Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 28, 2013
'CEO transparency. It almost sounds uncontroversial. A CEO should tell her staff everything! Right? Right?!? Of course not. It’s a hard topic to write about because it’s almost an accepted norm that total transparency is good. It is not. For starters let me use “CEO” as a proxy to include her “inner circle” which might mean co-founders or might just mean senior execs of the business.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 12, 2013
'Venture and angel investing has long been considered a man''s world--with domination of the industry, executives, financiers, and others by men, with only a few exceptions. In a bid to change that, there are a few groups working on helping women entrepreneurs, investors, and others, including the Pipeline Fellowship (www.pipelinefellowship.com), which recently launched itself into the Los Angeles market.
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InfoChachkie
SEPTEMBER 16, 2013
'A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. The six words, which I believe encompass the key characteristics of a successful, serial entrepreneur, are: Fervent, Wily, Selfless, Optimistically Pessimistic and Self-aware. At first glance, it may appear that a number of commonly assumed attributes are missing from my list. For instance, Alan Hall cataloged 27 entrepreneurial traits in THIS Forbes article.
SoCal CTO
SEPTEMBER 30, 2013
'Are you a non-technical startup founder who’s about to go have a conversation with a Chief Technical Officer (CTO) or Technical advisory type person? Maybe you are going for a reality check on your current situation - wondering if you have a Weak Development Team or a Startup Founder Developer Gap. Maybe you are trying to determine what technologies might apply that you should be evaluating.
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Berkonomics
SEPTEMBER 26, 2013
'So you’ve found the buyer, received a letter of interest, signed it, and tied your company up for a period to complete the deal. Everyone on the board is anxious to close this. You’ve committed time to do whatever is needed. You’ve informed your top management of the pending deal and they know they will be impacted and are a bit skittish. You wonder if you should make a public announcement to your troops, worrying over loss of focus, people thinking of jumping ship, competitors finding mors
Eric Greenspan
SEPTEMBER 27, 2013
'Eric Greenspan at Macaw Coffee Company Farm. My latest venture is coffee. Yes, coffee. After 20+ years as an IT geek, I’ve jumped ship. After starting my career with IBM and building three successful IT companies, I’ve decided to follow my true passion. I’ve been a foodie most of my life, so this fits me quite well. As far as technology goes, sure, I’ll be using my knowledge and skills to develop a business around technology and the process of producing our product uses
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 18, 2013
'Santa Monica startup Amp , led by Sarah McKinney, has launched its service into beta, saying that it is looking to help students and professionals find information on sustainability resources. According to the startup, it lets users discover resource around environmental and social progress, allowing for discovery, ratings, and reviews of everything from news sources, to conferences, and more in the areas of environmental and social areas.
InfoChachkie
SEPTEMBER 3, 2013
'Is One Line Enough? A version of this article previously appeared on PandoDaily. In 1908, American baseball pitcher Addie Joss threw 74pitches and completed the most efficient perfect game ever recorded (i.e., no hits, no errors, no runs). To put this accomplishment into perspective, there have only been 23perfect games recorded in major league baseball during the past 133 years, during which nearly 400,000 games have been played.
Startup Professionals Musings
SEPTEMBER 8, 2013
'Contrary to what most of you might guess, the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity over the last few years is not Gen-Y young upstarts, but Baby Boomers in the 55-64 year age group. In fact, according to a study by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, these Boomers are actually driving a new entrepreneurship boom. Some people are calling entrepreneurship the ‘new mid-life crisis’ for the 76 million-strong demographic once thought to be over the hill.
