Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 18, 2012
It’s 4.50am. Sunday morning. And I couldn’t sleep. I have much on my mind since I just returned from a week on the road. 5 days. 3 cities. Late night Mexican food. Beers. Airports. Delays. I left on a Sunday. I had to miss a full day with my family, camping in the mountains. I returned home Friday night at 10pm – too late to see my kids.
SoCal CTO
DECEMBER 19, 2012
I was talking with an early-stage founder who has a product vision and wants to get it built. He is not a technical person, but is somewhat web savvy. He wanted to get input from me on what he's doing, and he wants to begin to ask developers what it would take to build his product. I asked some of the same questions I ask in my Free Startup CTO Consulting Sessions and then I get to a very common conversation: Me : Do you have specs?
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Berkonomics
MARCH 25, 2012
For those of us who’ve invested in early stage companies, especially technology startups, we have confronted a universal problem. There are many ways to project the value of a company for purposes of pricing an investment, but all rely upon the revenue and profit projections of the entrepreneur as a starting point. Many formulas then discount those projections according to some set percentage or by assigning weight to elements of the enterprise.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 9, 2012
Who are the top tech companies to work for in Los Angeles? Despite a huge number of companies, we found there are a number which. popped up consistently in an informal (and highly non-scientific poll) of a number of readers, executive recruiters, and others in the Los Angeles area, who cited growth, brand, profitability, and other factors in their suggestions to us of the top companies.
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.
InfoChachkie
NOVEMBER 19, 2012
This article previously appeared in Forbes. Note: This is an installment in the Iconic Advice series. Other installments include: Jeff Bezos , Steve Jobs , Mark Cuban , Richard Branson , Walt Disney , Mark Zuckerberg , Michael Dell and Larry Ellison. Oprah Winfrey is one of the most successful entrepreneurs of her generation. Raised by her grandmother in rural Mississippi until age six and then by her mother, who worked as a maid in Milwaukee, Ms.
Eric Greenspan
JULY 3, 2012
11 years and 8 months of commitment, my life savings, every available dollar on every credit card, line and loan, and a promise to my children of a future, gone. The real story behind Make It Work’s demise isn’t exciting. It’s simply about a team of dedicated individuals that failed. We failed because the industry we were in changed over the years.
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
Frank Addante
OCTOBER 24, 2012
1. Sanebox (Email Organization) : Service that uses algorithms to organize your email into what’s important and what’s not. I was skeptical and had a lot of issues with giving up control of my inbox, but I’m hooked now. It works amazing well. Tips: Trust it. Check @SaneLater twice a day, @SaneBulk whenever you feel like reading newsletters, promotions, etc. and use @SaneBlackHole for all of your junk that you never want to see again.
Tech Zulu Event
JULY 13, 2012
Join TechZulu on a tour of some of the hottest Silicon Beach tech companies. Why not stop by for a quick beer, game, snack or just say hi at one of the many Silicon Beach tech companies on July 26 th from 6pm to 11pm Have a free beer or beverage, drop off a resume, see the office space or just kick back. The Deets. When: July 26, 2012 6-11pm. Where: Santa Monica, CA (Silicon Beach!).
Steve Reich
JUNE 11, 2012
This is not an article about the high moral purpose and the nobility of listening to your customers. It is an article about how to make your company worth a fortune by listening to your customers. Why does Google dominate search? They obsess about having the best search out there. Why do so many of us have iPhones? It gives the best customer experience of any phone.
Jason Nazar
JANUARY 9, 2012
Don’t take for granted your life, even if you think it’s filled with strife. Don’t take for granted your health, it can’t be replaced any amount of wealth. Don’t take for granted your friends, they may be all you have in the end. Don’t take for granted your kin, for they love you in spite of your sins. Don’t take for granted your dad, he may get mad when you’re bad but his love is no fad.
Both Sides of the Table
APRIL 28, 2012
When you work inside a startup with lots of clever and motivated staff you’re never short of good ideas that you can implement. It’s tempting to take on new projects, new features, new geographies, new speaking opportunities, whatever. Each one incrementally sounds like a good idea, yet collectively they end up punishing undisciplined teams.
SoCal Delicious
SEPTEMBER 19, 2012
Follow PandoDaily: Search. Main menu. Skip to primary content. Skip to secondary content. Deals. People. Products. Culture. PandoList. Events. Back Page. Books. Ten Tech Entrepreneurs Who Are Putting LA on the Map. Post navigation. ← Previous. Next → For one reason or another, people in this country tend to look down on LA. If a person from outside Los Angeles is a fan of the city, dig a little and you’ll probably find that they like it for the celebrities, Hollywood not LA.
