Both Sides of the Table
JULY 19, 2010
Startups are hard. When you read the press you only read the glamorous bits. You read about Mark Zuckerberg or the guys at FourSquare, Twitter or Zynga. But that’s a bit like reading about your state lottery winner and feeling bummed out because you haven’t won despite years of trying. The reality is that most of you will never hit it BIG yet you’ll lead fulfilled and productive lives.
socalTECH
JULY 22, 2010
Aliso Viejo-based ecommerce site Buy.com said this morning that it is going beyond the industry-standard, 30-day return policy and extending out a new, 45-day return policy on its items. The firm said it has extended out the return policy to become a "more customer-friendly option" than competitors Amazon, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, NewEgg and others.
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SoCal Tech Calendar
JULY 22, 2010
Wednesday, July 28, 2010 -- SIGGRAPH 2010. The 37th International Conference and Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques. See [link] (more).
Berkonomics
JULY 3, 2010
Business coaches come in all sizes and shapes. You’ll have a relative willing to devote time, a school friend with business experience, professionals who charge for the service, investors with a reason to promote your success and more. But by far the best coaches are those that have lived through the process you’re going through and built successful enterprises in your same industry.
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Office leases are one of companies’ largest expenses, and if your whole team is working from home with no clear end in sight, you may be wondering what to do about your lease.
SoCal CTO
JULY 13, 2010
Some great content around the intersection of startups and being a Startup CTO in June this year. This continues my series of posts: Top 29 Startup Posts May 2010 Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April 16 Great Startup Posts from March There was some really great content in June. Here are the top 30 along with a brief snippet from the post. 10 Ways To Be Your Own Boss - A VC : Venture Capital and Technology , June 18, 2010 The folks at Behance and Cool Hunting asked me to talk at their 99% Conferenc
Eric Greenspan
JULY 19, 2010
Make It Work bases all of its decisions around bringing delight. We are known for our impeccable customer service and our willingness to bend over backwards for our customers. What you may not know about us is our desire to delight our employees as well. Delight isn’t just for the customers – it starts with the employee! A perfect example of sharing delight with our employees is the story of former Make It Work-er Peet Guercio.
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
socalTECH
JULY 20, 2010
One of Southern California's successful, serial entrepreneurs is Winston Damarillo , who founded Gluecode, which he sold to IBM in 2005. Earlier this month, his latest startup, El Segundo-based Morphlabs announced it had raised a Series B funding worth $5.5M. We thought we'd catch back up with Winston to hear about the Morphlabs. Winston, nice speaking with you again.
InfoChachkie
JULY 13, 2010
In this video John Greathouse does a small Q&A about building what traits/roles are needed to create a strong start-up team. If you haven’t already subscribed yet, subscribe now for. free weekly Infochachkie articles! Q&A: Want to learn more on this subject? Read the post about building Tribes: The Tribe. You may not realize it, but your adVenture’s Core Team is akin to a primitive tribe.
Berkonomics
JULY 10, 2010
This insight addresses the establishment and maintenance of an advisory board, a formal group with no legal responsibilities, but one able to be called upon to act as business, industry and scientific advisors to the CEO. Usually, such an advisory board is formed carefully by the CEO to fill in the critical areas of need not evidenced in the board of directors or within the company itself.
SoCal Tech Calendar
JULY 7, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010 -- TechAmerica South Bay HR Executive Strategy Roundtable Dinner Series-Building Powerful Relationships with Your C-Level Team. Have you ever wondered why you have an effective working relationship with some of your company executives, and not others? Learn how to "read" executives and tailor your relationship-building techniques to each individual and situation to improve your results.Bring your Company Executives so everyone can achieve more as a team!
Eric Greenspan
JULY 29, 2010
Wanna Talk? Chat? Email? Text? Tweet? Message? Post? Comment? We need guidance on how to use these tools properly. While they’ve been designed to make it easier to communicate, many of us find it adding to our stress. The toughest part is choosing which tool, method, medium or device. I say, go for it, use em all…but here’s a few of my ideas on each: Email for conversations where tracking, history and detail is important and if you wish to forward to another and the best sales
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 13, 2010
For the first 5 years of my career I was a “bottom up&# thinker and worker. I assembled tons of data, grouped things, found results and drew conclusions. It was difficult to make the transition to a “top down&# thinker but as a senior executive – and as an entrepreneur – you’re far less effective without this skill in your arsenal.
socalTECH
JULY 13, 2010
Mehdi Daoudi is CEO of CatchPoint Systems (www.catchpoint.com), a new Los Angeles startup focused on the web site and web application monitoring industry. Daoudi was previously an executive at DoubleClick. Daoudi spoke to us about how his experience at DoubleClick resulted in starting up CatchPoint. What does CatchPoint's software do? Mehdi Daoudi: The idea is very simple.
