Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

I’m super excited to announce that GRP Partners led the investment in Ethan Anderson’s new company MyTime (link has LA-based merchants but will give you a good feel for the product). BuildOnline (the company I founded) has just announcement plans to be more aggressive in growing in the US. Let me not bury the lede.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2015

recently wrote a post talking about how some VCs meddle in operating company decisions or some executive teams are too reliant on VCs to jump in and make hard calls for them. Of course we fancy ourselves as the best sales people in the company. Here is where I see this really play out: Product Management. ” PR.

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 17, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Saturday, February 17, 2007 About this Blog Ive been thinking about doing a blog with my thoughts on technology and whats happening in the Los Angeles area technology scene for a while, but it was Ben Kuos recent start of a blog that inspired me to actually go ahead and do it. Thanks Ben.

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Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 16, 2014

One of the vivid memories I have from being a startup CEO is the feeling that most people in your company have a look in their eyes that like they can do your job as well as you. But if you level up , raise capital and grow customers, revenue and staff – life changes. You hire great people. How hard could it be?

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Both Sides of the Table

JULY 1, 2010

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. But issues do arise as your company grows. I see two common mistakes in companies (not just in startups, in fact).

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Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2014

Much has been written about when it is time to hire a “professional CEO” to run a startup company and of course that has long been a norm in Silicon Valley when founders find that their inexperience may be a limiting factor in company growth ( know as the Peter Principle ). and Microsoft had become.

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Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 21, 2014

Working hard together at a big company just isn’t the same. The truth is you really don’t know how your teammates or your bosses will perform in good times and bad. You hire people who look good on paper. Who came in the office at 2am when the servers crashed – even on the night of the big company party.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2023

So, the first question I usually get is what percent of the company or equity is that person worth? The value in a startup is all about tangible results, so I see no equity value in the idea alone. Building the product may be the easy part of your startup challenge. Level of responsibility and time allocated.

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 1, 2014

It’s the company that evokes fear into more startups and venture capitalists looking to fund eCommerce businesses than any other potential competitor. We always had the added advantage that I have never met a single person in my life who ever said anything positive about their storage provider or experience. 10x the experience.

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SoCal CTO

MARCH 4, 2010

I’ve worked with 30+ early-stage companies in all sorts of capacities (and spoken to many, many more), so I thought it might be worthwhile trying to classify the various ways that I’ve engaged in different technology roles in startups. Later he posted about his experience in Challenges of Startups.

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socalTECH

APRIL 24, 2019

Anyone who hires anyone, or has ever looked for a jobs knows how important a resume is. We spoke with founder and CEO, Shane Bernstein , on why he thinks the company's system is far superior to using a resume to find technical talent. What's the problem you are solving here for companies? How did you end up starting the company?

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 17, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Saturday, February 17, 2007 Finding Good Developers in Los Angeles? Im part of a CTO group that meets once a month to discuss various topics. About 18 months ago, the entire group began to mention that they were having more difficulty finding good developers.

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socalTECH

MARCH 12, 2013

What is it about the content delivery network market which has enabled Santa Monica-based EdgeCast to go from startup to over $100M in revenues in only a few, short years? We caught up with James Segil , the firm's President, to hear the story behind that big growth at the company. We've grown really fast.

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socalTECH

AUGUST 8, 2018

We spoke with Dave Fink , CEO and co-founder of Posite, and Jonathan Neddenriep , co-founder and CTO of the company, to learn more. We've taken all of the logistics and headache out of defining a campaign for our customers. Companies are looking at diminishing returns, and were finding it more challenging to scale on Facebook.

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socalTECH

MARCH 8, 2013

DatAllegro was one of the first companies in what is now the "big data" industry, and helped to pioneer the entire segment. Now, Frost has set up shop buildling out a whole series of companies in the industry, and we caught up with him to learn more about the companies (Predixion Software, Cirro, Lineage, Kumo, etc.)

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 9, 2020

So the first question I usually get is what percent of the company or equity is that person worth? The value in a startup is all about tangible results, so I see no equity value in the idea alone. Building the product may be the easy part of your startup challenge. Level of responsibility and time allocated.

Startup 174

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Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2011

Only then can I even care about product, market or their nebulous “fit.&#. It’s my belief that through exceptional leadership you attract great teams that do more than the sum of the parts. I made an investment in a company with deep domain knowledge. “What I care about first and foremost is a great leader.

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Both Sides of the Table

JULY 5, 2010

You attend five customer meetings together over a two-week period and after each meeting you replay the results in the office about what it meant. We spend hours of seemingly “wasted&# time just in these informal chats simply shooting the shit. He downs cold ones with the head of biz dev. And it doesn’t stop there.

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socalTECH

JUNE 30, 2016

Phil Hui-Bon-Hoa , the CEO of El Segundo-based Kaleo (www.kaleo.com), is a serial entrepreneur who has previously built and sold four companies, including one acquired by IFILM, and another by Sun Microsystems. That ends up being a waste of time, especially in larger enterprises. How did the company start?

