up with a few folks last night who explained to us what the Portland startup scene is all about. “It’s highly collaborative and there are lots of people supporting one another, giving each other help. The peer-to-peer mentorship is really big here. Everyone is extremely helpful — that’s the big thing that stands out.” — Lindsay Nelson, CEO and co-founder at Theme Dragon. “When I came back to Portland 18 years ago, it was pretty dead. Now, it’s very vibrant and crazy on the startup side. Money is actually coming in to Portland. They always used to skip up and go from the Bay Area to Seattle. Now, they’re starting to take notice. It’s good to see. It’s making the whole West Coast a vibrant tech community.” — Scott Chandler, iOS developer at CrowdCompass. “The tech community is attracting young people from all over the country. Even though there’s a really entrenched core group of people, you’re always going to see new faces because companies are growing so rapidly that it’s really changing the face of our whole economy, quite frankly.” — Abby Collins, senior account executive at Open Sesame. “The tech scene in Portland can best be described by saying that it’s very entrepreneurial-driven. It’s very focused on viable commercial software that makes sense and solves a problem. I don’t think it’s just because of investor interest and angel money, but I think we have really fostered that culture here amongst Portland entrepreneurs.” — Angelo Seminary, Director of Sales at ITMotives. “It’s a tight-knit community. There’s a lot of support here and people just want to help. That’s unique to our area. There’s also something new here every day. Just when you think you have an idea of what’s going on, something new pops up.” — Farrah Campbell, TechFestNW volunteer. “It’s nice to have people talk about the Portland startup community and not mention Nike or Intel. There’s lots of cool ideas, lots of innovators. We’re sort of like a mini Silicon Valley right now — that’s the mentality, at least. That breeds a lot of great innovation. People are also starting to realize the quality of life that we have up here and the secret is getting out.” — Aaron Thompson, account manager at Jive Software. Reach staff reporter Taylor Soper at  taylor@geekwire.com  or on Twitter  @Taylor_Soper . Follow us on Twitter  @GeekWire . Like what you're reading? Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletter to catch every headline
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Portland’s entrepreneurs explain why the city’s startup scene is so vibrant

Jama Software

Cvent

Syclo

Brience

Hopin

Fastbar Technologies

Atlas Accelerator

ACTIVE Network

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CrowdCompass develops and delivers native mobile Apps for the global conference, event and tradeshow market. The company's Apps help drive revenue for users and exhibitors, and produce better-connected, more sustainable events while dramatically improving attendees, exhibitors and event managers overall experiences.In June 2012, CrowdCompass was acquired by Cvent. The valuation of CrowdCompass was $10 million.

CrowdCompass

Name	Work History	Title	Status
Tom Kingsley		Chief Executive Officer	Current
Brian Felder		Chief Product Officer	Current
Dave Shanley	Jama Software, Cvent, Syclo, and Brience	Founder, Chief Technology Officer	Former
Matthew Donegan Ryan	Hopin, Fastbar Technologies, Cvent, Atlas Accelerator, and ACTIVE Network	Senior Vice President	Former

Name	Tom Kingsley	Brian Felder	Dave Shanley	Matthew Donegan Ryan
Work History			Jama Software, Cvent, Syclo, and Brience	Hopin, Fastbar Technologies, Cvent, Atlas Accelerator, and ACTIVE Network
Title	Chief Executive Officer	Chief Product Officer	Founder, Chief Technology Officer	Senior Vice President
Status	Current	Current	Former	Former

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