Both Sides of the Table
DECEMBER 10, 2012
My wife & I have a close friend who recently entered the workforce for his first-ever job. On his first day of work my wife was kind enough to write down words of wisdom from her years on the job. I don’t write about Tania very often – mostly at her request. Otherwise I’d shout from the mountain tops how smart & capable she is.
Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 20, 2012
Every so often I find myself caught up in a really hectic 3-4 week schedule where it seems like I float endlessly betweens meetings. Pitches. Intros. Board Meetings. Conferences. And I get flooded with legal docs, end-of-quarter financial administration, recruiting, whatever. I get sucked up in “Do” mode. Startups Are for Doers. Now, I’m pretty on the record that being an entrepreneur is about being great at The Do.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 22, 2012
I think I’ve read Paul Graham’s post on “ Startup = Growth ” three or four times now. And of course on Twitter I’ve seen the Tweets, ReTweets and superlatives on what a great post it is. Viewing the article through the lens of a venture capitalist there’s much to agree with under the mantra of “growth!” And when you read the article carefully it allows for a period of discovery in your business.
Both Sides of the Table
DECEMBER 15, 2012
My Blackberry died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don’t know. It seems so long ago that we had to start hiding our Blackberry’s in our pockets to avoid always being chastised. If you were caught sending out an email on your Blackberry you had to quickly whip out your iPhone to show that – wait! – I have one of these, too. It is stunning to think about the blind spots that market leaders can develop.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 27, 2012
This article originally appeared on TechCrunch. Recently I wrote a post arguing to make the definition of a Startup more inclusive than that to which Silicon Valley, fueled by Venture Capital return profiles, would sometimes like to attach to the word. Today I’d like to talk about what startup communities outside of Silicon Valley look like, how they emerge and what makes them take hold.
Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 5, 2012
For the past three years I have been pounding the table as loud as I can about the future opportunities in digital video. The concise guide is here. My narrative has stayed pretty simple: People in the US watch 5.3 hours of TV per day. People read for less than 30 minutes. You will not fundamentally change consumers media consumption habits. So you tell me what the future of the Internet will be?
Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 5, 2012
This article originally appeared on TechCrunch. It is election season. So it’s tempting to think this is going to be a partisan post – it is not. I use George Bush vs. Al Gore as allegory and I’ve been using it with entrepreneurs for years to sink in a simple point about how to communicate with the market. I use it because I believe in the power of visual and memorable stories to sink into the consciousness.
Both Sides of the Table
DECEMBER 17, 2012
I got a call Sunday from a business colleague while I was sitting in the lounge at LAX waiting for yet another delayed flight. This colleague is a lawyer with whom I work on a deal and have done so for a couple of years. By all accounts I now consider him a friend. He caught me while I was sipping a Bloody Mary and thinking a bit a business situation that bummed me out.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 9, 2012
It’s Wednesday late afternoon. I’m aboard Delta flight 1833 from Cincinnati (actually, Northern Kentucky for what it’s worth) to Los Angeles. I had a very enjoyable day in Cincinnati meeting many local entrepreneurs, angels and accelerators. I was here to see one of our LPs (limited partners are the people who invest money in VC funds) called Fort Washington.
Both Sides of the Table
FEBRUARY 20, 2012
Tracy DiNunzio isn’t your typical Silicon Valley startup founder. She’s a painter and a self-proclaimed Bohemian. She did her first tech startup after the age of 30. And she didn’t start her company in Northern California. Tracy built her company, Recycled Media , out of necessity. She hasn’t raised any venture capital. She drove her company to profitability before paying herself a modest salary.
Both Sides of the Table
MARCH 22, 2012
Intros.They’re the lifeblood of networking – the currency of mavens. They are your route to angel money. Your entrée to sales meetings. We couldn’t live without them. But when misused, overused or abused they can diminish your personal brand, consume your valuable time and waste that of the relationships you value the most. I would like to make the case for being judicious with your introductions.
Both Sides of the Table
MARCH 3, 2012
I had this ethical dilemma pop up on one of the first deals I even did as a VC. I had been looking around at several deals in late 2008 as the markets were tanking. I had gotten close on a couple of deals but nothing rose to the level of “must do.” I was learning which VCs I wanted to work with, what stage & check size I wanted to commit do and what teams would be a good fit for me.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 5, 2012
This article initially appeared on TechCrunch - with a minor update highlighted in red below. Ah. We’re back to discussing convertible debt again. This time by the efforts of Adeo Ressi to introduce a new kind of structure called “ convertible equity.” I applaud all efforts by people to take on this issue and especially be Adeo who – let’s be honest – was really the first champion of trying to make the VC world more transparent by launching TheFunded, which d
Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 4, 2012
I recently wrote about the 12 tips to building successful startup communities. After a recent discussion I had with Steve Blank it made me remember that I had left off one of the most critical factors – a culture of failure. I remember this lesson well. I lived in London from 1997-2005 and for 6 of those years ran my startup based out of London.