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 16, 2010
If you expect to succeed in the thrill-a-minute, roller coaster ride of a startup, let me assure you it takes more than a good idea, a rich uncle, and luck. In fact, the idea is often the least important part of the equation. Investors tell me that they look at the people first, the business plan second, and only then at the idea. If you want some tips to beat the insurmountable odds, take a look at the following concepts, adapted from Richard C.
Berkonomics
JULY 26, 2010
As you follow these insights from ignition to liquidity event, you’ll detect a continuing theme, emphasizing the need for deep and wide relationships that the CEO and senior staff can call upon for advice and guidance. This is the time to elevate those insights to the level of highest value for the corporation, one that cannot be listed on a balance sheet nor included in an appraisal of corporate worth. .
SoCal Tech Calendar
JULY 30, 2010
Thursday, August 5, 2010 -- Social Media. TCVN. e've all heard about the power of Social Media. What is it? What can it do for me or my business? How in the world am I supposed to keep up with the changes? On August 5th, TCVN will be hosting a workshop that will answer these questions. Times are changing and brands need to communicate with their customers in a different way.
Eric Greenspan
JULY 23, 2010
We needed an efficient and simple way to explain our various services at Make It Work, so we made this: Then, our customers asked us to make some for them too. So we created [link]. Want one? Tags: Eric Greenspan.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 20, 2010
Yesterday I wrote about the importance of choosing happiness. Today I want to write about a related topic: not taking the little things in life for granted. I promise not to turn this blog into a personal self-help blog! But today is a special day and I’m thinking about this topic so please humor me just one more time. More later in the post.
socalTECH
JULY 7, 2010
One complaint we sometimes hear from venture capitalists visiting Southern California for the first time, is the difficulty of finding experienced entrepreneurs and executives. socalTECH.com has mined its proprietary database of high tech companies and entrepreneurs and identified just a few of the repeat entrepreneurs to watch in the region. Here are eight Southern California companies and the experienced, successful entrepreneurs heading up their efforts, who haven't had any problems finding i
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 14, 2010
Yesterday I wrote a post about top-down versus bottom-up thinking. There is a corollary to that advice, which is “doing the right things is more important than doing things right.&# Sounds simple but in practice I promise you most organization fall into the latter trap. Here’s how it goes: You have a business development group with two people.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 16, 2010
Lots of discussion these days about the changes in the VC industry. Here’s my take: 1. The VC industry grew dramatically as a result of the Internet bubble - Before the Internet bubble the people who invested in VC funds (called LPs or Limited Partners) put about $50 billion into the industry and by 2001 this had grown precipitously to around $250 billion. 2.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 1, 2010
We all like to think of startups as “non hierarchic&# organizations and to some extent that should be true. I’m not a big believer in too much hierarchy. A good early-stage CEO needs to be accessible, to be accountable for producing results and should be establishing the cultural norms of the company through direct leadership at all levels.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 26, 2010
Social Proof in Action … Yesterday I wrote about the benefits of using social proof and authority in raising venture capital. If you didn’t read that yet it might be worth having a quick skim as a primer. Social proof is defined as “looking for others to guide our decisions&# and is also one of the most important techniques in acquiring customers in your company.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 25, 2010
I recently read a book I’d highly recommend to every reader of this blog called “ Yes, 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be Persuasive &# by Robert B. Cialdini who is also author of a very well received book called “ Influence &# (which I plan to read). “Yes&# was given to me by one of my favorite angel investor / seed VC’s to work with – John Greathouse of Rincon Venture Partners and author of the blog InfoChachkie that you should check out because it is fille
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 12, 2010
There’s a famous line about consultants that clients love to repeat, “consultants take your watch and then tell you the time.&#. I suppose there’s some truth to that but of course it’s an over simplification. I used to work for Andersen Consulting (for > 8 years) – mostly building computer systems for large companies in the fixed telecoms, mobile and Internet sectors.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 11, 2010
[if you're not old enough to get the reference between this image and the title you can click on the image for a prompter]. This past December I spent a week in Boston to try to get to know some of the local VC’s and entrepreneurs a bit better. One of the meetings I had (organized by my good friend Jeff Yolen ) was with New Atlantic Ventures held the at the CIC, aka the Cambridge Innovation Center (no prizes for guessing where it’s located).
