I recently had the opportunity to watch one of the TutorLinker founders (a student from UCLA) pitch to a group of angels in southern california.  The pitch was rather rough in a couple ways: it didn't address what their market was, how they were going to bring any return on the investors capital, or really what their product was.  They assumed many of the angels were well versed in web 2.0 and how that applied to finding a tutor.  Needless to say the angels weren't and thus Tutorlinker didn't make it past the first round of pitching.

Within the crowded space of local search, Fastcall411, a Los Angeles based company, is trying to differentiate itself by focusing on connecting customers to businesses via phone as fast as possible.   The concept is that if you are searching a category such as plumbers, FastCall411 will simultaneously call multiple plumbers in your area, and connect you with the one that answers the phone quickly.

While technically a Korean company they are partnered with K2 Network located in Irvine, CA (Orange County) and they are hiring and basing their U.S. activity out of Orange County as well.

While Storyblender isn't live yet, they are already building some early buzz leading up to their December release by their inclusion in the TechCrunch Top 40. What they've demonstrated so far is a service that allows users to collaborate in editing and "blending" their text, audio, video, and image clips online. Once the blending is complete people will be able to share their "blended stories" with their friends in the Story Blender online community.

The Good
It just sounds fun being able to turn a fat kid with a baton...

Into a fat kid with a light saber; so with the help of a few friends I foresee endless hours of entertainment.

There is also a fertile market for Story Blender in music mixing as well as video editing for more practical purposes like school projects, action sports, and work presentations. The social network could really prove useful; not only because it will allow users to share their artistic talents but it has the ability to facilitate a teaching and learning process that might be keeping many people away from editing their own videos.

Finally they have $1.5MM in funding and are headed by Yong Joon Hyoung who is the founder of Cyworld a popular social network in South Korea.

The Bad
Most video editors that I know (even the ones who only dabble) are very particular to their programs, whether it be Final Cut Pro, Abode Premier, or iMovie. Most video editors aren't going to start utilizing a new way of editing when its unlikely that Story Blender will be able to match many of the features of "real" desktop video software.

Teleflip is a Los Angeles based company that specializes in email to SMS text messaging. Anyone can send an email to phonenumber@teleflip.com (eg 987654321@teleflip.com) and it will automatically convert the email to SMS format and send it.

The web 2.0 company that proclaims itself as MySpace meets the yellow pages. Mojo Pages is based out of North County San Diego and have had more hype than Crystal Clear Pepsi. So lets get down to it and take a look at MojoPages.
The Good:
Lets face it user generated reviews are in and for good reason, user generated reviews offer the most reliable information to users (yeah I know it is redundant but it also makes sense)...Moreover MojoPages are adding some benefits that companies might consider as a serious benefit, for example adding a wide range of categories to review on (Value, Service, and Quality), and video reviews.

Its also hard to forget that they have millions in funding and some pretty big name people involved in the company - such as an early level employee from Zillow.

The Cons:
They are the late comer here, Insiderpages and Yelp already have a big command on the user review industry. Given that, it seems highly unlikely that many locally owned stores will want to pay for premium placement on MojoPages, with relatively low unique traffic.  Of course the biggest gripe is that it is hard for me to see what the added value of this site is, compared to any other user based review site. The most unique feature is the ability to upload video reviews, but how many people are really going to do that (not many), and even if they did how useful would the video be?

There is a huge barrier that MojoPages needs to surpass and the first is to convince their potential users that their added value features make it a better or more useful place for their reviews.  As of now I am not convinced!

A startup company out of Pasadena, CA has an interesting proposition; have users enter their measurements and their preferences in how they want their clothes to fit, and Myshape.com will in give them their own "Personal Shop," featuring only clothes which fit their preferences.

The Positives:
Their concept is simple and gives them direct access into a very lucrative market, from their site they mention that the women's apparel market is around $30 billion per year. Also I am not a female but I do know that women never hesitate to complain how nothing fits them and how they hate trying clothes on so MyShape.com seems to be angled at an open market gap. Their website is also simple to use, user friendly, simple return process and they really seem to keep customers needs first which is always a key to success in retail. Finally they have recently received millions in Series B funding so if they are smart with it they can leverage this money and place themselves at the forefront of personalized online clothes shopping for women.

The Negatives:
Getting well tailored clothes just by collecting a few measurements seems feasible from my poorly dressed perspective, but I question if it will actually work. Women judge clothes on more levels than just a few simple measurements, and to get clothes to properly fit many women I have a feeling many more detailed measurements are involved than just the few simple measurements that MyShape requires for creating your own personal clothing shop.

Overall great concept and they are executing it well.

TechCoastReview is a new weblog dedicated to tracking newly launched tech startups located in Southern California. In addition to new companies, we will profile existing southern California based companies that are sufficiently innovating in the areas of Internet and Technology.

Tech Coast Review is a response to the "Bubble 2.0" phenomena. A notion that the Internet and Technology Industry is in a rebirth of sorts; a gradual return to the highs and lows of the Internet bubble of the late 90's. New companies are forming everywhere, and many are touting the "power of web 2.0". While the definition of Web 2.0 continues to be fuzzy (Wikipedia entry on web 2.0), the excitement of leveraging, wikis, blogs, social networks, mashups, etc, through application frameworks like AJAX and Ruby on Rails, and open APIs such as Google, Yahoo, Flickr, et all. is palatable.

New companies are emerging at a rapid pace, and the venture capital and angel community have once again began bullishly investing in the online tech market. None of this, is "new" news to anyone who has been following the industry for the last 2 years or so. It is all well covered in the "valley".

But apart from Silicon Valley, areas such as Seattle, New York, and Southern California are hotbeds for innovation and investment. Despite the relatively small geographic distance between Socal and the Valley, cultural differences abound. In many ways the net result is that technology companies in Southern California tend to get underrepresented. Yet companies that have the potential to make a profound impact are emerging from areas like Santa Barbara, Ventura, Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Diego. This collective region, known as the "Tech Coast", has some of the greatest concentration of R&D efforts in the world, and its high time that someone was profiling it. So welcome to Tech Coast Review.

If you’d like to contact us with suggestions, comments, corrections, errors or announcements, feel free to email us at editor@techcoastreview.com.