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On the third Wednesday of every month I co-chair a meeting called the SoCal VCA (venture capital alliance), which represents participants from all of the top venture capital firms in Southern California as well as prominent members of the Tech Coast Angels (TCA). We feature a prominent speaker at every event.
“We don’t have budget for that this year” “I don’t believe in social media advertising.” We will have to build (or buy) technology in this area.” She might gladly tell you who gets decisions made, who is a pain in the arse, who is super technical, etc. It’s too strategic.
Santa Monica-based Demand Media (www.demandmedia.com) has seen its share of ups and downs as one of the highest visibility technology and media companies to come out of Southern California's technology ecosystem in recent years. What is Demand Media doing nowadays? Can you explain that process?
X1 Discovery said today that it has launched a new, electronic discovery software called X1 Social Discovery, which is specifically aimed at helping computer forensics professionals address social media content. X1 Discovery said it will be releasing its software on October 18th, priced at $945 per seat annually.
The press around the raise & company was fantastic and the promise of their technology – wireless charging that works as easily as WiFi – would positively affect many of our lives. uBeam’s tech does work and I have safely seen it demo’d in the real life many times. Working on it. And being ambitious.
There’s an article making the rounds in tech circles titled “ Growth Hacking is Bull ” written by Muhammad Saleem. His early experience was at LogMeIn and then he went on to help Xobni, DropBox, LookOut and EventBrite to name a few companies I’m sure you’ve heard of. Success begets success.
If this isn’t you, we’d probably still have a look if you did something truly exception – probably at startup or tech firm. The chosen candidate will probably have worked for a very reputable firm that is either in technology, consulting, investment banking, media or a startup. We need help.
TapIt Media acquired for $23M by Phunware. 9 Ways socalTECH Can Help You With Your New Year's Resolutions. Southern California's Most Popular Tech Stories. LaunchpadLA Opens Up Spring Applications. Acquisition of note: Nexsan Acquired For $120M, by Imation. In our features section: Interview with Blair Harrison of Frequency.
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 best “MCNs” are in fact building strong technology businesses with rapid growth and strong, defensible assets. Not so fast.
The world of media is in the midst of a major transition, where radio and television are no longer the powers they used to be--and there''s a clear shift towards some unknown future online. Our other shows are about sports, entertainment, movie reviews, university news--all of the things that fit under the umbrella of news. Just do it.
The technology team disagrees on direction and wants resolutions. Maybe it helps that I love controversy and pushing the boundaries so people felt it was OK for them to do it as well. There’s a guy in Los Angeles that I met at several tech networking events. Your head of sales thinks she should fire somebody. he asked.
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.
Its approach is also drastically different from most fertility service providers — it has savvy, intelligent marketing; a tech-enabled and fully virtual care facility; a focus on compassion; and ample customer education to help patients feel involved and understood. The company today has 12 outlets in 10 cities in the U.S.
This is our second year of creating our list of the top 50 people to watch in Southern California''s technology industry, and it was NOT an easy task. As we found last year, it''s a tough, unforgiving task to narrow down a list of the folks in Southern California''s technology industry to just fifty to watch. Will Kassoy , AdColony.
Seattle should be the envy of any non Silicon Valley tech community in the country. It really wouldn’t take much to turn a great technology ecosystem into a truly electric one. Who’s going to help you with improving your marketing / positioning to become a clear platform category leader like Twilio?
Quality of your technical and business teams. Back in the early days of the personal computer, Bill Gates and Microsoft were widely recognized and having the strongest technical culture, as well as a commanding marketing presence. Proprietary technology with a high barrier to entry. You need to do the same now.
Guy’s latest book, Enchantment , was released in March of 2011, to overwhelmingly upbeat reviews. Of the 225 customer reviews currently posted on Amazon, over 90% are highly positive. I enjoyed the book as well, as evidenced by the review I wrote at the time of its release, which you can read HERE. It wasn’t the Guy fan base.
Michael Lum: We were all semi-independently looking at mobile, due to the growth projection and potential there. Instead, our software looks at each impression, and our bidding technology decides which impression to buy. Programmatic buying enables you to buy media based on your model. We help them to deliver that goal.
Santa Monica-based Factual , the open data startup headed by Gil Elbaz, the inventor of Google's AdSense technology, said today that it has launched a new open set of data that the firm says provides geo-coded data for 14 million local U.S. businesses.
These two questions/answers can help define the early proof points for your company. Proving your Business Model Works - Build, Define, and Review But how do you prove your numbers? Finally, review the numbers with your partners. Apply costs to each channel. We need to make sure we have these numbers.
Once this new service became popular then the media companies could control the rules of distribution & advertising. To say that the tech elite were cynical of Hulu’s launch would be an understatement , but by the time it launched just a few months later it was getting great reviews.
The tech market is filled with many stories of early-stage funding. HealthDataInsights (HDI) is a company that helps to recover money for the government or private insurers who have been incorrectly billed or fraudulently charged. It’s even more exciting when you can report an exit of a company that is a major win.
help you integrate your product with other systems making it harder for your product to be replaced by competitors. deliver profitable revenue that while on gross margins of 50% vs. software at 85-95% it is still profits to help you cover fixed costs. it's all in this article if you want the details]. rollout support. configuration.
