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What does it mean to be a CTO for a startup? Should a startupCTO spend their time programming? The role of a CTO varies as the company matures. Here’s a graphic from Socal CTO that illustrates the roles as they change over time: In its earliest days, a startup’s top need is often to produce a product.
Todd Gitlin of Safire Partners was nice enough to compile some data on StartCTO Salary and Equity at Venture Backed Companies for the LA CTO Forum and present last year. Todd is a go to resource for people looking for talent in startups. He was a great presenter to our group.
I generally am working as an acting CTO for about 3-4 start-ups or other companies at any one time. I also found this interesting graphic of the changing needs around the CTO role in different size/type companies that somewhat echoes my experience. So, what is my role as an acting CTO? Great question.
I’ve been having discussions with several people recently about the role of the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) in very early stage companies. In December 2007, I described how I commonly take on an Acting CTO Role in a Start-up. However, I’ve now begun questioning how and what an early-stage / startupCTO should be.
I did a presentation recently for a graduate class from The Founder Institute around getting online/mobile products out the door. I LOVED it because, the presentingpart was over quickly and we got into specific issues that the founders had in terms of getting things built. I was very worried for several startup in the room.
Todd Gitlin of Safire Partners was nice enough to compile some data on CTO Equity and Compensation at Venture Backed Companies for the LA CTO Forum and present last year. Todd is a go to resource for people looking for talent in startups. He was a great presenter to our group.
Over the past several years, I've done lots of presentations around a wide variety of topics. " I realized that I've never captured topics that I've covered (I'm always willing to look at other topics), nor have I put up my speaker bio. Tony Karrer Over the past 15 years, Tony has been a part-timeCTO for more than 30 startups.
I did a presentation this week at Coloft that looked at how Non-Technical Founders can go about getting their MVP built. I promised to do this post as a follow-up to the session to provide additional links and information. The real reason to build an MVP is to do early tests of key Startup Metrics for the business.
We all like to think of startups as “non hierarchic&# organizations and to some extent that should be true. As your organization grows and you hire senior staff where you are no longer managing every employee directly the issue of how to manage people that are not your “direct&# reports arises.
A large part of this conversation is what kinds of advisors startups should be looking for. A little while ago, I suggested that Every Web/Mobile Startup Should Have a Technical Advisor. We both felt that most startups are not taking a very systematic approach to defining with they need in terms of advisors.
There was a lot of passion in the room last week when I presented Working with Developers at the Stubbs Precellerator. So I promised that I would provide a follow-up after the session. This is that follow-up and hopefully it’s useful to people outside of the session as well. I.e., they need a developer more than they need a CTO.
Startups are hard. You’ve heard that a million times. The truth is you really don’t know how your teammates or your bosses will perform in good times and bad. 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.
I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity. I’ll start with an obvious one – I talk with the entrepreneur about competitors. I once had a startup team pitch me for an investment where the President of the company led the first call with me on his own.
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. I would far rather have some messes to clean up than to never have them cross the line trying.
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.
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. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony.
skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Monday, March 12, 2007 MyShape Article - Analyst Misses the Point The NY Times did a piece today on MyShape, a start-up in Pasadena - Log in Your Measurements, and the Clothes May Fit. “They’re probably a little ahead of their time,&# she said.
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.
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.
skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Friday, March 9, 2007 Map of VC Investments Found this Map of 2006 VC Investments post. 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-TimeStartupCTO? .
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. Attorney and Startup Business Advisor – Aaron Shec.
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.
skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Saturday, February 17, 2007 Where LinkedIn Works for Me Ive been a long time user of LinkedIn , but only recently have started getting the benefits I always expected. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony.
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.
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. Its works great. And there was a big surprise.
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.
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. He has twenty years’ experience as a CTO. He has been the CTO for several start-ups, most notably eHarmony.
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.
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.
To start off the year, we are publishing our first interview for the season with Jamie Siminoff , the CEO of Los Angeles-based Unsubscribe.com , an online service which helps you unsubscribe from unwanted newsletters and email lists. Tell us the story behind how the firm started? We raised $2.1M
skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Friday, February 23, 2007 Events and Networking in Los Angeles One of the issues I discussed in Innovation and Geography was that the geography and traffic in Los Angeles generally makes it more difficult for networking. Startup Co-Founders: If You Cant Recruit Em, Should You Join Em?
skip to main | skip to sidebar SoCal CTO Tuesday, March 20, 2007 Time Rich, Time Poor and Apple Jeremy Liew at Lightspeed Venture Partners has an interesting post: Time Rich or Time Poor? In it he separates web consumers into: Time Rich (more time than money) and Time Poor (more money than time).
link] [link] Posted byTony Karrer at 5:33 PM 0comments: Post a Comment Newer Post Older Post Home Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) About Me Tony Karrer Dr. 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.
Do you anticipate scale issues presently or in the future? Although noteworthy, working with large corporations differs remarkably from working with startups. While the appearance matters, remember you are hiring the development firm primarily for its development skills, not its graphic design skills. cto , product , saas
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. Maybe this meme will help.
Jeff Curie: I''ve been a startup guy here in Orange County for a long time. I was hired to head up strategy, marketing development, and product management. We grew that up, and did very well, and eventually sold it to IBM. Between Greg and Alan, we''ve come up with a very innovative way to solve this problem.
Becka Klauber Richter is co-founder of the startup, and spoke to us about the company, which she co-founded with Kasey Edwards. You often hear about people talking about how being with kids makes you present in the moment, and understand the things in life that are important to us. What's your background, how did you start the company?
When you run a startup you’re always on borrowed time. I’ve never met a founder who wasn’t acutely aware of his or her ticking time bomb and the sense that failure and humiliation is a real possibility. It’s why so few can really start a business from scratch.
In his spare time he raised nearly $30 million. Trust me – that kind of encounter can mean the difference between securing a contract, protecting yourself from getting turfed or getting acquired one day. You start to act cohesively as a group. Startup Advice' How much is too much? Rob jokes about it.
For example, we've been testing out local search for features phones, specifically, and we're starting a click-to-call prototypes, and even doing application marketing. The punchline is, we're implementing new ways to monetize mobile devices, base don time and location. It's not strictly cost-per-click ads anymore. READ MORE>>.
However, there's a new generation of technology driven startups who are looking to apply software and technology in a way that will change how movies are made, and marketed. What usually happens, is there's a barrage of poorly targeted ads leading up to opening weekend, and it drives downhill from there. It's all about execution.
Messenger : Thorsten von Eicken , RightScale’s Co-Founder and CTO, Chief Architect at Citrix Online (formerly Expertcity) and Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University and UC Santa Barbara. Does the world really need more servers in more datacenters gobbling up more power to send more tweets and Facebook pages around the world?
Earlier this week, a new startup, Porch (www.porch.com), launched its service to let people get a look at their neighbor''s home improvement projects -- complete with before and after photos, costs, and details on contractors and more. What inspired you to start the company? After finishing up my degree, we had a great 3.5
Coming hot off the coat tail of earlier this year’s Startup Weekend LA where Zaarly launched, this LASW was nothing less than amazing and as someone put, one of the best tech events in LA they had ever been to. With the pitching energy escalating in the room, regular pitches began short after.
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