The VentureFizz Podcast

It’s not every day that you get to interview someone who launched four product lines with Steve Jobs and the rest of the Apple exec team, so as a fan of all things Apple, lets just say I was a little excited for this interview. Calin’s career has always been at the forefront of emerging technologies and trends. From his first stint at Apple working on software for the iMac and iBook (yes, the shell shaped laptop), to his time at Handspring where he helped bring the Treo - a first generation smartphone - to market, to his return to Apple to work on early iPhone software, iTunes Mobile, pre-HealthKit, Apple TV, and AirPlay, plus the other startups that he’s been involved in. The next frontier ahead for Calin is sound and as a Co-Founder & CEO of Spatial, their goal is to redefine the human experience by creating virtual soundscapes where you work, where you play and where you stay. The company recently announced its Series B funding highlighted by Mike Gordon, President of Fenway Sports Group, The Kraft Group, Marquee Sports Holdings, WS Development and National Geographic Society. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Predictions for the future of immersive experiences at sporting events and concerts. * All the great stories throughout his career at Apple, Handspring, and the various startups… including the question I had to ask him about. * What it was like working with Steve Jobs. * A deep dive into his latest company, Spatial and how their technology works, plus a glimpse into the plans ahead for the company. * Advice on keeping a culture of innovation as a company scales. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

Real estate is the largest asset class in the world, so it’s surprising that this industry has been slow to change, but this is not the case anymore. The proptech industry is on fire. According to the Wall Street Journal, last year over $9.5B was invested into the proptech industry from VC firms and other investors. It’s proof that there is a tremendous amount of disruption happening in this sector through the use of technology to solve an incredible amount of business challenges and improving operational efficiencies. After building a very successful career in the real estate and tech industry, Gary saw an opportunity to build on his knowledge to launch Roofstock, the leading end-to-end online platform for single family rental investing. Its marketplace makes the process of investing in single-family properties accessible, cost-effective, and just simple. The company just announced a $240M Series E funding at a $1.94B valuation. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * A discussion about the proptech market and what’s going on within this industry. * A walk through Gary’s background and all the great companies that he’s been involved throughout his career. * All the details on Roofstock in terms of how the marketplace works and growth plans ahead. * Three real estate markets that Gary is the most bullish on. * Gary’s point of view on the current state of real estate market and how economic factors play into the overall puzzle. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

I’m always amazed when I talk to an entrepreneur who starts a company while in college. There’s a lot going on during those college years in terms of the academic and social experience, so it’s impressive when they have the vision and maturity to embark on the adventure of building a business. I find it even more impressive when the entrepreneur's company is working on hard tech and has legs beyond college, as in the case with Indico Data. Since it was founded while Slater was at Olin College of Engineering, the company has gone on to raise multiple rounds of venture funding and their tech has evolved to being an enterprise solution for helping empower organizations’ use of unstructured data. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * How training in MMA (mixed martial arts) helped him with his career in entrepreneurship. * Slater’s decision to attend Olin and how it influenced his career to become an entrepreneur. * A deep dive into Indico Data, including how the idea came to fruition and the process of building the tech and getting the company started. * The current stage of the company and growth plans ahead. * Slater’s role as an EIR at .406 Ventures and his experience as an angel investor. * When it makes sense to hire an outside CEO for your startup. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

This is an extra special episode of The VentureFizz Podcast as it is a milestone episode - welcome to Episode 250! This means we have over 10 days worth of entrepreneurial and investor interviews! For Episode 250, I couldn’t think of a better guest than Jonathan Bush, Founder & CEO of Zus Health. Yes, his last name is Bush, as in the same Bush family where his uncle and cousin were both president of the United States. Jonathan has been following his own journey as a very successful healthcare entrepreneur. He co-founded and led athenahealth to a public offering with this early cloud based healthcare software provider. His latest company, Zus Health, is an even larger swing, as the company is looking to build out the platform to disrupt the healthcare industry the same way Stripe disrupted payments by building the industry’s first shared development platform backed by a shared data record. The company is venture backed with financing led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). F-Prime Capital, Maverick Ventures, Rock Health, Martin Ventures and Oxeon Investments also participated in the round. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Trends across the healthcare and tech industry. * His background growing up and how his time spent as an EMT and a combat medic gave him the inside look at the inefficiencies across the healthcare industry. * The full lifecycle story of athenahealth in terms of the original business model and how the company evolved to being the leading provider of cloud based services for electronic medical records, revenue cycle management, medical billing, and more. * All the details on Zus Health and how they are disrupting the healthcare industry, plus the details on their growth plans ahead. * An overview of Firefly Health where Jonathan is the company’s Executive Chairman. * Advice for first time founders on building startups in the healthcare industry. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

