Which Startup Was Born on Twitter?

In just a few tweets, this company was born. Yoseph West was 17 when he started investing. At that time, he says that he realized that the “black box of the stock market wasn't so much of a black box.” “There was a better way than guessing and ‘trading' market fluctuations,” West, the co-founder and CEO of Vuru, told Benzinga. “I realized there was a lot of information and analysis that could be leveraged. So, that's where I started. I completed my own analysis for a number of years. The downside to this was that each potential investment would take at least two to three hours to research and that wasn't even for a stock I was going to buy. Eventually I had enough and figured that a lot of the complex financial analysis I was doing could be automated.” West said that as he and his team were building Vuru, “we quickly realized that the people that could benefit most from this automation wasn't advanced investors, as we'd originally thought.” “It was beginner and intermediates who didn't have the skills to complete complex financial analysis and needed help putting context around the financial statements,” he said. But before his ideas could be put to use, West needed to find an investor. He did so in a very unusual way: by turning to Twitter. “We originally got involved in Startup Weekend in Toronto,” said West. “From there, we were able to build a strong relationship with the investment director of one of the biggest VC funds in Canada. He mentored us for almost a year before we got our first round of funding. It was the ability to parlay that relationship that helped us get the first money in.” “The funny story is how we actually got that,” West continued. “I follow Mark Macleod (@startupcfo) on Twitter and back then, I noticed he tweeted that he'd signed up for an investment site that was a potential competitor to us. I had a look at the site and noticed a couple flaws and instantly brought those up to him. We tweeted back and forth a couple times and then I suggested a 15-minute conversation for advice.” During the call, West made his pitch. “It was an okay reception,” he said, “but the big opportunity to push things forward was a talk he was giving in Toronto a few days later. I then ‘happened' to be there and chatted with him prior to his talk.” Eventually, he ended up getting in touch with Vuru's aforementioned mentor and started to provide the team with feedback. “We had a couple conversations and he suggested we take a look at their accelerator program, called FounderFuel,” said West. “Luckily enough, we were accepted, received funding, and spent a great few months in Montreal – all from what started as a Twitter conversation.” Follow me @LouisBedigian