We love startups for what they are: fast-paced, all-hands-on-deck-type work environments that breed ingenuity and foster creativity. No red tape. No hierarchies. No monotonous days. Small companies rely on talent, hard work and a whole bunch of perseverance to achieve their goals.
Just because some companies are smaller in workforce doesn’t mean they don’t have the same lofty goals, skilled staffs or all the amenities of a Silicon Valley tech behemoth. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. As the number of small tech companies popping up all over the country increases, so too does the competition for the best talent. The salaries, benefits and culture at these organizations are some of the best around.
Every year, Built In creates a list of the 50 best small companies in each of our seven markets of Austin, Boston, Chicago, Colorado, Los Angeles, New York and Seattle. These companies are all well-positioned to make noise in the tech sector.
What makes a company one of the “best” small companies? First, they have to have 100 employees or fewer. Then, based on company-submitted benefits and employee-submitted compensation data, each company is assigned an algorithmic score. Using the combined salary and benefits score, we comprise the 50 best small places to work list. Be sure to check out our Best Places to Work FAQ page if you want a deeper dive into our methodology.
In this list, we’ve rounded up the top five small companies that dominated the 2019 lists from each market. With great salaries, immense benefits and a growing workforce, these companies may not be small for long. Check them out below.
Here are Built In’s 35 best small companies to work for in 2019.
Austin
New Knowledge
Industry: Artificial Intelligence + Machine Learning
Location: Austin, Texas
Local Employees: 48
What it does: New Knowledge is using AI and machine learning to combat disinformation campaigns on the internet. The company’s platform deploys various technological tools to help detect, monitor and mitigate “fake news,” ranging from false social media accounts to threats of terrorism.
What people are saying: “I love coming to work and getting to make this world a better place. The work we are doing is extremely important and it really all feels like we are apart of that mission.”
Headspring
Industry: Cloud + Software
Location: Austin, Texas
Local Employees: 77
What it does: Headspring specializes in everything from app development to enterprise architecture implementation and artificial intelligence. The Headspring team provides customized development across the enterprise for each client, as well as consulting services. Callaway, 3M, CAT and Crate & Barrel are just a few of the big brands that rely on Headspring to craft their individualized tech solutions.
What people are saying: “Our culture of trust and autonomy encourages change, self growth and ownership — on and off client projects. The team, beyond invested, competent and empathetic, is plain cool, and often fast friends. I love leading our clients to better solutions!”
ActiveProspect
Industry: Marketing Tech + Software
Location: Austin, Texas
Local Employees: 20
What it does: ActiveProspect is a marketing software company helping teams with lead acquisition. The company’s main product, “LeadConduit”, is a real-time, customizable data acquisition platform that sorts through lead flows and uses rules-based logic to accept quality leads and reject those that don’t meet the individualized criteria.
What people are saying: “I love working with a team of highly talented people that have such a variety of experience and backgrounds. The soft benefits are a true bonus: team workouts at Dane’s, salads, flexibility and a true appreciation of work-life, balance.”
Modernize
Industry: Information Technology + Marketing Tech
Location: Austin, Texas
Local Employees: 100
What it does: Need to get your kitchen remodeled or fix a leaky roof? Modernize connects homeowners who need projects completed with quality contractors. The site gathers information about your project needs and provides informational resources and quotes from reputable contractors in the area.
What people are saying: "As the first sales dev. rep, it has been an amazing opportunity to see the team grow and transition into such an integral part of the company. The company empowers constant growth for each one of us."
NSS Labs
Industry: Cybersecurity + Software
Location: Austin, Texas
Local Employees: 80
What it does: NSS Labs provides cybersecurity research and product testing. The company offers in-depth guidance on the development and deployment of everything from clouds to data centers to threat detection analytics.
What people are saying: “I like to feel challenged professionally every day. Working at a smaller company regularly presents new challenges for me, since no two days are the same.”
Boston
MedTouch
Industry: Healthtech
Location: Somerville, Mass.
Local Employees: 45
What it does: MedTouch digitizes the healthcare process. The company builds personalized patient experiences, crafts digital strategies and even produces content and UX/UI design work to help hospitals, clinics and doctors provide an efficient and thorough patient experience.
What people are saying: “Our collaborative work environment and amazing colleagues make MedTouch such a great place to work. We are fortunate to have a great leadership team, talented designers and developers that can bring any idea to life.”
