The Tech Tribune staff has compiled the very best tech startups in McKinney, Texas. In doing our research, we considered several factors including but not limited to:

1. Revenue potential
2. Leadership team
3. Brand/product traction
4. Competitive landscape

Additionally, all companies must be independent (unacquired), privately owned, at most 10 years old, and have received at least one round of funding in order to qualify.

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1. Playful

Founded: 2012

Also honored in: 2018 Best Tech Startups in McKinney

“Playful Corp. is an independent game studio on a mission to bring joy to the world, one game at a time. Located just north of Dallas in McKinney, TX, Playful was founded in January 2013 by the team behind Words With Friends, with additional past credits including Age of Empires and Halo Wars. Playful is passionate about creating products at an intersection of innovation and joy, and finding places where beloved IP and cutting-edge technology converge to create opportunities to reach new audiences. Its titles include Super Lucky’s Tale, Creativerse, Lucky’s Tale, and Star Child.”

2. BALANCED Media|Technology

Founded: 2016

“At BALANCED we are building a platform which harness the enormous potential of unused community resources while tapping into the unmatched power of human intelligence to crowdsource opportunities. Our solution combines volunteer distributed network computing with human-assisted machine learning without the traditional infrastructure investment. This achieves massive computational power at reduced cost and improved quality, with completely new human guided AI tools and techniques never created— all while empowering community-driven collaboration. With our proprietary technology, we have woven together the joy of play with the reward of problem solving. Time spent enjoying entertainment will now also become time spent unlocking opportunity.”

3. ShearShare, Inc.

Founded: 2015

Also honored in: 2018 Best Tech Startups in McKinney

“Rent salon space whenever, wherever!

ShearShare is a first-of-its-kind B2B app that matches licensed beauty professionals to unused salon space. Salon and barbershop owners make money on their empty chairs. Licensed cosmetologists and barbers lease professional suites & booths by the day! In 330+ cities, 11 countries.”

4. ThynkWare Innovation, Inc.

Founded: 2013

“ThynkWare was founded by Duane Cash in 2013. As a continuation of a Master’s Thesis project called MindGear in 2013, Duane Cash expanded his original prototype for a mind-controlled virtual assistant on a smartphone device to other products. ThynkWare was created to pave the way to deeper integration between human and their devices with the power of thought.

ThynkWare provides the interface layer between your brain and your devices. With ThynkWare, anyone can use their thoughts to control their smartphones, tablets, clothing, home, office, tv, robots, plants, clothing. ThynkWare creates a new way of computing by allowing everyone to “thynk” to interact with devices, social networks, and other people. The ThynkWare interface is the next step in computing following the invention of the mouse and personal computer.”