socalTECH

JUNE 1, 2012

That's what Los Angeles-based MergeLocal (www.mergelocal.com) is looking to find out, by offering up points which can be converted to real cash, when users check into local businesses. What's your background, and how did you decide to start the company? Michael Wong: I was previously CTO of an agency called Breakthrough Ads.

CTO Coach 223

CTO Coach Startup Mobile Artificial Inteligence 223

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 19, 2012

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? This should be an iterative process with advisors and customers providing feedback on the product. Founder : Ummm. what do you mean? Don't stress over format.

Develop 354

Develop Development Technical Review CTO Coach 354

socalTECH

NOVEMBER 15, 2011

Are you an entrepreneur hoping to startup a company in the Los Angeles area? The latest to enter the scene is Los Angeles accelerator Start Engine (www.startengine.com), which was created by Howard Marks and Paul Kessler. Howard Marks: We're a startup accelerator, which will help entrepreneurs become successful in 90 days.

CTO Coach 194

CTO Coach Startup Mentor Activision 194

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 29, 2011

We caught up with Bong to hear more about his new startup. From the ground up, we're focused on both social and fun, and our brand attributes are aspirational, cultured, and fun. What's the story on how you started the company? Bong Koh: We started at the end of April. What is LifeCrowd?

Startup 271

Startup CTO Coach Activity Software Review 271

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 13, 2014

Let me assure you that it is also alive and well within startups. I see startup founders and managers who are stalled transplants from large organizations, as well as highly-capable technologists trying to start and run a business for the first time. How many technologists have tried to run startups and failed?

Startup 99

Startup CTO Coach Training Organization 99

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 15, 2019

As a long-time business advisor and angel investor, I’m a believer that “two heads are better than one” in building a new business. The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO.

Software Review 88

Software Review CTO Hire Outsource Development Startup 88

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 21, 2014

Startups are hard. You join teams that got good write-ups on TechCrunch, have great VCs, have star CEO’s, whatever. We tell startup stories. Our founder, Yves Sisteron, was my mentor and board member at my first startup. You’ve heard that a million times. Those that we survive with become family.

CTO Hire 320

CTO Hire Startup CTO Coach Venture Capital 320

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 20, 2013

As the NBA playoffs closes to an end in a grueling road to Game 7 between Miami Heats and San Antonio Spurs, it would behoove every startup founder to learn from key elements and strategies of both teams, as lessons from the sport of basketball can directly translate to the success of a startup company. 1) Identifying Team Chemistry.

Startup 94

Startup CTO Coach Coach Study 94

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 23, 2014

I will soon announce a few fundings (not yet closed, sorry) and I’m beginning to help them think about how to ramp up their engineering teams. And I spoke with the CTO of another great company I used to be on the board of and enlisted his support in potentially being an advisor to one company. Whom to Meet?

Networking 366

Networking Startup CTO Coach Email 366

socalTECH

JUNE 9, 2014

Los Angeles-based Jukin Media (www.jukinmedia.com) thinks it has figured that out, and instead of trying to create viral videos, has been buying up the rights to those videos--before they really go viral--to create not just a one-hit, viral video wonder, but a sustainable business. What is Jukin Media?

Media 235

Media Content Startup IP 235

SoCal CTO

MARCH 22, 2007

skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Thursday, March 22, 2007 Discussion Creation Among Bloggers - LinkedIn, Blogging and Discussion Groups Ive been participating in a Yahoo Group that are users of LinkedIn and who are Bloggers: [link] Its an interesting group of folks from diverse backgrounds. See Five Things Meme as an example.

Blogging 150

Blogging CTO Coach CTO Hire Southern California 150

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 16, 2014

We recently sat down with Luc Berlin, co-founder of Miigle, a SoCal startup that has an aggressive global mission to bring entrepreneurs together from around the world. We followed up with Luc to see just how he’s been managing the entrepreneurial waters. The quintessential problem that every startup has is one of visibility.

SoCal 104

SoCal Southern California Startup Platform 104

SoCal CTO

MARCH 18, 2010

I started out as screenwriter, went into local television, ran ad sales in the west for AOL and joined Facebook in the companies very early days. Example here: [link]. With that as a start it rarely feels burdensome. What keeps you up at night? You’ve got a REALLY diverse background. What’s the short version?

Startup 225

Startup Los Angeles Social Network Twiistup 225

SoCal CTO

JULY 23, 2012

I received a great question via LinkedIn: I'm the founding engineer and working hard to launch my startup. I seem to encounter a lot of people who want to attach a CTO label to me as I'm the only programmer on the founding team of three. What can I do to best equip myself to step up when the need to officially fill this role arises?

CTO Coach 231

CTO Coach CTO Hire Outsource Development Develop 231

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

Let me assure you that it is also alive and well within startups. I see startup founders and managers who are stalled transplants from large organizations, as well as highly-capable technologists trying to start and run a business for the first time. How many technologists have tried to run startups and failed?

