Onavo, Roar Engine dominate MobileBeat startup contest

We chose 16 mobile startups to take part in our MobileBeat 2011 startup competition today, but only two could win our coveted Tesla prize.

Onavo, a company that compresses mobile data on smartphones and tablets, and Roar Engine, which impressed judges by building a social game in four minutes, were declared the winners by our panel of judges for the consumer and infrastructure categories respectively.

The two companies each landed a Tesla prize (named in honor of Nikola Tesla, the scientist who discovered early mobile communication) and a two-hour consulting session with Tandem Entrepreneurs.

Additionally, TappMob, a company that aims to create simple one-tap mobile apps, and LiveDibs, a marketplace that aims to find you deals you’ll care about, won the People’s Choice awards. The companies each received a DEMO scholarship worth $5,000 that will guarantee them booths at the fall DEMO conference.

The MobileBeat startup competition was sponsored by Tandem Entrepreneurs, which also provided one of the judges.