startup

or start-up

[ stahrt-uhp ]

noun
  1. the act or fact of starting something; a setting in motion.

  2. a new business venture, or a new commercial or industrial project: a small, 5-month-old internet startup.

adjective
  1. of or relating to the beginning of such a venture or project, especially to an investment made to initiate it: high start-up costs for construction of a new facility.

Origin of startup

1
First recorded in 1550–60; noun use of verb phrase start up

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use startup in a sentence

  • If a professor called his name suddenly, he would start up and answer, "Coming, sir—coming!"

    Friend Mac Donald | Max O'Rell
  • At seven o'clock, a horrible din makes you start up in bed and tremble from head to foot.

    Friend Mac Donald | Max O'Rell
  • Laughing at intervals that low gurgle which sprang from fear, as some wild bird would start up at his approach, he plodded on.

    The Underworld | James C. Welsh
  • The way that she seemed to start up just when—so soon after we had lost dear granny, and in a sense our home.'

    Robin Redbreast | Mary Louisa Molesworth
  • Something made me start up, a low, piteous howling of dogs somewhere far below in the valley, which was hidden from my sight.

    Dracula | Bram Stoker

British Dictionary definitions for start up

start up

verb(adverb)
  1. to come or cause to come into being for the first time; originate

  2. (intr) to spring or jump suddenly from a position or place

  1. to set in or go into motion, activity, etc: he started up the engine; the orchestra started up

adjectivestart-up
  1. of or relating to input, usually financial, made to establish a new project or business: a start-up mortgage

nounstart-up
  1. a business enterprise that has been launched recently

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with startup

startup

Begin to operate, especially a machine or engine, as in Start up the motor so we can get going. [First half of 1900s]

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.