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Tuesday March 9, 2010
An Online Guide to Parking Spots

By Manuel Baigorri (posted on December 2, 2008)

An Online Guide to Parking Spots

ParkingCarma
Rick Warner

What's an online service with real-time info on parking spots in California doing in Flint, Mich.? Showing the lengths a downbeaten region will go for startups—and the distance entrepreneurs may have to travel for their new businesses. Rick Warner, 48, founder and chief executive of ParkingCarma, started sketching out a Web-based parking database in 2002 after driving around San Francisco for 45 minutes one day looking for a place to park. By early 2007, he had everything ready. The last step was moving 2,400 miles to claim up to $2 million in public and private backing in Flint. He says he had little choice: "Frankly, parking isn't sexy to really get venture capital interested in it." Visitors to parkingcarma.com can find location and rate information about public garages in 70 markets. In addition, for $9.99 a year, registered users in San Francisco and San Diego can reserve spaces via a computer, PDA, or mobile phone. Warner hopes to add that service in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Detroit in 2009. The 11-employee company also gets revenue from ads and a percentage of what customers pay for parking.