Both Sides of the Table
MAY 23, 2012
This article originally ran on PEHub. If you prefer the super short version – I’ve summarized the post in the final section. Many observers of the venture capital industry have questioned whether its best days are behind it. They are frustrated by the past decade of subpar returns for the sector. The most recent report to weigh in on the troubles of the industry was produced by the esteemed Kauffman Foundation.
InfoChachkie
JUNE 11, 2012
HIGHEST DEGREE OBTAINED BY AMERICA'S 400 RICHEST PEOPLE Source: Forbes Magazine, Jan 2012. According to a January 2012 Forbes article, nearly 16% of the 400 most affluent Americans do not have a college degree. When one considers the 400 richest people on the entire planet, the percentage of non-college graduates doubles. Shocking? Hardly. PayPal Co-founder Peter Thiel has granted 24 people under 21 years old $100,000 each, with plans to allocate additional scholarships in coming years.
InfoChachkie
FEBRUARY 6, 2012
As part of UC Santa Barbara’s Distinguished Lecture Series, Jason Nazar, Co-Founder and CEO of Docstoc , recently shared ten lessons that emerging entrepreneurs can learn from superheroes. Jason’s inspiration for this 6 ½ minute talk was a blog entry he wrote in 2008, which went viral within the startup community. You can check out Jason’s original entry HERE.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 24, 2012
Serena Ehrlich , Director of Marketing of Los Angeles-based Mogreet --and who is also well known in Los Angeles for her work with the Los Angeles chapter of the Social Media club--has been recognized by Mobile Marketer as one of its Mobile Women to Watch 2013. Ehrlich has been involved widely in the Los Angeles startup and social media community. Ehrlich joined Mogreet earlier this year.
socalTECH
MAY 23, 2012
In what is a huge blow to Silicon Beach, Santa Monica-based BetterWorks , the software-and-technology-meets-employee-perks startup run by Paige Craig, told its users today that it is sunsetting its site on May 31st. According to an email from Craig, the company decided to close down the BettterWorks perk platform, and will not longer be active after next Thursday.
InfoChachkie
FEBRUARY 20, 2012
Note: This is an installment in the Iconic Advice series. Other installments include: Jeff Bezos , Steve Jobs , Mark Cuban , Richard Branson , Walt Disney , Mark Zuckerberg , Michael Dell and Larry Ellison. For more than 30-years, Bill Gates has been at the pinnacle of the software industry. Like Steve Jobs, Michael Dell and Larry Ellison, he is one of the few startup Founders who remained at the helm of their respective companies throughout their entire maturation process.
InfoChachkie
JUNE 4, 2012
“Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself.”. Eleanor Roosevelt – US Diplomat & Wife of President Franklin Roosevelt. As an entrepreneur, I helped create companies which achieved two IPOs and two trade sales totaling $385 million. During those same 15-years, I made innumerable mistakes. Entrepreneurship is best learned experientially , both directly and through the experiences of others.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 27, 2012
For the last week of the year, we're featuring the thoughts and reflections of some of the movers and shakers of Southern California's high tech community. We asked the same four questions of a variety of top technology entrepreneurs, investors, and others, to hear what they're thinking about, and are sharing it here over the next week. Kevin Winston , is the organizer of Digital LA , the popular and widely attended networking organization for the Los Angeles startup, web, movie, music, marketin
InfoChachkie
NOVEMBER 5, 2012
I always walk away smarter after speaking with Steve Blank. In addition to being a thought leader within the Lean Startup Movement , Steve is also a professor at Stanford and Berkley. However, many people are not aware that prior to entering academia, Steve was a wily and creative marketing entrepreneur. If you haven't already subscribed yet, subscribe now for free weekly Infochachkie articles!
InfoChachkie
JANUARY 18, 2012
As part of UC Santa Barbara’s Distinguished Lecture Series, serial entrepreneur and noted venture capitalist Mark Suster recently shared his advice with a large crowd of emerging entrepreneurs. Mark is a Partner at GRP Partners and authors one of the most widely read startup blogs, BothSidesOfTheTable. Mark framed his comments around the major mistakes he made during his early ventures.
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