Yesterday was the 6th annual Rice Alliance IT and Web 2.0 venture forum, at Rice University in Houston. The event showcases tech companies from all around Central Texas. The judges select five companies (from a huge crowd of applicants) for the morning sessions where they get 10 minutes on stage to pitch their company to a panel of venture capitalists. After the pitch, a few of the VC’s are selected to give feedback to the presenters.  Austin-based Moximity was selected as one of the five presenters.

The afternoon contained elevator pitches from 55 different companies. Each company was given just 90-seconds (complete with a timer) to pitch their company to a larger panel of judges in the crowd. The judges selected ten “most promising” companies which received trophies at the end of the day.

Austin-based companies receiving trophies included:

• Socialware – a startup company that provides tools for large companies to enable and manage the use of social media tools.
• Hourville – a marketplace for people who sell their time by the hour.
• LessNetworks – a provider of free wireless internet and wireless hotspots.
• SmoothStone – Still in stealth mode, they have chip technology that reduces power consumption in the data center.

Congratulations to you all!