3Play Media
Industry: Software + Media
Location: Boston
Local Employees: 52
What it does: 3Play Media’s technology provides closed captioning, transcription, audio description and subtitling solutions for a wide range of media. The company’s tools help video creators, media outlets and even lecturers transcribe and caption their content in a variety of languages and formats. The University of Wisconsin, MIT, The Economist and T Mobile are just a few of 3Play’s users who rely on the product to reach a wider audience.
What people are saying: “I love working at 3Play Media because of the people, the flexibility, and the interesting work I do everyday. It’s very rewarding to know that each day I will work with intelligent and capable coworkers to solve challenging problems.”
Midaxo
Industry: Fintech + Software
Location: Boston
Local Employees: 43
What it does: Midaxo’s platform helps businesses streamline the mergers and acquisitions process. The company’s suite of tools assist in visualizing and constructing pipelines, monitoring progress and centralizing all lines of communication and collaboration.
What people are saying: “Midaxo is a young company, a fun work environment and offers a lot of career opportunities. The company is growing fast, but still retains the startup vibe. It’s a great place for people who like to take initiative and ownership over their projects.”
Pixability
Industry: Adtech + Software
Location: Boston
Local Employees: 60
What it does: Pixability’s platform assists with advertising video campaigns and gives insights to help build a quality audience. The PixabilityOne platform optimizes 37,000 times a day to segment target audiences into nano-audiences, giving marketers a granular look into the success of their campaigns. Puma, Ford, Bose and the NFL all use Pixability’s platform to gain insights into their video campaigns.
Attivio
Industry: Big Data + Machine Learning
Location: Boston
Local Employees: 55
What it does: Attivio is a cognitive search and insights platform assisting businesses in answering questions across the enterprise. Attivio uses natural language processing and machine learning to constantly scan an enterprises’ data sources and help inform company-wide decisions regarding everything from call centers to customer retention initiatives to IT architecture.
Chicago
Clearcover
Industry: Fintech
Location: Chicago
Local Employees: 70
What it does: Clearcover’s insurance platform provides policy quotes in minutes. User need only to fill out a short questionnaire, then individualized quotes are generated that fit the user's specific needs. Additionally, Clearcover users can use the app to file claims and get paid faster through the company’s digital payments process.
Bento for Business
Industry: Fintech + Software
Location: Chicago
Local Employees: 16
What it does: Bento for Business is a spending and expense management platform for SMBs. Bento offers small to midsize businesses an individualized platform for owners to manage spending policies and set employee spending limits. The company offers everything from physical corporate cards to virtual cards to a digital payment platform.
What people are saying: “It’s incredibly rewarding to hear unprompted customer feedback on how features I’ve released are being used and making a difference. I work with passionate people looking to transform an industry and I get to contribute to our customer's success.”
Payformance Solutions
Industry: Healthtech + Machine Learning
Location: Chicago
Local Employees: 10
What it does: Payformance Solutions is a healthcare payment platform helping stakeholders plan and optimize their reimbursement programs. The platform helps organizations with transitioning to value-based reimbursement models using real-time analytics and tools to measure performance and impact on cash flow.
What people are saying: “There are times we stay late to finish a project, but other times we all go out for a drink after work. Community outreach events include beach clean-ups and most recently we went axe throwing! Friday is a lunch out day — we try to go to a different place every week. Office decorations for every holiday and always ways to get involved!”
Punchkick Interactive
Industry: Fintech + Agency
Location: Chicago
Local Employees: 40
What it does: Punchkick Interactive’s team builds customized web and mobile software and business intelligence platforms for companies looking to gain better customer and product insights. The company has worked with major brands like Harley Davidson, Walmart, Microsoft and Allstate to help optimize customer experience on their digital platforms.
What people are saying: “Punchkick is the first place I’ve worked where I can bring my true and whole self to work every day and I know that every Punchkicker will be doing the same.”
Sittercity
Industry: Family + On-Demand
Location: Chicago
Local Employees: 55
What it does: Sittercity connects parents with quality, vetted babysitters. The platform lets parents view sitter profiles, read reviews, interview candidates and schedule. The Sittercity platform also includes candidates who specialize in pet, senior or special needs care.
What people are saying: “I joined Sittercity because it has a mission that I believe in. It’s not just about the bottom line, but about improving people’s lives and society as a whole. I’m proud and excited that each day my work impacts the lives of families and sitters!”
Colorado
VERA
Industry: Information Technology + Cybersecurity
Location: Denver
Local Employees: 11
What it does: VERA’s cybersecurity technology helps businesses secure, track and manage their digital information across all platforms and devices. The VERA platform allows businesses to manage who can access information, track intellectual property and even encrypt files for a boosted security protocol.
