Equipboard

Equipboard is a company that participated in the Capital Factory 2013 cohort.

Equipboard is an online database of music artists and their respective gear. It was founded on September 30, 2013, by Giulio Chiarenza and Michael Pierce.

Equipboard's content is crowdsourced by fans, musicians, and retailers. The database is searchable by artist, discipline, gear type, and keyword. Each item of gear listed on an artist’s equipboard includes a citation to either a news source, photo, or social-media posting that definitively links the item to the artist. Gear entries feature ratings and reviews by the Equipboard community as well as links to authorized retailers.

The site also offers a library of articles and buying guides authored by a team of industry experts.

Registered members are able to follow the equipboards of pro artists to receive gear updates; create their own personal equipboards to index the gear that they have and keep track of the gear that they want; contribute to Equipboard by adding new artists and gear to the database, linking existing gear to a particular artist, and correcting inaccuracies; review gear for fellow musicians; and participate in forum discussions.

Giulio Chiarenza and Michael Pierce started Equipboard to connect musicians with the brands and equipment used by professional artists. The company adopted its current crowdsourcing model in 2014. As of 2019, Equipboard features roughly 57,000 gear profiles and the collections of over 55,000 individual artists.

Equipboard has been headquartered in Austin, Texas, except for a span of 6 months in 2014 when the company temporarily relocated to San Francisco in order to participate in the 500 Startups Accelerator Program.

Equipboard has participated in three accelerator programs: Capital Factory (Fund 4), Jon Brumley Texas Venture Labs (Fall 2014), and 500 Startups (8th Accelerator Class). Equipboard has received investment money from Capital Factory, Jonathan Coon (1-800 Contacts), Dave McClure (Simply Hired), Silverton Partners (Silicon Labs), and 500 Startups.As of 2019, Equipboard has raised a total of $650,000 in investment capital.