AngelList Launches 2011 Yearbook: 500 Startups, 2,500 Investors & 12,500 Introductions

AngelList was founded back in 2010 as a community for startups — part social network, part communication tool — designed to connect first-time entrepreneurs with respected angel investors. At the time, veteran venture capitalist and angel investor Mark Suster said that it was one of the most important contributions by the Web to angel investing “to come along in awhile.” He elaborated in a TechCrunch post in February. Many agreed, and some disagreed.
Regardless, AngelList got hot in 2011, and Naval Ravikant and Babak Nivi’s startup community was oft-talked about as a service with potential to transform dealflow and give young entrepreneurs access to hard-to-reach investors — with value proposition being evident on both ends, for founder and investor. In the latter half of the year, they partnered with Seedcamp, which combines an early-stage seed investment fund with a world-class mentoring program for European entrepreneurs, and opened up their data set to access by developers with the launch of its API.
The introductions were many last year, and to get the year started off right, AngelList is giving users a chance to review all the craziness that 2011 had to offer, as it this weekend soft-launched its “2011 Yearbook”. The Yearbook offers the public an opportunity to get a more detailed look at AngelList’s activity over the course of last year, with CrunchBase data to boot.
The top line numbers show that it was indeed an active year for the community, as 500 startup joined with more than 10 introductions facilitated by each, 2,500 investors joined the community, resulting in a total of 12,500 introductions during 2011.
AngelList’s Yearbook allows users to drill down into the data by category (Education, Health Care, Hardware, Mobile, etc.) and by location (Silicon Valley, New York, LA, etc.), which gives one a great opportunity to parse the community’s data set in manageable chunks. The Yearbook also features an addictive “Shuffle,” which will take you to the landing page for a randomly-chosen startup. You can then view their profile from there.
From the Yearbook’s main page, if one selects a startup, you’ll be able to view the name of the company, their tagline and category, the team, and most recent news. On the right side of the page, there’s a timeline with relevant info presented chronologically, complete with funding information pulled from TechCrunch’s very own CrunchBase.
It’s a fantastic resource, which gives AngelList fanatics a great way to see year-in-review information, along with relevant funding information — who’s funding, how much they’ve invested, and when. Look out, it’s a great resource, but also a dangerous time sink.
For more, check out the Yearbook in action here.

Source:http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/29/angellist-launches-2011-yearbook-500-startups-2500-investors-12500-introductions/