Every business wants to be successful. They may have been built on a great idea and developed by a solid team. But many of the vital things that should help a business grow don't guarantee a bright future for the company.
There are a lot of companies that looked promising, but collapsed under the weight of their own goals. The same goes to startups.
The term "startup" is often seen as a business with a volatile and disruptive nature. While some receive huge investments and succeed, most didn't quite make it. Many startups failed, and many are dead beyond recognition.
Helping people to remember those deceased startups because "history shouldn't have to repeat itself", a website called Startup Graveyard wants to memorialize those that have fallen. Each dead startup gets its own coffin imprinted with its logo.
Clicking on it will open a new page where people can literally lift the lid of the coffin to see a bit of biographical information about the company, such as its background, how much it had raised, its competitors, who founded it and what literally went wrong.
Below is an example of a page dedicated to Sonar which was a free mobile application which showed the user how they are connected to other individuals in a room via publicly available social media profiles and location information from Foursquare, Twitter, and Facebook.
A great business comes from an innovative idea, supported by funding by impressive business goals and business models, positive marketing, great leadership and talented teams. While all those vital things are necessary for a startup to succeed, the path is never smooth.
Some get what they deserve while most failed.
The idea of Startup Graveyard is because people don't simply hear as much about companies that never quite made it despite the time, money, sweat and reputation that have been put into them.
While Startup Graveyard puts a funeral tone by living off from its fallen comrades, the site isn't taking pleasure from their failures. Startup Graveyard pays its respect, and that is seems to be its main intention. As the creators noted at the top of the page: