In 2007, TeamPages Inc. won the $38,000 Enbridge second-prize package for its online social network for amateur sports teams.

Today, almost 30,000 teams, primarily in the U.S. and Canada, use TeamPages’ online tools to post their teams’ game and event schedules, track game scores and records, arrange carpools and volunteer schedules, and e-mail team members.

Since winning the competition, the company has moved from Victoria to Vancouver, grown from three to six employees and raised almost $1 million in financing. The company has also increased its services, offering league and club packages and online registration tools.

Company CEO Mike Tan says TeamPages should become profitable early this year. Revenues grew 10-fold in 2009 over 2008 and he expects to attract a further 50,000-100,000 teams this year.

Some of that growth will come from English-speaking countries around the world. Says Tan, “We’ve already had some potential international partners come knocking on our door to help bring TeamPages overseas.”

Much of TeamPages success, says Tan, “can be attributed to sticking to, and executing, our business plan, which was reconstructed, shaped, and improved with the help and advice of our NVBC mentors and the judges.”

Highlights over past two years:

• Employee growth: from 3 to 6
• Investment: $1 million
• Customers: 30,000
• Revenue growth 2008-2009: 10-fold
• Expected customer growth in 2010: 50,000-100,000

The second annual PICK 20 roundup of Canada’s leading Web 2.0 pioneers has been announced over at Backbone Magazine and eight of the twenty hail from British Columbia.

• NowPublic – Crowdsourced/participatory news gathering
• HootSuite – A Twitter toolbox that manages multiple Twitter profiles
• ThoughtFarmer – Intranet software which incorporates social networking features
• AfterCAD Online - Enables viewing and publishing complex data sets over the Web
• TeamPages – Website  creation and management service for amateur sports teams
• Clarity Accounting – Online accounting for small businesses and the self-employed
• Taglocity - Enterprise e-mail management and knowledge sharing
• Pixton – A site where people create, publish, share and remix comics

Of these BC-based Web 2.0 companies, you’ll recognize three from past New Ventures BC competitions. TeamPages was a runner-up in the 2007 competition and both Clarity Accounting and Taglocity were competitors in 2008.

Congrats to everyone on the list. It’s great to see BC so well represented as well as our New Ventures BC alumni.

On July 17th, the University of Victoria’s Bachelor of Commerce students specializing in Entrepreneurship will be heading to Vancouver to meet Vancouver entrepreneurs and everyone is invited. They’ll be hosting a Passion and Purpose Discovery Workshop at the Pan Pacific Hotel from 2:00pm to 5:00pm followed by a wine and cheese mixer from 5:00pm – 6:30pm.

The free workshop is meant to be “engagement tool” to help to foster networking among entrepreneurs and encourage discussion around the pursuit of entrepreneurial goals. It’s an opportunity to mingle with other entrepreneurs as well as about 60 enthusiastic students that are drawn to working with or as entrepreneurs. Most of the students will be completing their Bachelor of Commerce degree requirements this August.

If you can make it to the workshop, the wine and cheese reception, or both, please RSVP to Charlene Zietsma by email at czietsma@uvic.ca.

UVIC Grad Mike Tan of 2007 New Ventures BC competition runner-up Teampages is one of the organizers of the event.

Mike Tan of 2007 New Ventures BC finalist TeamPages is bringing a tradition from Vancouver Island over to the mainland and organizing a Vancouver Web Based Entrepreneurs Lunch for May 20th.

When TeamPages was back in Victoria there used be a lunch every month where all the web based companies would come together for lunch. It was an awesome way to share ideas, technology, seek advice, and build a stronger and more cohesive web based community in Victoria. I figured if we could have a monthly lunch in Victoria why not start one up in Vancouver.

The lunches are informal and there’s no monthly fee. We’ll pick restaurants that are reasonably priced (as we’re all start ups) and you can wear whatever you want (although some form of clothing is recommended). You can stay as long as you want to or can based on your busy schedules. This lunch is all about taking just a little bit of time out of our busy schedules to meet up and share. Please note this lunch is only for Web Based Entrepreneurs! Any non Web Based Entrepreneurs will have to sit at the kids table

12 of the 20 spots are spoken for, so if you’re web-based and interested head on over and sign-up now.

Bean Services, the 2007 third-place NVBC winner, has launched the commercial version of its online system for automating the accounts payables process.

CEO Jarrod Levitan says the service is already finding favour with construction companies, property management companies and shipping companies because they all have a lot of paper-based invoices to manage, often from multiple locations.

“Our system does a great job of reducing delays and allowing you to approve invoices online from anywhere,” he says.

The company completed a $400,000 round of angel funding in 2008 and has just started a second round for $750,000 to fund marketing and growth.

The company has added two full-time employees since the competition and also moved to bigger premises.
“We’re over the hump now and we’re on our way,” says Levitan. “Right now our focus is on growing our customer base through partnerships and forming sales channels.”