What people are saying: “Great management with a diverse set of experience, all focused on your development and enabling you within your role. Product has a significant amount of demand across multiple industries. Fun culture, great product, tons of room for development”
AdAction Interactive
Industry: Adtech + Mobile
Location: Lakewood, Colo.
Local Employees: 28
What it does: AdAction Interactive is a mobile app media company partnering with advertisers to help drive user acquisition. The company develops customized, performance-based marketing solutions that drive app installs, increase engagement and produce higher ROI.
What people are saying: “AdAction truly embodies a work hard, play hard mentality. I love working in an environment where everyone is driven and committed to the success of the company, but still wants to grab beers together after work.”
Amplio Digital
Industry: Agency + Marketing Tech
Location: Boulder, Colo.
Local Employees: 16
What it does: Amplio Digital specializes in growing sales revenue through Amazon marketplace and digital paid advertising. To date, the agency says it has helped Amazon e-commerce stores drive over $100 million in revenue through optimized advertising campaigns.
Mobile Solutions
Industry: Mobile + Software
Location: Centennial, Colo.
Local Employees: 93
What it does: Mobile Solutions maintains a full suite of real-time managed mobility solutions. The company’s plethora of tools includes centralized views on all mobile-related tech, and a business intelligence dashboard that displays real-time expense and usage data. These tools help to give businesses a holistic insight into their mobile expenses and inefficiencies.
Inflow
Industry: E-Commerce + Agency
Location: Denver
Local Employees: 30
What it does: Inflow is an e-commerce marketing agency helping brands expand their customer bases. The company implements individualized SEO and paid marketing plans to help online brands connect with customers and turn them into sales conversions. The agency was named one of the top five agencies in North America by Google.
Los Angeles
ZestFinance
Industry: Artificial Intelligence + Fintech
Location: Los Angeles
Local Employees: 100
What it does: ZestFinance uses AI and machine learning to provide transparent, non-traditional credit reporting. The Zest Automated Machine Learning (ZAML) tool helps lenders analyze thousands of different variables that analyze risk. With this tool, ZestFinance cites a 15% increase in loan approvals without an increase in defaults.
What people are saying: “All of our conference rooms are named after famous 80's bands and have the records on the door to help us keep them straight! Our benefits rooms features hair metal band Poison, our main boardroom is Iron Maiden, and my favorite conference room is Devo.”
CREXi
Industry: Real Estate
Location: Marina del Rey, Calif.
Local Employees: 46
What it does: CREXi is an end-to-end commercial real estate platform. Through the site, buyers, sellers and brokers have tools that help set list properties, manage inquiries and accept sales. The CREXi platform maintains a wide variety of properties for sale and lease, including multifamily units, mixed-use spaces and even office buildings.
What people are saying: “What I enjoy most...the culture and people — waking up in the morning, you don't have that struggle getting out of bed. Going to work is extremely enjoyable!”
Cie
Industry: Digital Media
Location: Irvine, Calif.
Local Employees: 60
What it does: Cie creates digital experiences for businesses that boost customer engagement and increase company efficiency. The agency has developed hundreds of digital experiences, including an app for Pilot that helps decrease trucker wait time for fuel. The company has also developed an omnichannel ordering system for Petsmart.
What people are saying: “We are challenged every day to create and apply amazing new technologies. Above and beyond that, the people are amazing; each is passionate, kind, helpful, intelligent, and down to earth.”
JOANY
Industry: Consumer Web + Healthtech
Location: Pasadena, Calif.
Local Employees: 32
What it does: Using data science and machine learning, JOANY personalizes health insurance options for policy seekers. After filling out a questionnaire, JOANY is able to produce the best policies and advice based on an individual’s certain conditions and circumstances.
What people are saying: “We have an annual company retreat for team building, development and play. Last year we went to a beautiful all-inclusive resort in Cabo. Frequently we have team outings for happy hour, escape rooms and exploring new restaurants in the area.”
Renew Health
Industry: Healthtech + Insurance
Location: Santa Monica, Calif.
Local Employees: 24
What it does: Renew Health is creating a platform that takes a different approach to how medications and pharmacy benefits are managed. The company’s platform simplifies the pharmaceutical incentivization process and decreases overprescribing by setting fixed fees on a per-member basis.
What people are saying: “I love that we're working to solve problems that have a meaningful impact in peoples' lives. It's also a chance to break new ground in a market that's been underserved by the startup community.”
New York
Unacast
Industry: Big Data
Location: NYC
Local Employees: 21
What it does: Unacast is a contextualized location data platform giving real estate developers, retailers and data providers insights into human interactions. Unacast helps companies understand where people are moving, why they’re moving and how they can optimize their business strategies to capture a wider customer base.
