Week In Review: Neighborland, invoiceASAP, Rebirth Financial, Verizon

Here’s our roundup of the week’s top tech business news.   First, the most popular stories Silicon Bayou News published in the last seven days:

New Startup Neighborland Launches; To Hold Hackathon This Saturday In NOLA – Neighborland, the new startup that provides a fun and easy way for residents to suggest new businesses and services that they want in their neighborhood, is holding a hackathon this weekend in New Orleans.  Neighborland was founded by Candy Chang, Dan Parham, and Tee Parham.  The  group decided to set up shop in New Orleans partly because its a city that  embraces new technology and smart growth, and supports better resident-powered tools.

Feds Say NOLA Poised For Clean Technology Growth – The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) announced that New Orleans is one of two cities chosen for a pilot plan to showcase clean energy technology usage.  The program has several components  in New Orleans, and all  demonstrate how integrated clean energy technology solutions can be replicated in other communities and cities.

Mobile Startup invoiceASAP Rolls Out Beta Release – invoiceASAP, the cloud-based invoice app that allows you to easily create and send professional invoices, estimates, sales orders and receipts, rolled out the beta release of its first product.  The program, which is available now for iPhone, iPad, Android and Blackberry, has the ability to integrate with other invoicing and accounting software to let business managers deliver mobile invoices, receipts, and sales orders.  It also acts as a document storage device.

Rebirth Financial Secures Nearly $400K for NOLA Brewing – New Orleans-based Rebirth Financial, America’s first person-to-business lending platform and marketplace, has facilitated its largest loan deal to date.   NOLA Brewing Company will receive $390,000 in one of the largest deals in the history of the “Online Social Lending Industry”.

Louisiana Game Design Represents at E3 – A small contingent of Louisianans is making a big splash at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3Expo) in Los Angeles. The Expo began June 7 and runs through today.  Jeff Pellegrin of the Louisiana Digital Gaming Initiative (LDGI) is at the event, joined by Ryan Cooney and Jesse Hoggard. Jeff tells us that there’s quite a bit of buzz around Louisiana game design companies. Big contrast from two years ago, when the only response he got at the E3Expo was “Louisiana? Where’s that?”

Chris Schultz Reflects on LaunchPad Ignition – From organizing New Orleans’ first barcamp in 2007, to creating Launchpad, and now to LaunchPad Ignition, Chris Schultz and his team have worked their tails off to put New Orleans tech startups on the map.  And with LP Ignition’s impact on Louisiana’s startup scene clear and the first LP Ignition program coming to a close, Chris took a moment to reflect on his experience with a blog post on the Startup America Blog.

Verizon Launches Wireless Technology Innovation Awards for Greater New Orleans and Baton Rouge Businesses – Verizon has announced its Wireless Technology Innovation awards, a contest designed to spur innovation with Verizon mobile technology, in three cities, including New Orleans/Baton Rouge.

Warren Buffet, Mitch Landrieu, and Kendall Washington Discuss Entrepreneurship in New Orleans [VIDEO] – Goldman Saches’ 10,000 Small Businesses, the program designed to grow jobs and help entrepreneurs across America, held its first graduation for 30 entrepreneurs in New Orleans with Warren Buffet and Mitch Landrieu on hand to offer support and advice.

And the best of the rest:

Digital Gumbo: Video Game Industry looks to Grow in La. – As Louisiana’s video game industry continues to grow, groups around the state are developing training and education programs to train developers, designers, and project managers in the video game industry.

Angel Investor Bill Going To the House Floor! – Louisiana’s Angel Investor Tax Credit is making progress, passing out of the House Ways & Means Committee last week and scheduled to be heard on the House floor tomorrow at 1pm.  The Angel Bill is designed to incentivize investment in Louisiana startups and help overcome the access to capital barrier.   The bill would authorize tax rebates equal to 50% of the amount of the investment, for investments of up to $1 million per year, per business.