PartnerUp wants to help entrepreneurs find the people they need to get their concepts off the ground.
There are plenty of job search sites on the web, and one can use LinkedIn to browse for talent, but PartnerUp, with its focus on fledgling start-ups, aims to help start-ups build their core team.
Similar to conventional job sites like Monster and HotJobs, PartnerUp lets companies post opportunities and makes it easy for interested people to browse them. However, as its name suggests, PartnerUp lists opportunities for equity partnerships in brand new companies, positions on start-up boards, and co-founder status for companies that don't yet exist.
Some start-ups list these types of openings on job boards on popular blogs, but these listings cost money. PartnerUp is free -- though there is a $25 premium option that allows you to search for people with certain skill sets to be partners or prospective employees. (The free service limits you to posting and searching for opportunities.)
The idea for the site came after ParterUp's founder, Steve Nielsen, wanted to launch an radio-frequency identification (RFID) company, and could not find an electrical engineer. Later, after giving up, he was at a conference and encountered an RFID engineer who had been looking for a start-up to join, but didn't know where to look. PartnerUp wants to be that place. Down the road, it intends to add free listings for commercial real-estate to help start-ups find affordable office space.
The Minneapolis-based company has only been around since late April, and the listings are a little thin, but if it catches on, it could be quite useful for entrepreneurs that need to fill out their team. PartnerUp is currently self-funded, and intends to stay that way for a while.
