Both Sides of the Table
MAY 16, 2010
Canceling meetings is part of modern day life. I seem to get so over programmed that if I ever want to have a “break-out&# unplanned trip somewhere I seem to have to reschedule meetings. Not fun, but a reality. And people reschedule meetings with me on a regular basis, too. If done correctly I never have any problem with it at all. Done poorly and it really puts a bad taste in my mouth.
socalTECH
MAY 18, 2010
Anyone looking for signs that the economy is turning around, might want to look at what appears to be happening in Southern California's technology jobs market. According to numerous local CEOs, startup executives, and recruiters, the number of open positions for technical--and other-- talent at local companies has surged in recent months, and there's a wild scramble to find the right employees.
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SoCal CTO
MAY 19, 2010
I’m planning on going to a Tech Coast Angels mixer tomorrow and the topic for me is whether there is angel funding out there for startups that don’t meet classic VC models. If there are, then who are they, what are the criteria, what does it typically look like? By way of background for the question, there’s a great post by Bob Aholt, a Pasadena Angel: An Angel Investor’s Thoughts on Valuation.
Berkonomics
MAY 12, 2010
Equity is the currency of early stage businesses. The truth of this statement may be obvious, but the execution of a good incentive program using equity is often mismanaged, damaging the corporate capitalization structure and even affecting the outcome of subsequent investment into the company. First, a brand new enterprise is often formed from the efforts of several “partners”, each with an expertise valued by the others.
Advertiser: Aggregage
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.
Eric Greenspan
MAY 25, 2010
As I prepare for my role as emcee in June for Convergence 2010 , I began to look back at how I got involved in radio. I didn’t know what I was getting into when I started buying live endorsement radio ads back in 2005. I spent a lot of money on Mark Germain (Mr. K), Leo Laporte and Jeff Levy, to name a few. Today, we don’t buy radio, we make it and we don’t just make it, we make it work.
InfoChachkie
MAY 11, 2010
Below is a talk on Cloud Computing from the University of California Santa Barbara’s Technology Management Program, by Michael Crandell. I think you will be surprised by what the CEO of this industry-leading cloud computing has to say about the future of the Cloud. Full Bio: Michael Crandell, CEO and Founder of Right Scale. Michael Crandell is the CEO and a founder of RightScale, where he provides the vision and direction for the company as it pioneers innovative ways to bring the power of
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
socalTECH
MAY 4, 2010
San Diego-based RealGifts , which develops a Facebook application which ties virtual gifts with real, physical gifts, has signed floral delivery firm Teleflora as a partner. According to Teleflora, it will allow its customers to send flowers to Facebook users via a partnership with RealGifts. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed. Teleflora said that the deal will allow users to pick one of 15 bouquets, which can be delivered to any Facebook user.
SoCal CTO
MAY 19, 2010
I’m seeing and hearing that it’s becoming tough finding good developers again, at least here in Los Angeles. On Friday, at the LA CTO Forum , I heard from a couple of CTOs having trouble finding good developers. My company, TechEmpower , recently added a few top notch developers, but it wasn’t easy to find just the right people. And it’s not just me, Ben Kuo just posted - Good news for developers (and jobs) We’ve been talking with a lot (and I mean a LOT) of people who are looking for developers
Berkonomics
MAY 19, 2010
And be generous to your high achievers. . Recently I was asked to review an offer letter for a senior director of business development. The CEO was concerned that he was offering far too much in the form of incentive compensation, with bonuses that could greatly exceed the base salary if all of the bonus items were achieved.
Eric Greenspan
MAY 29, 2010
Using social media to increase your company’s touch and reach with each of your customers may be the most important reason to jump in to this game changing strategy. Social media can help bridge a long standing gap between customers and the companies they trust with their hard earned cash. There are many ways to use social media for this purpose, but the main thing to keep in mind is to make sure you are using the tools to listen and engage, while considering making changes to how your com
Tech Coast Venture Network
MAY 24, 2010
Kindergarten Financing. According to Robert Fulghum and his bestselling book “All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten,&# I should have learned how to finance a start up business in kindergarten – when I learned to share everything, play fair, and not to hit people (well, 2 out of 3’s not bad)! However, if you think about it, we innately do things as children that we stop doing as adults (e.g. being completely and totally honest once we learn the repercussions).