Berkonomics
SEPTEMBER 19, 2013
'Not all companies are successful. The end game can be a failure of the business. In fact, many angel investors or venture capitalists look for and respect the lessons learned by entrepreneurs that have survived a failed business. The key question is how did the entrepreneur fail? And then: What lessons were learned from the failure? One VC calls this entrepreneur one who “has seen the movie before” and spends time questioning the entrepreneur on lessons learned, often praising the person for
Tech Zulu Event
SEPTEMBER 27, 2013
'TechZulu is happy to announce that we will be bringing you all the action live from the GLAZED Conference Monday, September 30th starting at 9AM. GLAZED is a 3-day Glass and Wearable Tech event located in the heart of downtoan San Francisco including: a weekend hackathon put on by Stained Glass Labs/ AngelHack , a 1-day Glazed Conference : A Glass and Wearable Platform Business Thought Leadership Symposium culminating into the Digital Fall Tech Fashion Show co-produced by Ubergizmo and Sta
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 30, 2013
'As I have argued before, a few key people in every organization can make a huge difference on its success. Even for very large companies or even at a citywide level. But that doesn’t forgive the CEO, the board or for that matter anybody in an organization from allowing weak links. In fact, nearly every team work with I encourage them to think about succession planning in the event “that somebody gets hit by a beer truck.” I don’t know where I started using the phrase but
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 27, 2013
'Organizers of the annual Siemer Silicon Beach Summit said this week that they''ve created a new prize, worth $160,000, which it will award to a startup, in a combination of cash and services. Siemer Ventures, Manatt Digital Media, Grant Thorton, Trinet, and SocialRadius said the "Big Kahuna Award", which is part of its annual WaveMaker Awards recognizing companies with the potential for rapid scaling and success, will receive $75,000 in cash from Siemer VEntures and Manatt Venture Fund, plus $8
InfoChachkie
SEPTEMBER 30, 2013
'A version of this article previously appeared on Inc. Mankind has long recognized the power of scarcity- we want more of what we are denied or find difficult to obtain. Societies have come up with homilies that highlight the power of this remote bias, such as, "The grass is always greener on the other side of the hill" and "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
Startup Professionals Musings
SEPTEMBER 30, 2013
'Every investor expects to see some business traction, both before and after a funding event. If you have been working 20 hours a day, and spent your last dollar, but have no results to show, investors will be sympathetic, but will probably tell you that your dream doesn’t have wheels. Traction means forward progress. I hear a lot of entrepreneurs contemplating their great “idea” for several years with little discernable progress, and looking for money to start.
Berkonomics
SEPTEMBER 12, 2013
'When we start a business, we are optimistic that we will succeed and dream of riches to follow when the company is sold or even participating in an IPO. Some of us build our businesses to be lifestyle creations, destined to provide for our families but not necessarily as creators of great equity upon an eventual sale. But most of us dream of selling the business someday for lots of money and building our wealth upon that event.
Tech Zulu Event
SEPTEMBER 16, 2013
'Silicon Valley may still be the capital of technology with a mix of new (Google, Facebook) and old (Apple, HP) sprinkling the landscape. However, Silicon Valley isn’t the only place to grow technology innovators from the ground up. Los Angeles has seen its own startup scene develop with Silicon Beach, which stretches between Santa Monica and Playa Vista.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 15, 2013
'For much of 2013 I watched the press write articles about how the YouTube “MCNs” (multi-channel networks) were doomed and tried to square that with the data I was watching at the one I invested in, Maker Studios, who has had one hell of a year. Maker announced it has raised $62 million this year, acquired an amazing off-YouTube distribution network and grown its business in monetary terms by almost 300% year-over-year off of an already large base.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 24, 2013
'Online peer-to-peer room rental marketplace Airbnb is launching a big promotion in Los Angeles this weekend, with five "pop-up" houses which it is erecting in locations around the city, created by local celebrities. Airbnb said its "pop-up" houses--prefab houses being installed at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, The Cook''s Garden by HGEL in Venice, The Arts District, The Viper Room, and The Grove--will be bookable by users, and were designed by James Franco, Anjelica Huston, Moby, Molly Sims &
Steve Reich
SEPTEMBER 10, 2013
'The Pasadena Angels have redesigned our site with a new focus on Entrepreneurs and LA Basin tech resources. We took a lesson from successful companies we have funded–we talked to the market first. We started by surveying a group of local entrepreneurs and our own members to find out what they wanted in a site. The message that came back was very clear–both groups wanted a site that showed that: 1) the PA are actively funding companies, 2) are engaged with the local tech community,
Startup Professionals Musings
SEPTEMBER 7, 2013
'Investors will tell you that they love to put money into startups that are scalable, and ready to scale. But what does that really mean? Simply stated, it means that your business has the potential to multiply revenue with minimal incremental cost. Ready to scale is when you have a proven product and a proven business model, about to expand to new geographies and markets.
Berkonomics
SEPTEMBER 5, 2013
'When we are young and early in our business lives, we feel infallible to the degree that we do not think of what might happen if we die while in office or decide to leave the company for any reason. Such thoughts just do not occur to most of us until the business is substantially far enough along in its growth to have multiple layers of management and enough employees and stakeholders that there is a board of directors and calls for key man insurance and succession planning.
