Just a few of the mentors involved in the MuckerLab program, from the company's website
(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Web hosting provider DreamHost announced on Thursday that it has partnered with MuckerLab, a start-up accelerator based in Los Angeles, and will serve as the group’s official web hosting and application hosting provider for 2012.
DreamHost says it will provide start-ups accepted into MuckerLab’s program during 2012 with a year of free hosting services, including fully managed servers and a selection of other services, in addition to the tools provided by MuckerLabs.
The MuckerLabs program, says DreamHost, was created to help foster the technology ecosystem within Southern California. The mentorship-focused organization provides selected start-ups with a three-month package that includes mentorship, office space and $21,000 financing to help get their businesses off the ground.
According to the FAQ page on the MuckerLab website, the organization receives an average 6 percent stake in the companies it accepts (with no special rights), in exchange for the funding and services.
MuckerLab launched in October of this year. A badge on the site’s main page says “applications due December 15, 2011.”
The program concludes with an investor “Demo Day,” in which participants present their business plans and product concepts to investors.
“When we began DreamHost we knew that Los Angeles had the talent we were looking for and plenty of infrastructure to make it all happen,” says DreamHost co-founder Michael Rodriguez, quoted in the press release. “MuckerLab’s focus on start-ups, and on Los Angeles in particular, is really a validation of what we’ve been doing since 1997. If they had been around back when DreamHost was just a twinkle in our eyes, who knows what we could have done back then.”
Hosting providers are able to contribute an essential service to nascent small businesses – particularly if those businesses are built around software or other hosted solutions. As a result, they make valuable partners for programs designed around incubating start-up businesses.
Microsoft’s BizSpark program is an example of another such program, designed specifically around software firms developing on the Microsoft platform, and offering a prominent, mentoring position for hosting partners.
Probably a more directly applicable example would be YCombinator, or the Denver-based TechStars, on which MuckerLab is based. It is a member of the TechStars Network.
The benefits to a hosting provider for participating in such a project are fairly obvious – thought leadership and general goodwill, as well as the prospect of long-term profitable customers, if all goes well for the start-ups being given a leg up.
DreamHost says it is particularly well-suited to supporting web entrepreneurs, as its hosting environment is regularly praised by developers for making use of open-source tools, command-line freedom and the flexibility to support a start-up regardless of how big it grows.
About Liam Eagle
Liam Eagle has worked as a contributor to the Web Host Industry Review since its inception in 2000, and as editor since 2003. He has been editor of the WHIR's print magazine since its launch. His daily involvement in the gathering and reporting of Web hosting news and his regular interaction with Web hosting leaders gives him an uncommonly broad appreciation of the issues and tends facing the business. Through his WHIR blog, Liam spots Web hosting trends and offers opinions on the industry-wide impacts of major developments and the motivation behind big announcements. Follow him on Twitter @liameagle
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