What people are saying: “I love working at Unacast because the culture is awesome. Everyone is treated like an adult, hence our main value 'Be Your Own CEO.' My opinions are respected and supported. Plus, I get to work with people who are as funny as they are smart!”
Beeswax
Industry: Adtech + Software
Location: NYC
Local Employees: 67
What it does: Beeswax is a scalable, real-time advertising bidding platform. The company’s Bidder-as-a-Service (BaaS) technology lets advertisers choose their programmatic partners in a completely customizable cloud environment.
Stride Consulting
Industry: Software + Professional Services
Location: NYC
Local Employees: 70
What it does: Stride Consulting assists businesses on the development of agile-based technologies. In addition to software development, the company consults on agile-based product development, strategy creation and cybersecurity protocols. Sony, Plated, Casper and Stash have all relied on Stride’s expertise on a wide variety of Agile projects.
What people are saying: “I joined Stride mostly because I knew they were Agile and I wanted to TDD and pair program. The second reason I joined was because of the people, who are genuine and they shared my values!”
SevenRooms
Industry: Food + Software
Location: NYC
Local Employees: 90
What it does: SevenRooms is an operations, marketing and customer engagement platform for venues like restaurants, nightclubs and hotels. The platform helps boost direct reservations and even has profiles where venues can record customer characteristics (like seating, meal preferences and lifetime spend) to craft more personalized experiences.
What people are saying: “SevenRooms employees get to enjoy activities that are equal parts team building & fun! As a company that takes a culture-first approach, we enjoy group fitness classes, cooking classes, an industry speaker series, happy hours, meditation workshops, dinners at restaurant clients, wine tastings and more. We also love crowdsourcing new event ideas!”
Grailed
Industry: Consumer Web + E-commerce
Location: NYC
Local Employees: 65
What it does: Grailed is a curated marketplace for men’s fashion, sneakers and accessories. App users can find vintage, luxury and streetwear fashion from highly coveted labels like Balenciaga, Burberry and Supreme. The company also curates daily fashion picks so users can buy the freshest, most fashion-forward styles.
Seattle
Transparent Systems
Industry: Blockchain + Fintech
Location: Seattle
Local Employees: 18
What it does: Transparent Systems is using blockchain for real-time, cryptographic payment settlement. What separates this from traditional financial settlements? By using ledgers, Transparent Systems speeds up the settlement process to real-time and reduces processing fees, whereas, traditional methods are constrained by banking hours and high international fees.
Suplari
Industry: Artificial Intelligence + Fintech
Location: Seattle
Local Employees: 42
What it does: Suplari’s platform uses machine learning to help enterprises manage suppliers and costs. With Suplari’s solution, businesses use the AI tools to set strategic goals and gain a holistic view of spending data, supplier activity and contracts.
What people are saying: “I have not had this much fun at work for a very long time. I love this creating culture and the way we are attacking new ways of adding value to our tools and to the procurement and finance world.”
LiquidPlanner
Industry: Software
Location: Seattle
Local Employees: 50
What it does: LiquidPlanner is a project management software that uses predictive tools to assist with scheduling. The management tool sets dynamic schedules, automatically adjusts expected completion dates when projects expand and even includes a “Resource Workload Report” that displays what a team member is working on and if their bandwidth (or lack thereof) puts them at risk of missing deadlines.
What people are saying: “I was intrigued when I started reading about LiquidPlanner, but when I met the team, I knew this was a company I really wanted to be part of.”
Crelate
Industry: HR Tech + Productivity
Location: Kirkland, Wash.
Local Employees: 15
What it does: Crelate is a cloud-based recruiting CRM and applicant tracking system. Recruiters and staffing agencies are able to manage and visualize candidate pipelines with the platform’s suite of tools. Crelate lets HR professionals track candidate progress, record interactions, send emails and review resumes all from a fully customizable dashboard.
Xealth
Industry: Healthtech + Information Technology
Location: Seattle
Local Employees: 36
What it does: Xealth’s platform helps healthcare teams order digital content and services. The tool lets doctors prescribe informational content, like videos on workouts or articles on pregnancy, to patients. The healthcare team can then track and analyze the effectiveness of the content on a person’s health.
What people are saying: “I come to work every day and am inspired by my co-workers and our clients. Being at the forefront of digital innovation in healthcare is exciting and personally rewarding. I'm encouraged every day reach and learn. I love working at Xealth!”
Images via featured companies, social media and Shutterstock.