Tech Zulu Event
SEPTEMBER 4, 2013
'TechZulu is doing an ultra special TZ Tech Crawl for Social Media Week Los Angeles ! Come get a tour of some of the hottest Silicon Beach companies. Why not stop by for a quick beer, game, snack or just say hi at one of the many Silicon Beach tech companies from 6pm to 11pm? Have a free beer or beverage, drop off a resume, see the office space or just kick back.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 29, 2013
'If you track the venture capital industry it would be hard to miss the conversation going on this week over AngelList “Syndicates.” From the hyperbolic Jason Calacanis weighing in that “The petty VC’s did everything to deride [Naval, the co-founder of AngelList]” as though the industry was collectively s g its pants that AngelList was going to put us out of business.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 26, 2013
'There''s been a lot of buzz about tech mogul Elon Musks''s idea behind "Hyperloop"--a concept to make transit between Los Angeles and San Francisco in only minutes, using 800 mph, aluminum pods. However, Musk''s idea has only been that--an idea--with no plans to actually implement the transportation system. Los Angeles-based JumpStartFund wants to change that, and said today that it has tapped two notable engineers to head up crowd-sourcing on its site for the concept.
InfoChachkie
SEPTEMBER 9, 2013
'A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. Don Charlton’s heroic journey began with him growing up on government assistance and culminated in his founding The Resumator , one of America''s fastest growing startups. Don''s perseverance and chronically positive attitude is inspiring. The Resumator''s intuitive recruiting and applicant tracking solution has been used by over 12,000 companies, which have processed more than 4 million resumes and filled 36,000 jobs.
Startup Professionals Musings
SEPTEMBER 28, 2013
'Some people are not cut out to be entrepreneurs. This is a good thing, or the business world would be chaos, with everyone trying to do their own thing. So what about you? How do you know if you should be running your own company, or concentrating on that queue of work that someone else has built for you? I’ve hit this before, but I still hear from too many unhappy entrepreneurs.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 26, 2013
'If you Can’t Make Time, MakeSpace. A few months ago I wrote about an entrepreneur, Sam Rosen, whom we brought on as an EIR at Upfront Ventures. I would have liked to have been even more Upfront with you back then about our intentions with Sam but out of respect to him we held back on our broader thesis until now. Today we announced our launch. Here’s the deal.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 12, 2013
'Today is a day I’ve waited patiently for for 5 years but more earnestly for more than 1 year. I am thrilled to announce that we have added Hamet Watt as a Partner at Upfront Ventures. Now that he’s become a VC he’s promising me he’ll provide way more public information and discourse so please welcome him by following him on Twitter and better yet welcoming him with a Tweet of your own linking to his Twitter handle or this post.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 17, 2013
'In my last post I pointed out that many of the media commentators who have criticized the YouTube video network companies as not having strong businesses were mistaken. The main thrust of the post is that with YouTube taking a 45% of revenue and talent taking 70% of the remaining revenue, YouTube Networks didn’t have sustainable businesses unless they invested heavily in technology as a tool to increase margin and provide defensibility.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 19, 2013
'Six months ago Upfront Ventures announced its first Partner hire since 2007 – Greg Bettinelli. I wrote about him here. More importantly, he has just announced his first investment – he led a $7 million investment in Deliv – please read about it on Greg’s spiffy new blog. It’s been a really exciting time for me personally to be able to see a partner come in with the energy, enthusiasm and new ideas that remind me of myself 6 years ago.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 7, 2013
'Gabe Rivera wrote a post on why TechMeme is now using its editors to curate titles that appear on its site. Gabe’s post appears first on TechMeme’s website, which must mean Gabe has paid off some TechMeme editors to get his story to rise to the top. I never saw it go out with a “tip @techmeme” on Twitter. Did you? Well. His article is well worth reading anyways.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 26, 2013
'Looking for a weekend getaway? WanderWe , a new, online travel site from Los Angeles-based Oversee.net, said today that it has launched, to help travelers find and book short trips, within a 500 mile radius of home. The new site says it allows travelers to find short trips, based on distance from home, budget, and the kind of experience they''d like to have, and was specifically designed for tablet browsing.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 9, 2013
'The latest company to expand into Silicon Beach? Technology giant Microsoft , which opened up a new technology center in Playa Vista last week, which it says will house around 130 Microsoft employees. Microsoft''s efforts in Los Angeles are headed by Mark Kornegay, General Manager of Microsoft, Southern California. The employees at the new Microsoft office are supporting a number of customers in the LA area.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 20, 2013
'Los Angeles-based Virtual Greats , a provider of licensed, virtual goods for online and mobile games, has been acquired by fellow virtual goods company Iconicfuture , the two announced this week. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. Virtual Greats distributed a range of virtual goods linked with brands, celebrities, TV shows, films, and other sources.
socalTECH
SEPTEMBER 6, 2013
'In a move which adds some additional capital to the Los Angeles clean technology market, utility company Southern California Gas Company said Thursday that it has created a new, $1M innovation fund to help companies develop clean technology. SoCalGas said it created the new fund with the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator , to help fund startups in the area of fuel cells, renewable natural gas and distributed natural gas products.
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