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 28, 2010
I’ve had this conversation so many times it’s painful. A friend calls me up from “you name it&# city: Boston, New York, Chicago, San Francisco and says, “I’m thinking about moving to Los Angeles (or SF, NY, etc) and I’d love to start interviewing. Let me know if you hear of anything interesting.&#. I guess when I hear things like this I revert back to my shock jock instincts and say, “Don’t bother.
socalTECH
MAY 18, 2010
Los Angeles-based Titan Gaming is announcing this morning that it has scored $1M in an angel funding round, from notable local angel investors. According to Titan, it is focused on developing a "complete" gaming platform for skill-based matchmaking, tournaments and points or cash competitions. The list of angel investors--a veritable Who's Who of technology investors in Southern California--included William Quigley and Jim Armstrong of Clearstone Ventures; Brock Pierce; MP3.com's Michael Roberts
SoCal CTO
MAY 27, 2010
I was just interviewed by Frank Peters - Tony Karrer and the Founder-Developer Gap. It was a lot of fun for me. I’ve listened to Frank’s show for several years. And I always recommend it to people involved in early stage startups. I received a follow-up question from an early-stage startup about the Founder Developer Gap that I’ve described before and that was part of the interview with Frank.
Berkonomics
MAY 4, 2010
Here is one that takes a real leap for a younger manger or CEO to believe. After hiring someone with all of the attendant enthusiasm followed by the training and learning curve, if an employee shows signs of weakness in the job or problems dealing with contemporaries, it is the natural tendency for most of us to go first into coaching mode, and reset the observation clock to see if our excellent coaching does the job.
Eric Greenspan
MAY 6, 2010
So, I patiently waited for my iPad 3G to arrive. All of its accessories were here a month in advance, waiting to connect, wrap and power this powerful and game changing new device. However, I’m not sure it’s changing the game for me. Here’s why… The iPad has a giant screen for a handheld, but its also a giant device and its heavy.
Jason Nazar
MAY 4, 2010
This month’s Startups Uncensored will be on “How to Raise Venture Capital”. It will be an open and frank town-hall conversation where we bring in venture capitalists from the top firms across the country to talk about the process and requirements entrepreneurs need to go through to successfully raise money from venture capitalists. This month’s session will be hosted by Jason Nazar (CEO, Docstoc.com), and we will be joined by Nate Redmond of Rustic Canyon , Josh Stein of Draper Fisher Jur
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 18, 2010
As a startup entrepreneur you’ll have many demands for your time. Especially if you start to have a degree of success or build a high public profile. Everyone will want you to speak at conferences. Service providers will want to get to know you. Potential employees want to “get together.&# VC’s will want to learn about what you’re up to and later stage VCs will have their 23-year-old analysts call you to tell you how interested they are in your company.
socalTECH
MAY 3, 2010
An article in this month's BusinessWeek names Santa Monica number three, and Irvine number four, on its list of top 10 cities for startups. The article cites Santa Monica's density of technology and digital media companies, and Irvine's workforce, University of California campus, and office parks in its rankings. Tags: businessweek santa monica irvine startup jobs.
Startup Professionals Musings
MAY 25, 2010
Investors are people too. They evaluate you like you should assess a possible co-founder or first employee. What are your credentials? What have you done that would convince me that my money is safe in your hands? Only after they’re sold on you, do they want to see your plan and hear your idea, not the other way around. Even with great credentials, it is all too possible for an entrepreneur to come across as a high risk investment.
Berkonomics
MAY 26, 2010
In 1981, Herb Cohen published “ You Can Negotiate Anything ”, an excellent guide to great negotiating. I’ve read and reread the book a number of times and find myself using the techniques often in many areas of my life. One of his lessons remains clearly on my mind and is a variant of the old “You name the price and I’ll name the terms” challenge that works so well in negotiation. .
Eric Greenspan
MAY 4, 2010
Let’s face it, the iPhone is pretty great. But…why, oh why, can’t my iPhone do the following… Why can’t I touch and hold an email and be given a popup menu that offers: Find/show all from this person. Find/show all to this person. Show all from Subject. Show all UNOPENED. Flag for Follow-up. Why can’t they add a hard button for switching on multi-tasking and/or one for the camera.
Tech Zulu Event
MAY 11, 2010
Oh Craigslist, the place you go to find just about anything you may be looking for and then some. Well now there is a place startups can go to find just about anything a startup may need and its called Help A Startup Out (HASO). The categories are made up of "Advisors", "Feedback Needed", "Co-founder Wanted", "Rants And Raves", "Education", "Looking for Funding", "Office Space" and "Services", and "Startup Jobs".
