SoCal CTO

MARCH 10, 2010

Steve Blank wrote a great post recently entitled Perfection By Subtraction – The Minimum Feature Set where he explains the real goals around defining a minimum viable product: Founders act like the “minimum” part is the goal. Only a special subset of customers will and what gets them breathing heavy is the long-term vision for your product.

Product 150

Product Startup Custom Customer 150

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? Technology Jobs in Southern California – a Rebound. Product Manager Entrepreneur Mark Geller SEO for Startups Startup Version 1.0

CTO Coach 150

CTO Coach Southern California CTO Hire Social Media 150

Berkonomics

JUNE 11, 2015

I was fortunate that I could write software and doubly fortunate that my despair at working for ‘the Man’ – and feeling compelled to strike out on my own – coincided with the dawn of the personal computer era. As I look back, I can remember so many times where I benefited from good luck.

Customer 120

Customer Custom Writing Southern California 120

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2010

The VC’s & executives were then asked to make “commitments&# (in writing) to 3-5 of the companies that they felt they could make some sort of contribution to. Walk into any Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Southern California and you can’t miss their digital screens. And of course we had, TheMan.

Company 276

Company Companies Startup Southern California 276

SoCal CTO

MARCH 18, 2010

Vince: In addition to my management writing I’ve interview many CEOs and innovators. I’d love to get your thoughts at some point about writing for these publications vs. on your own blog. What networking events in Los Angeles or Southern California do you go to? Tony: So how do you do this and still have dinner at home?

Startup 225

Startup Los Angeles Twiistup Social Network 225

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 25, 2010

Rincon is part of the new breed of Seed Stage VCs and with the leadership of Jim Andelman has charted out the most authentic early-stage investment strategy in Southern California. Any SoCal entrepreneur raising early-stage money should put Rincon on their short list. From there Rob decided to make a small investment.

Guide 293

Guide Funding Venture Capital Technical Review 293

socalTECH

OCTOBER 10, 2012

What are GridTest's products used for? I left there in 2010, and starting looking at the electric vehicle market, what Southern California Edison was planning, saw these charging networks, and how all of this was planned to be an intelligence network. Our product has gone to China, Taiwan, Australia, and Europe.

Help 178

Help Startup Southern California San Fernando 178

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 30, 2012

Jackson , “This financing round, coupled with hiring Adam Sroka as our head of technology, puts CapLinked in a position to further enhance our enterprise product offerings.”. 25 Years of Writing Code. He helped develop an airline tracking system for Homeland Security and is an organizer of the Agile Open SoCal conference.

Technical Review 88

Technical Review Software Review Bertelsmann Technology 88

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 15, 2010

I give a sneak peek at a blog post I’m writing on the topic next week. I spoke about the need of the CEO, CTO and head of Products to be in the same location. Heck, stick around and watch me discuss the seed funding debate that is going on right now and what is happening in the VC industry overall. Great exit. -

Venture Capital 210

Venture Capital Seed Funding Pricing Southern California 210

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 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. Me : Product definition, use cases, feature list, wireframes, comps, really whatever you have.

Develop 354

Develop Development Technical Review CTO Coach 354

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 21, 2010

This is stuff I tell people verbally at least twice / month so I’m glad to finally get it into written format. When to get a lawyer - If you plan to be a venture or angel backed technology company (what I mostly write about) the best time to start meeting and getting to know lawyers is long before you ever start your company.

Startup 318

Startup IP Southern California Entrepreneur 318

SoCal CTO

APRIL 2, 2013

They look at the following high level definition of Lean: and they interpret that as write up an executive summary with your ideas and hand it to developers to build. What's going to go wrong?

CTO Coach 219

CTO Coach Metrics Framework Software Development 219

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. And, I dont like to copy and paste.

Blogging 150

Blogging CTO Coach CTO Hire Southern California 150

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

Right now, there are no real efficient products in the dating market. As I was driving home from that meeting, I decided to work from there, and ended up writing a business plan and fundraising from family and friends. We launched our application officially in February of 2019, and we've now been in Southern California for 18 months.

Startup 203

Startup Entrepreneur Southern California Netflix 203

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 1, 2011

Southern California--despite the lack of huge, name brand firms-- has a significant number of enterprise software companies, of which Network Automation is just one. The traditional way to handle that is to write code. He spent a number of years with another, Southern California bootstrap, Goldmine.

Networking 214

Networking IBM IBM Pacific Palisades 214

SoCal CTO

MARCH 12, 2012

I promised I would write this post with some thoughts and ideas on the topic. Tech Events / Meetups - In Los Angeles, There are lots of Networking Events in Los Angeles and Southern California that are techie oriented. Hire a Product Design Lead First Nailing that elusive technical co-founder Ask them about your concept.

CTO Hire 211

CTO Hire CTO Coach Startup Equity 211

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I keep my competitors as friends and those that didn’t choose me or my product as friends, too. They had a prominent NorCal investor already so I thought a SoCal lead would make sense – that I could help them in a more hands-on way. Write things down. We helped the write out their requirements for a system.

Outsource Development 333

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 333

SoCal CTO

OCTOBER 14, 2009

I moved into writing software to analyze audience data, and wrote a lot of computer graphics software. I also write about holding events ( [link] ), and I’m writing a series about integrating marketing strategy with marketing tactics ( [link] ). What networking events in Los Angeles or Southern California do you go to?

Los Angeles 150

Los Angeles Networking Marketing Startup 150

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 16, 2010

We talked with Noah about how the company grew out of a business plan competition at the University of Southern California, his recent funding from the Maverick Angels, as well as how the firm hopes to stand out among a crowded list of comparison shopping sites. Noah Auerhahn: The funding is going to enhance the product.