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 29, 2010
We received so much positive feedback from our This Week in Venture Capital show walking through valuation calculations & term sheets that we decided to do a Q&A show this week to address topics that entrepreneurs want to learn about. We will continue to do more of this. If you want to watch the show click the image above or this link , but if you want a quick read – here’s a summary: 1.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 1, 2010
I think I’ve now mastered how to make images clickable so in the future you *should* always be able to click on the TWiVC image above and go directly to the video. Just in case here’s the link to this week’s episode. Our guest this week was Scott Painter. Scott is the kind of guy you could just grab a drink with, sit back and listen to him tell stories for hours.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 10, 2010
This episode of This Week in Venture Capital featured Michael Montgomery, president of Montgomery & Co. If you don’t know Montgomery & Co it is one of the premier technology & media focused investment banks in the country (and as Michael corrected me they also have a strong Healthcare / Med tech practice). For entrepreneurs who want to learn about how to work with investment banks, how to position yourself to be acquired and what the IPO markets look like this is the episode to
socalTECH
JULY 29, 2010
Los Angeles-based Invested.in , the online fundraising site run by Alon Goren, is powering a new effort to help educators raise money for educational programs from the BizWorld Foundation. According to The BizWorld Foundation and Invested.in, the two are partnering on a fully customized fundraising portal, which will help educators raise money to purchase BizWorld's educational programs for their classroom.
socalTECH
JULY 2, 2010
Aliso Viejo-based Telogis , a developer of route planning and fleet management software, said late Thursday evening that it has acquired the assets of Remote Dynamics , a developer of GPS fleet management technology. Financial terms of the buy were not disclosed. Telogis said the acquisition will further its penetration into the industry and into certain verticals.
socalTECH
JULY 2, 2010
Looking to reduce its dependence on Twitter's fickle advertising policy, Los Angeles-based Ad.ly , the Twitter advertising startup backed by Greycroft Partners and GRP Partners, said earlier this week that it has extended its platform to applications and websites. Ad.ly said it has launched a new platform called Ad.ly for Apps, which allows applications and websites to use and API to pull up targeted, in-stream apps adjacent to a streams from sources like Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and LinkedIn
socalTECH
JULY 9, 2010
The good news for content creators in Hollywood and elsewhere trying to make it on the Internet: YouTube , the video sharing site owned by Google, said today that it has just launched a new program which will invest five million dollars for new content partners. According to site, its new YouTube Partner Grants program will invest in new and emerging YouTube partners for those partners to invest into their product budgets.
socalTECH
JULY 9, 2010
Monrovia-based Green Dot , the provider of prepaid debit cards, has set pricing on its IPO, saying in a filing Friday that it estimates and initial public offering price of between $32.00 and $35.00 per share. The firm is set to list on the NYSE as GDOT in the offering, which would net the firm around $154M at $35.00 per share. Green Dot filed for an IPO in February, and is backed by Sequoia Capital, TTP Fund, and the Tech Coast Angeles.
socalTECH
JULY 14, 2010
Pasadena-based online dating site eHarmony is moving its headquarters from Pasadena to Santa Monica, according to reports from local community papers. eHarmony is reported to be moving to a space in the Yahoo! Center, taking with it 250 employees to the new location. No date for the move was given. eHarmony has been in its current Pasadena location on Walnut street for the last five years.
Both Sides of the Table
JULY 15, 2010
We started this week’s show with a Q&A session where I answered viewer questions about fund raising and the VC industry. If you enjoy this blog I think you’ll enjoy watching the first 14 minutes of this video (just click on the image of me below). Heck, stick around and watch me discuss the seed funding debate that is going on right now and what is happening in the VC industry overall.
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