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 1, 2010
Running the “Agile&# Board. Most early stage startups having monthly board meetings. I normally recommend 8 meetings per year. It makes no sense to meet in August or December due to travel schedules of most investors. You can do calls if need be. And I often recommend that board meetings be every 5 or 6 weeks rather than 4 to give enough elapsed time for stuff to actually happen between meetings.
socalTECH
MAY 24, 2010
Los Angeles-based Twitter advertising firm Ad.ly , which appears to have been caught this morning by Twitter's declaration that it would no longer allow third party advertising in Twitter streams, has responded to the announcement. Sean Rad, the firm's founder, told socalTECH this afternoon that Ad.ly supports Twitter's effort to "create standards around in-stream advertising," explaining "Since inception, Ad.ly has, and still is operating under Twitter's approved guidelines and terms of service
Startup Professionals Musings
MAY 10, 2010
Maybe it’s just me, but I seem to be seeing more and more parallel entrepreneurs these days. These are people who are working on multiple startups concurrently. On the surface, this seems like an extremely difficult and dangerous practice, but for the new generations which have been multi-tasking since birth, it may be just business as usual. I’m not talking here about a bit of overlap between the winding down of one venture, while already gearing up for the next.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 15, 2010
I recently wrote a piece about how Entrepreneurs Should be Respected, Not Loved. The premise was that some leaders are too enamored with the approbation of their peers than making the tough decisions in the business that are bound to upset some people. The corollary to this rule is “decision by indecision.&# This is one of my favorite lines to remind entrepreneurs because it is the sort of garden variety mistake that is so common in everyday life.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 23, 2010
Often when startups who have raised venture capital need another round of financing they will turn to their existing investors to give them money before raising from outsiders. This happens when the company has been making steady progress but hasn’t built enough “ proof &# to raise its next round of financing from external investors. The traditional way that this type of financing is offered is what is known as “convertible debt.&# This means that the investment does not have
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 15, 2010
We just had our sixth episode of #TWiVC and I felt this one was the best. This week was had Jason Calacanis as our guest. It’s always fun chatting with Jason because he’s knowledgeable about the market, quick on topics and pushes me to talk more about VC / entrepreneur issues. We’re staring to get the hang of how to divide the show up into talking about deals but also talking about issues for entrepreneurs during funding.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 25, 2010
I have read much commentary on my Twitter stream (ironically) and in the press about how investors are going to abandon investments in the Twitter ecosystem because they seem to appear hostile to ecosystem partners. Let me be the first to say that I don’t agree with this notion. Let me explain. 1. Regarding protecting the quality of the stream from an influx of low quality advertising, I emphatically agree with (what I perceive to be**) Twitter’s positioning.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 12, 2010
I recently wrote an article on how to respond to board members between meetings. I basically took some time on a weekend and just hacked out what was on my mind. Two people whom I respect (Babak Nivi and Brad Feld) added commentary that made me want to come back and clarify my thoughts. If I were to re-write the original post I would have taken out the section on “how to get better intro’s from VC’s&# and made it it’s own post.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 11, 2010
I haven’t written a blog post in a week. I travelled for a couple of days for work and decided to get some sleep on those days rather than staying up into the wee hours as I often do when I travel. I closed one deal (I’ll talk about that soon) and issued one term sheet (I hope to talk about that soon, we’ll see!). It has also coincided with the kickoff of our Launchpad LA educational series which has taken some of my time.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 19, 2010
Our guest this week on #TWiVC was Dana Settle , partner at Greycroft Partners , a venture capital firm with offices in New York and Los Angeles. It’s always fun debating companies with Dana because she’s always so knowledgeable on deals – particularly those in the digital media, ad-tech and eCommerce spaces. When the show has been processed it will be available here (estimated 8pm PDT).
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 4, 2010
Had a great chat with Jim Armstrong who is a General Partner at Clearstone Venture Partners today on TWiVC. You can watch the TWiVC episode with Jim Armstrong here. It was especially fun for me because we got the chance to talk about the VC industry and how entrepreneurs should think about the VC industry in addition to discussing deals. Clearstone currently invests out of a $200 million fund based in LA with offices in Menlo Park and in India.
socalTECH
MAY 27, 2010
For this morning's interview, we have an interview with Kieve Huffman , the co-founder of Dather (www.dather.com), a new Los Angeles startup which has created a tool which helps to aggregate social networking web sites and media. Kieve has previously been GM and VP of Sony BMG's Global Digital Business Group, and VP of Media Content at InfoSpace, and his partner, Scott Boyd, who was most recently GM at Buzznet and also was Managing Director of AOL Music.
socalTECH
MAY 13, 2010
Los Angeles-based Internet Brands has been sued by the former owners of one of the firm's properties, Model Mayhem , according to legal documents recently leaked to the press. According to the complaint, which was filed by Donald F. Waitt and Tyler A. Waitt, founders of Model Mayhem, Internet Brands failed to make deferred payments which were a part of the deal to acquire Model Mayhem.
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