Meet Innovator of the Week
Garrett Cypher
Co-Founder of Slipstream Music Player
Please provide your 30-second pitch about your company.
Stop swapping cables and pairing Bluetooth devices. Slipstream Music lets you plug one device in to the speakers and connect everyone else to it. Once connected you can select songs from anyone’s music library and vote on what you want to hear next. It works at home with the family, in the car on a road trip, and at house parties like you’ve seen in teen movies. It’s seamless, intuitive, and let’s everyone have their say. Not sure what to play next? You can stream music with friends using SoundCloud. Slipstream Music is the only group music player of its kind and brings the human experience back to music.
Who or what was your best resource for starting your company?
One of the best foundations for creating Slipstream Music was my degree in Business Administration from UNH, and my brother Scott Cypher’s degree in Computer Science. The SCORE office, NH Small Business Administration, NHHTC, and the Patent Pro Bono program are also excellent free resources available to start ups.
What was your biggest obstacle in starting your company and how did you overcome it?
The biggest obstacle in getting Slipstream Music off the ground has been funding it out of our own pockets. It’s entirely possible, but requires us to be very calculated on where we allocate funds.
What’s the best advice you have received?
The best advice I have received is to keep going anytime you encounter an obstacle. Road blocks are inevitable. The way you handle them and create innovative solutions to the obstacle is what makes you stand apart.
What about the NH lifestyle appeals to you?
New Hampshire has a killer music scene, plenty of space to wander, mountains, the ocean, and a crisp air that’s ripe with opportunity. It’s a place where you can take your idea, harden the steel, and sharpen the blade. No one will do it for you. You can harness your drive and make it happen.
What does the future look like for your company?
We recently won the people’s choice award at Tech Out 2015 with over 60% of the audience vote. In addition to evolving our relationships with industry professionals it’s been a huge boost to moral leaving my brother and me with huge grins on our faces. The future of our company will be evolving our idea, implementing it in a cross platform environment (iOS and Android), and making our push to market. To date, the app has only been found by word of mouth, and after 8 months we have received 5,000+ downloads.
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