USC 207

USC CPC Sites Startup 207

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I keep my competitors as friends and those that didn’t choose me or my product as friends, too. They had a prominent NorCal investor already so I thought a SoCal lead would make sense – that I could help them in a more hands-on way. Write things down. We helped the write out their requirements for a system.

Outsource Development 328

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 328

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." It is almost never the case that you are building an MVP to "show" to an investor the product itself.

Metrics 264

Metrics Venture Capital News Product 264

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2010

I’m very pleased today to announce that I invested, on behalf of GRP Partners, in Burstly alongside Rincon Venture Partners , an early stage VC in Southern California whith whom we love to work (and were our co-investors on RingRevenue ). And this part of the product is entirely free to use. I like that.

Mobile 282

Mobile Invest Company Companies 282

SoCal Tech Calendar

FEBRUARY 10, 2012

If so, how can you use mobile apps for your business? Should you pay someone to write the code for you or should you use an app-generating and hosting alternative? What are best practices for integrating mobile, social, Internet and other channels of marketing and customer service or mobile workforce productivity?

Social Media 100

Social Media Mobile Media Technology 100

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 15, 2010

I generally try not to stalk people I don’t know when they announce they’re in town, but as a fellow VC (and a partner in Southern California’s largest fund), I felt we had a legitimate reason to connect. I just spoke with Jamie again today on the phone, which is what made me think to write this post.

Social Network 347

Social Network Networking Blogging RSS 347

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2010

My partner was in product management at Demand Media. This post isn’t about Formation Media so I won’t drill down. So 2 things reminded me of that story and got me thinking about writing this post: I was on a panel this week talking to a crowd of a couple of hundred aspiring entrepreneurs. Sam stood up to ask a question.

Startup 315

Startup Content Conference Media 315

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 17, 2017

We've made some investments here and there, and are now building a team, and making a lot of investments in SoCal tech companies. We want to have startups we can get productive or generating revenue pretty quickly. I had a sales force when I was at SkyPipeline, selling telecom, networking, and broadband wireless products.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review Software Review 100

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

Product : You should build a product or a prototype. I’m a software guy so I’m sure there are cases where building isn’t feasible. You cannot be just a biz dev type, salesperson, marketing genius or whatever and divorce yourself from product. Great companies are built by having great products.

Angel 291

Angel Funding Venture Capital Startup 291

SoCal CTO

MARCH 3, 2011

This overview (executive summary) needs to include: Product and Business What is the product? How does the product solve a pain? What are related products/companies? What product, market testing have you done so far, if any? Do I have to write up the overview? Who's the customer? Are there specs?

CTO Hire 264

CTO Hire Startup Technical Review Development Team Review 264

SoCal CTO

MARCH 3, 2011

This overview (executive summary) needs to include: Product and Business What is the product? How does the product solve a pain? What are related products/companies? What product, market testing have you done so far, if any? Do I have to write up the overview? Who's the customer? Are there specs?

CTO Hire 259

CTO Hire Startup Technical Review Development Team Review 259

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2010

There is one thing I learned a long time about about setting goals, “you manage what you measure&# so you need to begin by regularly recording your weight. Writing down your weight from your scale is obviously a manual process and it’s tedious. I loved the product that much. We’ll see. Enter Withings.

Technical Review 278

Technical Review Software Review Startup SoCal 278

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

Our approach is often additive to all parties, resulting in ongoing, productive relationships. thinks his product is probably much easier to (use than) VoiceXML, but he is not sure that the ease of use will offset the market confusion. However, in 2008 we were focused almost exclusively within Southern California.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

Tech Zulu Event

JANUARY 30, 2012

Months of submissions and the amazing help from our judges , the Spotlight is shinning down on awesome companies that were born right out of Southern California. We write and create our own content for the game. Everything happens in the browser (no software to download) and the finished product looks amazing on large screens!

CalTech 91

CalTech Company Companies Idealab 91

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 1, 2016

In fact, 50% of our investments are in Southern California, from Santa Barbara to San Diego. But putting no time into anchoring your beliefs because you’re too busy executing sales, marketing, support, product & engineering is an easy recipe for leadership drift. They get involved in hard product decisions.

Startup 150

Startup Coach Course Invest 150

Jason Nazar

MARCH 22, 2011

In the bay area it’s quite common for the entrepreneurs starting a company to be developers or technologists who can build the first versions of their products. When he had the idea for his company, he didn’t write a long business plan or try to raise money to hire an agency to build a website for him.

Company 111

Company Companies Rustic Canyon Startup 111

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2009

I keep my competitors as friends and those that didn’t choose me or my product as friends, too. We helped the write out their requirements for a system. How could a company like ours be so callous as not to support their software (even one more than 4 years out of date)? Write things down. Quite the opposite.

Startup 151

Startup Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review 151

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 21, 2012

Steve Jillings has a long track record of running successful startups in Southern California, ranging from such companies as FrontBridge Technologies (sold to Microsoft in 2005 for over $200M) and Vantage Media (acquired in 2007). One was for our PhoneID product, which is extremely important to us.

Marina Del Rey 238

Marina Del Rey Startup IP Web 238

socalTECH

JUNE 23, 2011

One trend in the Southern California high tech startup market has been an increasing number of startups--and executives--who have been looking to combine their interests in business with their enthusiasm for giving back through nonprofits and causes. We're still powering actions there, but we're not doing editorial.

Causecast 222

Causecast Startup Content Education 222