At least one million people will be receiving the next FabFitFun box as the Los Angeles company surpasses $200 million in revenue and continues its run as one of the startups to watch in the Los Angeles tech community. . “We’re helping their products get discovered.
I’m a huge supporter of his initiative to help end this practice. This was in large part due to the marketing efforts of Jason that created a great top end of the funnel (100+ companies applied) and the herculean efforts of Tyler Crowley who spent days going through all of the submissions and serving up 5 very interesting companies.
The insurance industry today is one of the last industries to fully jump into adopting technology for offering up their products, says Wayne Slavin , CEO and founder of SURE (www.sureapp.com), and just needs some help in getting there. Wayne Slavin: I have been in tech my entire career, mainly in Southern California.
Responding to Elizabeth Warren’s call to regulate and break up some of the nation’s largest technology companies, the venture capitalists that invest in technology companies are advising the presidential hopeful to move slowly and not break anything. As a whole, venture capitalists viewing the policy were underwhelmed.
Reviewing financial & operational performance. By now you have many smart people around your board but probably people who don’t totally understand the nuances of your employees, customers, sales reps, marketing messages, technology challenges, competitors and strategic choices. We realized we needed help. Mentorship.
At TechEmpower, we frequently talk to startup founders, CEOs, product leaders, and other innovators about their next big tech initiative. After all, that’s what tech innovation is all about. Who’s helping you with fundraising? Do you have a custom algorithm or other technology? Tell me about the business.
Blanchard/O’Reilly Media. I argued it in my post on how social proof helps fund raising with angel investors. “A startup could also give better deals to investors they expected to help them most&# – That is a quote from Paul on the “high resolution financing&# post. Photo credit: D. rings true to me.
When my friend’s small business was struggling a while back, I suggested he add some social media marketing initiatives, and his answer was that he was “too busy.” According to a recent Harvard Business Review article , only 60% of companies today use social media for marketing, and only 12% of those feel that they are using it effectively.
I can’t help feel a bit of rear-view mirror analysis in all of “VC model is broken” bears in our industry. I have been close to the tech & startup sectors for more than 20 years and I can’t think of a period in which I felt more optimistic about the innovation and value creation I see in front of us.
The service--currently only available on iPhone and Android--allows users to find reviews and information about consumer electronics products. Mickie Rosen: Tecca is the easiest and most helpful independent service for mainstream consumers to learn, shop, and make the most of their personal technology.
I continue to be amazed that more than a quarter of new businesses don’t even have a website , and many more don’t pay attention to social media, or monitor feedback on sites like Yelp. At minimum, that requires a modern website, and visibility on relevant social media sites, likely including Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter.
You need to be great at something: technology back-end, front-end design, usability, sales, marketing, quantitative analysis, leadership –> whatever. But if you’re not uber talented there is always a “Justin Bieber of technology&# waiting to kick your ass. To be a great entrepreneur you really do need talent.
Everyone is talking about how social media can help you jumpstart your business at no cost, and experts are springing up on all sides to help you do it at a high cost. Before you start, analyze existing media, demographics, and new social media alternatives for a fit to your rollout campaign requirements.
Vince: I’m an author, speaker and management consultant with a special expertise in online media sales. Today I lead a small consultancy that helps advertising supported develop and scale the revenue producing sides of their businesses. I also serve as CEO of a small media companies that profile “Tomorrow’s Most Exciting People Today”.
Today, there are many companies competing for innovation in the field of wearable tech. Not only can wearable technology make our lives easier, but it can also help to make the lives of many with illnesses or disabilities more comfortable and productive. Google Glass is one of the most famous examples of wearable Tech.
Los Angeles-based MomentFeed (www.momentfeed.com) is looking to sort through that data to help marketers better tap into location based, social networking. Rob Reed: I was doing social media strategy consulting from 2007 until 2009, what I would really characterize as Social Media 1.0. That's really what Social Media 2.0
For some aspiring to be tech entrepreneurs, I often suggest a two-step process, as I argued in this post that “ The First Startup Founder You Need to Invest in Is You.” He or she has worked at some very successful big technology or media companies and went to a great school. the standard 4-6% for a hired-gun CEO).
Craig has recently uncloaked his stealth startup, BetterWorks (www.betterworks.com), focused on helping companies to manage and offer fringe benefits to their employees. She planted the seed into my head that LA was an up and coming tech scene. Beyond that, it's really about real time recognition.
I have never felt prouder of the team & product at awe.sm ( please visit to check out our latest & be ready for our next big product announcement due out in next month or so) and yet we just brought in a new CEO to the company, Fred McIntyre. ” We had inbound M&A requests from some of the biggest names in tech.
Clearly, 2009 was not a good year, from the perspective of the technology innovation ecosystem. Technology and innovation has historically been the thing that has pulled the economy out of recessions, and I think that is especially true right now. For OCTANe to be successful, we want to see our technology ecosystem grow.
For those who still might be wondering what Spotlight: LA Tech is all about, It’s a screening room for new technology homegrown in our region. It’s a gathering of friends and tech enthusiasts of all stripes. This Spotlight takes place Thursday, July 14, at The California Institute of Technology (CalTech). RSVP: AGENDA.
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