2007 NVBC Competition runner-up TeamPages was featured on Canada AM this morning.

Co-Founder Mike Tan continues to pile up his press mentions with an appearance on CTV’s morning show this morning. Tan and soccer coach Kent Green joined host Seamus O’Regan to talk about how TeamPages can simplify team organization thanks to its Facebook-like features.

Check out the video here – look for the link titled TeamPages allows players to keep in touch to skip past the rest of the broadcast.

Earlier this year, Tan and his startup team were featured on CBC’s Fortune Hunters. Kudos to their PR reps for the amazing coverage to date.

2007 New Ventures BC finalist TeamPages announced today that it has completed its second round of financing led by Burda Digital Ventures, W Media Ventures, and local angel investors, including Ralph Turfus, founder and past CEO of Class Software Solutions.

“Since our first round of financing, we have been listening closely to our community and heads down improving the product and making it easier to use. And it has really paid off. We are seeing upwards of 1200-1400 teams registering each month with this number steadily climbing as the busy spring sport season is approaching,” says Mike Tan, founder and CEO of TeamPages. “We are really excited about this round of financing. Not only will it help us continue to improve our platform and bring on more teams, but it has added a some really smart investors to our team as well.”

The new financing will be used to further develop its newly launched League and Club Management software and expand into larger youth sport associations, leagues, and clubs across North America.

TeamPages has been on a roll of late. Last month their profile ran on an episode of CBC’s Fortune Hunters and they also celebrated having their 10,000th team join the TeamPages community.

Congrats to Mike and his team on their success to date.

This to CBC Newsworld for this info. Mike Tan and Teampages (2nd place winners in 2007) will be featured on CBC Fortune Hunters this Saturday, Feb. 14th.

Synopsis from the CBC:

Fortune Hunters looks at emerging trends in the marketplace and features Canadian entrepreneurs cashing in on them, even in today’s economy. On February 14th, our episode “Facebook Factor” will examine the social networking trend in Canada.

Viewers meet Mike Tan and his team as they try to take Teampages to the next level. Web experts Leila Boujnane of Idee Inc. and Evan Carmichael of evancarmichael.com weigh in on their chances of success.

The episode ends with the story behind the huge success of Lavalife – how Bruce Croxon attracted people looking for love. A fitting story for Valentine’s Day!

The episode airs on CBC Newsworld on Saturday, February 14th at 3:30 pm and 8:30 pm PT; and on Sunday, February 15th at 10:30 am and 1:30 pm PT. It will also be available on our website on Thursday, February 12th at www.cbc.ca/fortunehunters

New Ventures BC 2007 third place finisher Bean Services announced today the launch of beanbills 2.0, a user-friendly web-based service designed to streamline the accounts payable process, and save organizations up to 70% of invoice related overhead. Beanbills optimizes, automates and streamlines invoice processing for small to medium sized businesses.

By combining new document scanning, recognition and reporting technologies, beanbills reduces accounting overhead – and improves controls. Beanbills accommodates existing processes, allowing companies to easily adopt its solution with minimal setup and disruption with no required modifications to existing accounting software.

Accordking to Bean Services Founder Jarrod Levitan: “Endless paper has long been the enemy of accounting and operating processes. Finally we have a secure solution to instantly access, control and process this information, saving time and money. In the battle for the paperless office, Beanbills is the ultimate weapon.”

Founded in 2005, Bean Services mission is to increase office productivity through user friendly and innovative e-payables software. Just one year ago, Bean Services place 3rd in the New Ventures BC competition and picked up a prize package worth $17,000. In May 2008, Bean Services announced that they closed a second round of angel investor funding. The investor group consisted of seasoned angel investors, some of who participated in earlier rounds.

Congrats to Jarrod and team at Bean Services!

2007 Finalist and 2008 competitor Razor Technology has gained the attention of not only clients, but of the market strategy firm and NVBC presenter Rocket Builders, making their 2008 “Emerging Rockets” list. Their FireTonic platform offers a unique distribution method for mobile content such as ringtones, wallpaper, games, video, songs, and applications. Distributing content to a phone over the internet or through a cellular provider can be expensive, slow, and cumbersome. FireTonic provides kiosks that transfer content to phones via Bluetooth for free or fee, bypassing high mobile data rates. Their target clients are stores, coffee shops, restaurants, theatres, conventions, and street promotions.

Razor’s direct distribution model has attracted big name clients such as Nintendo, Microsoft, and Dairy Queen, in addition to Vancouver game companies like Playful Entertainment, Nerd Corps, and Hothead Games. The platform saw use at this year’s Vancouver International Game Summit and Vancouver International Digital Festival. Razor claims that the amount of content they distributed during these two events would have cost over $40,000 in mobile data charges.

Watch Razor’s CEO Ray Walia give his pitch on Fundfindr: