ComparTeVe has won the Hot Company of the Year award during the Festival of Media LatAm in Miami this week, the Uruguayan social TV startup has announced.
Promoted by the Media Accelerator Programme (M.A.P) and powered by IMS, the competition helps new media companies get attention from marketers, senior media executives and VCs. During its Latin American edition, a jury of professionals reviewed the five finalists that were shortlisted in the Company of the Year category, and selected ComparTeVe as the winner.
As some of you may know, ComparTeVe is a free iOS and Android app for TV viewers that creates what it describes as “a real-time social network for users who are watching the same TV programs.”
In other words, ComparTeVe is a second-screen app such as Wywy and IntoNow, but targeted at the Latin American market. As we mentioned, ComparTeVe is an Uruguayan startup, although its co-founders have developed their careers abroad – respectively in Israel, France, Spain and Chile.
As usual for this type of platforms, ComparTeVe acts as a TV guide, while also leaving users share messages and comments during broadcast – and become part of its community. They can also schedule their favorite TV shows in their calendars automatically and receive suggestions that match their tastes.
ComparTeVe is currently participating in Start-Up Chile‘s fourth acceleration round. Although it shares similarities with another alumnus of the program, Argentine startup Comenta.TV, ComparTeVe’s co-founder Gabriel Roizner is quick in pointing out differences between the two companies, starting with their strategy.
As Spanish speakers may have noticed on the above screenshots, ComparTeVe can use Shazam-like sound recognition technology to identify and validate the TV program its users are watching. Convenience aside, this positions the app as a potential alternative to traditional ratings, which it could sell to TV networks and brands once it gets enough traction.
From the end user’s perspective, ComparTeVe also offers incentives to keep on using its platform, which reminds us of popular US app Viggle. As a matter of fact, TV viewers earn points for every action which they can then redeem to get rewards. “For instance in Uruguay, which is the first country where we have launched, users will start receiving gift cards to use on the country’s leading daily deal website,” Roizner explains.
At the moment, ComparTeVe heavily focuses on mobile, but it is also working on a Facebook app. While it will include fewer features, it will give more users a chance to interact with ComparTeVe’s mobile community, Roizner says.
➤ ComparTeVe, via the App Store and Google Play
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