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 25, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Sunday, February 25, 2007 Interesting Model for University President Saw a post by Paul Kedrosky pointing us to Graeme Thickins on How Stanford Does It. Its interesting to think about how universities might want to have their staff better aligned with moving ideas from the lab to start-ups.

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 20, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Tuesday, February 20, 2007 Innovation and Geography I ran across a post in Read/Write Web - Does Location Matter in Web Innovation? that talked about a recent NY Times article When It Comes to Innovation, Geography Is Destiny. eHarmongy) as an acting CTO.

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SoCal CTO

MARCH 20, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Tuesday, March 20, 2007 Kevin Federline Search Engine Just saw a post - Sleep with a pop star, get your own branded search engine. talking about Prodeges Search with Kevin Site - [link]. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. I actually think this is a pretty innovative model.

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socalTECH

JANUARY 2, 2014

To shortcut what has been an antiquated way of connecting consumers with attorneys, Los Angeles startup LawKick (www.lawkick.com) has created an online, easy way to match up clients with lawyers, through a set of simple questions and answers about different kinds of legal problems. What''s LawKick about?

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 27, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Tuesday, February 27, 2007 Stanford Podcasts - eHarmony - Greg Waldorf I was just pointed to a set of great podcasts done by Stanford B-School and particularly, I just listed to the podcast by eHarmonys Greg Waldorf. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO.

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 17, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Saturday, February 17, 2007 A Different Kind of Incubator - The Hive I recently met with The Hive a new incubator in Orange County. This company was started by Victoria Duff (who many of us know from back in the late 90s), Phillis Lane (who I have known for quite a few years) and Jon Bukosky.

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 25, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Sunday, February 25, 2007 Challenge of Predicting Winners I just read a bit on the payout to YouTube from the Google Acquisition ( Internet News , CNN ). He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony.

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socalTECH

FEBRUARY 13, 2015

It''s the wild, wild west out there when it comes to valet parking, with hundreds of companies, and not much brand reconition. We caught up with CEO Serge Gojkovich to learn more about what the company is up to, and to hear more about the company''s acquisition of Curby this week. What is Curbstand up to right now?

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Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

This is part of my series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity. They often make great team members such as head of products, CTO, head of sales, CFO, etc. I was recently on TWiST with Jason Calacanis.

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SoCal CTO

MARCH 1, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Thursday, March 1, 2007 Entreprenuer Network Great post by Ben Kuo - The Importance of the “Network&# to Entrepreneurs - the informal connections between people in the technology industry here who have a vested interest in helping entrepreneurs take their companies to the next level.

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SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 28, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Wednesday, February 28, 2007 Google Maps Mobile I recently downloaded Google Maps Mobile for my Treo. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony.

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SoCal CTO

MARCH 20, 2007

Tony Karrer is CEO/CTO of TechEmpower , a Los Angeles Web Development firm, and is considered one of the top technologists in e-Learning. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony. ► February (2) CTO Founders / Cofounders Part-Time Startup CTO?

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

Eventually a successful startup will grow into a big company. Growth will slow, partly due to internal limits and partly because the company is starting to bump up against the limits of the markets it serves.” I spend a lot of time encouraging startups with whom I work to take measurement more seriously. Grow or die.

Startup 390

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SoCal CTO

MARCH 9, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Friday, March 9, 2007 Map of VC Investments Found this Map of 2006 VC Investments post. Tony Karrer is CEO/CTO of TechEmpower , a Los Angeles Web Development firm, and is considered one of the top technologists in e-Learning. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO.

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socalTECH

JUNE 9, 2014

We caught up with Lee Essner , the President of Jukin Media, to learn more about how the company thinks it has figured out how to make a business round viral videos. Can you talk about those businesses? The nice thing about those two businesses, is they feed each other nicely. It''s much more about quality, than quantity.

Media 235

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Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 22, 2014

A while back I talked about how and where to find a co-founder in “ For a Startup, Two Heads are Always Better Than One ”. The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO. Partner decisions are more important than hiring decisions.

Software Review 107

Software Review Entrepreneur CTO Hire Outsource Development 107

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

aka: An Open Letter to the Next Big Social Network) - 500 Hats , November 1, 2010 I've held off writing this post for a long time, because I couldn't quite get my head around all the issues. The United States is now a debtor nation to China and that the bill is about to come due. How to Take Down Facebook -- Hint: It Ain't Twitter.

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Startup Product Technology 175

SoCal CTO

MARCH 13, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Tuesday, March 13, 2007 8 Ways the Internet has Changed Software Marketing Great post - 8 Ways The Internet Changed Software Marketing - is an interesting take on how different it is these days to market software. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. Good stuff.

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