AUSTIN, Texas--When Crestline alum and Mansfield resident Scott Gatchall entered Inmobly in the South by Southwest Accelerator competition back in October, he knew they were in for stiff competition. What he could not have predicted was that they would emerge as one of only eighteen finalists for the prestigious award. The South by Southwest (SXSW) Accelerator has been part of the popular Texas film, music and interactive technology festival for seven years. It pits startup companies against one another in a pitch competition similar to the popular television show Shark Tank. But not just any company gets to come to SXSW to pitch their idea. Over five hundred companies like Inmobly entered the competition. In December, Gatchall learned that Inmobly was one of 48 finalists who would pitch their idea to venture capital judges from all over the world.Gatchall, Inmobly's senior vice president of corporate development, and company CEO and co-founder Hesham El Gamal traveled to Austin, Texas this week to do just that. On Saturday, El Gamal did a live two-minute pitch and was successful in advancing the company through to the finals, where on Sunday they competed against New York company Zype and Japan's Six in the Entertainment and Content Technologies category.Results from Sunday’s finals left Inmobly in the top three, but not the winner of their category. That honor went to Zype. Despite the defeat, Gatchall was positive about the experience the company had at SXSW."The networking has been immeasurable. The disruptors and decision-makers are all here looking for the next great thing," he said.Inmobly's technology purports to solve the problem of mobile data congestion by optimizing the use of existing network resources to predictively cache video based on user preferences and behavior.What this means to users is that Inmobly delivers videos directly to their device at times when network traffic is low--like in the middle of the night. This, according to Gatchall and El Gamal, gives the user a better video experience - no buffering or waiting - and can dramatically reduce the use of their data plan, saving money on data overages.When asked about the biggest challenge Inmobly faced getting to the finals, Gatchall reflected, "The greatest challenge was one we face every day: that true tech innovation only happens in Silicon Valley. Ohio is fertile with tech talent and superb universities and we are committed to debunking that myth."Based on the fact that no Silicon Valley companies made the finals in their category, it looks as though Inmobly is on the way to meeting one of its goals.