Return to main blog

Music Technology Cluster?

A funny thing happened at the various events last week (VentureAtlanta, Future Media Georgia, and GVU's Demo Day...

I suddenly noticed how many music technology companies have recently sprung up in Georgia! [Read more...]

Why Are We Doing This?

So by now you've seen the press release about reorganizing ATDC, VentureLab, and the SBIR Assistance Program under the single banner of ATDC. And that we're throwing open the doors of ATDC to all technology entrepreneurs in Georgia.

This is different.
[Read more...]

Rebooting the ATDC Franchise

Below is the text of a press release that Georgia Tech will send out on Monday, 27 July 2009.
[Read more...]

Not The Valley

(Click for full-size image.)

Those of you at the Atlanta CEO Exchange this evening may have seen the lapel button I was wearing. It generated a lot of attention. [Read more...]

TopEyeView

I made an expedition to Gwinnett County recently to look at a blimp. [Read more...]

Entrepreneurial Atlanta!!

You asked for it, you've got it!

Sometimes, it makes sense to sit back for a moment and reflect on how much things have changed in four years. For those of you who were part of the Atlanta entrepreneurial community, think back to May of 2005. Pretty different, wasn’t it?

You can see the final version of my "Entrepreneurial Atlanta" chart below. But you don't get the real impact until you click on the slide and watch the animated version.
[Read more...]

Don’t Cross the Streams!

Fascinating pair of events in Atlanta this week... the DLA Piper "Venture Pipeline" and the Angel Capital Association annual summit. I've learned a bit, and have definitely gotten a few ideas to think about.

No surprise to anyone who's active in the startup community... investment in early stage companies is down but not out. Deals are still getting done. And the most savvy investors realize that prices of early-stage equities are as cheap now as they will be for a long long time... it's a good time to buy.

(That's not the greatest news for the entrepreneurs, but don't let it stop you. Waiting for valuations to go up just means you're letting your competitors run unopposed.)

The most interesting discussion so far was led by Basil Peters. He's crunched a lot of numbers in writing his book "Early Exits" and come up with some non-intuitive conclusions. [Read more...]

Canaan’s Entrepreneur Pitchbook

You may have seen this linked elsewhere already, but I'm putting it here for future reference.

Canaan Partners is a first-class venture capital firm, and they've assembled a "how to" document for entrepreneurs coming in to pitch. They explain very clearly what they're looking for in a first meeting, and you should pay attention. It applies to any early-stage VC or angel investor. [Read more...]

Edward Tufte course coming to Atlanta

I've recommended Edward Tufte's books many times... you can see some of my previous comments here and here.

He's going to be in Atlanta next month. If your job consists of presenting complex information on paper or on screen, you should go: <http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/courses>. [Read more...]

Capital Calls

There has been a lot of noise lately about venture capital funds in trouble because their investors are missing capital calls. Which, at first blush, doesn't make sense because venture funds are supposed to be "decoupled" from public markets. The key bit of knowledge that surprises many people is that venture funds don't have any money. They're not supposed to. [Read more...]