Startup 84

Startup CTO Coach Training Organization 84

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

This is part of my Startup Advice series. So I was surprised at the sheer volumes of decisions that had to be made when I became a startup CEO. Somebody asks whether you plan to set up 401k’s and do contribution matching. Yes, I know it’s my job as the CEO to be the coach for people and that’s fine.

Entrepreneur 414

Entrepreneur Technical Review Slides CTO Coach 414

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 16, 2010

Let me assure you that it is also alive and well within startups. Forty years ago, in a satiric book named “ The Peter Principle ”, Dr. Sooner or later they are promoted to a position at which they are no longer competent, and there they remain, unless they join a startup to get the next level. Practice and training are critical.

Startup 88

Startup CTO Coach Training Organization 88

socalTECH

JULY 13, 2016

Dawn Newton: As an example, when you go to Google.com, it is actually routing to an IP address. We figured out that by using DNS, youcan have a name�for example, I am dawn.newton.bit � and that name I can give to everybody, and if someone puts it in, they know it is going to the right wallet. So, it's critical to get that right.

Startup 100

Startup IP CTO Coach Allegis 100

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 23, 2011

Let me assure you that it is also alive and well within startups. Forty years ago, in a satiric book named “ The Peter Principle ”, Dr. Sooner or later they are promoted to a position at which they are no longer competent, and there they remain, unless they start or join a startup to get the next level.

Entrepreneur 92

Entrepreneur CTO Coach Training Startup 92

SoCal CTO

MARCH 11, 2013

Yesterday, I was talking to a startup founder about their MVP and they said something that finally got me to write this post: "I have a few investors interested but they want to see a product." For example, the iPod won not because of better features and functions. I would guess that this represents less than 5% of startups.

Metrics 264

Metrics Venture Capital News Product 264

SoCal CTO

NOVEMBER 10, 2009

From there, I became the first non-founder employee at an e-commerce startup called BITSource, which was the first electronic software distributor delivering electronic volume software licenses to corporations. Earlier this year I founded a new startup called KlickFu. What’s keeping you up at night? What are you working on now?

Product 150

Product Entrepreneur Social Media Google 150

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 16, 2017

As a long-time business advisor and angel investor, I’m a believer that “two heads are better than one” in building a new business. The reason is that good attributes apply equally well to “external” partners, as they do to internal partners, like a co-founder or CTO.

Software Review 56

Software Review CTO Hire Outsource Development CTO Coach 56

Tech Zulu Event

MAY 20, 2014

TechZulu recently sat down with east coast transplant Olenka Polak to talk about startup life in Los Angeles. Explain to our readers why you started your company, and why you created your app myLINGO. I mean, we’re new to this town and new to this industry – so just a lot of things came up during the launch that we’re now looking into.

Startup 91

Startup Entertainment CTO Coach Screening 91

SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 10, 2016

By far the most popular post on this blog is 32 Questions Developers May Have Forgot to Ask a Startup Founder. While I’ve updated it a few times, it continues to get at important questions that startup founders need to be asking. For example, are you providing a stats service that needs frequent, fast updates? What do they do?

Startup 150

Startup SEO CTO Coach Web 150

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 8, 2010

August was a slow month in terms of traffic and I was away for a lot of the month, but there were some really great posts at the intersection of startups, technology, product and being a Startup CTO. He blogs to 10,000 web entrepreneurs at Software by Rob and co-hosts the podcast Startups for the Rest of Us.

Startup 191

Startup Venture Capital Blogging CTO Hire 191

SoCal CTO

FEBRUARY 13, 2013

I promised to do this post as a follow-up to the session to provide additional links and information. Examples might be a recommendation engine, search engine, matching engine or something with a complex interface. The real reason to build an MVP is to do early tests of key Startup Metrics for the business.

Technical Review 338

Technical Review CTO Hire CTO Coach Software Review 338

SoCal CTO

OCTOBER 5, 2010

Great content again in September that meets at the intersection of startups, technology, product and being a Startup CTO. Chris Dixon , September 12, 2010 My most useful career experience was about eight years ago when I was trying to break into the world of VC-backed startups. Why You Should Write. Status / reputation.

Startup 191

Startup Product Technology Venture Capital 191

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 23, 2012

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. The easy answer of splitting it equally among all co-founders, since there is minimal value at that point, is usually the worst possible answer, and often results in a later startup failure due to an obvious inequity.

Startup 101

Startup Entrepreneur Equity CTO Hire 101

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 8, 2010

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. The easy answer of splitting it equally among all co-founders, since there is minimal value at that point, is usually the worst possible answer, and often results in a later startup failure due to an obvious inequity.

Equity 91

Equity Startup CTO Hire CTO Coach 91

SoCal CTO

AUGUST 3, 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 30 Startup Posts in June 2010 Top 29 Startup Posts May 2010 Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April 16 Great Startup Posts from March The following are the top items based on social signals.

Startup 217

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Software Review 217