Startup Roundup: American Society of Inventors event tonight, StarCite gets patent, VentureHacks teaches email

Introducing Technically Philly’s Startup Roundup. Here, we’ll parse out the small pieces that make our greater Startup ecosystem thrive. We want to keep you in touch with the innovations that we can’t quite get to covering, but that deserve highlight. Follow along with the Startup Roundup’s dedicated RSS feed. If you’ve got news to share, get in touch.

DEFINITE READS

We’re not sure how we missed this one, but nearly a dozen local well-known groups have come together to host an event with the American Society of Inventors, tonight at the University City Science Center, to talk about how to launch a successful entrepreneurial venture. We’d list all the organizations here, but gosh that’s a lot of text. Trust us, you know about ‘em. And it’s free, people.

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Shop Talk: StarCite’s web-based event planning software is all about SaaS

The Chief Financial Officer of purchasing at any large company can easily pull up a budget and see how much money is being spent on telephones, computers and office furniture.

But meetings and conferences are a hidden expense category: their budgets are often hidden away within departments and divisions with no way to see spending at an executive level.

That’s foolish. At least, it seems so after a chat with Center City-based StarCite Inc. Vice President Kevin Young.

“Instead of spending $10 million at different hotels, corporate event planners could go to Marriot directly and say ‘Let’s talk about better rates. What can you do for us?,’” he says.

If planners had a way to see spending, that is.

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