One of the common mistakes that entrepreneurs make is failing to discovery the true market need for an idea by talking to potential customers. Entrepreneurs sometimes fall in love with their idea and go off to build it but to only find out that it’s not a pain point for customer who are willing to pay money to solve. This was definitely not the case for Shensi and Gil Feig, the Co-Founders of Merge. While they were still employed, they spent 6-9 months talking to at least 100 different companies to validate the problem, their potential solution, and of course the long term opportunity in terms of the addressable market. At that point, the due diligence was done and it was time to leave their jobs and go all in on building the company. Merge is revolutionizing the way B2B companies integrate with their Unified API for payroll, HR, recruiting and accounting. The company announced a $15M Series A round of funding towards the end of last year led by Addition, with participation from existing investor NEA. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Advice on raising funding for first-time founders. * Shensi’s initial experience in investment banking & technology investing, plus her role as the Chief of Staff at a startup and what this experience taught her about running a company. * The aha moment that led Shensi and Gil to work on Merge and how they got started. * All the details on Merge today, the platform, use cases, funding, and growth plans ahead. * What positions were the most challenging to hire for in the early days of the company. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

Music is a passion of mine. Technology is a passion of mine. Digital marketing is a passion of mine. So, what if you could roll up all three into one… well, you’d have Gupta Media and that is why you’ll hear the fan boy come out several times during my interview with Gogi. He takes us down the journey of his agency, Gupta Media, and how it has brought the modern world of performance marketing to the entertainment industry. The agency, which is based in Boston (not NY or LA), supports the biggest music labels and entertainment companies in the world… I’m talking the music labels behind The Weeknd, Adele, Taylor Swift, or music festivals like Boston Calling and countless others. For example - Gogi was one of 5 people who knew about Beyonce’s legendary secret album drop that rocked the music industry in terms of how it was released and Gupta Media was the agency that supported this global digital marketing campaign. I guess Gupta Media would be the alter-ego business that I’d like to run. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * The power of optimism and why it is such a meaningful word for Gogi. * His background growing up and a look at his professional career prior to starting the agency. * The full lifecycle story of how Gupta Media built their reputation in the entertainment industry and how it has continued to be a force throughout the years. * What it is like working there and growth plans ahead. * Lots of great stories from his experience in the music and entertainment industry. * Trends in digital marketing. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

Serial entrepreneur, inventor, angel investor, film producer, commencement address speaker, world traveler… These are just some of the words that describe Wayne and it all started at a young age when he discovered the world of technology. It was this world that would lead him down the path to building a very successful future. Wayne has a history of recognizing technology trends before they hit mainstream like peer-to-peer file sharing (yes, he was involved in companies like Napster and Dropbox, plus his own company i2hub) and developer tools with Crashlytics that was acquired by Twitter and is now owned by Google. His latest company is Digits which is crafting the real-time finance engine for modern businesses. It is also the latest company he has started with his Co-Founder, Jeff Seibert and the two of them have an amazing track record building companies together. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * What makes the foundation of a great co-founding duo. * Waynes background story and a walk down memory lane with various companies and his involvement in a ground breaking shift in the tech industry. * All the details on Crashlytics and the underserved market they were focused on and its rapid adoption by developers. * Why Jeff and Wayne are tackling the world of financial apps and a glimpse into the company’s future. * His experience as a film producer and winning an Emmy for the documentary, Chasing Coral. * Why a recruiter should be one of the first hires at a company. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

My coffee is shipped to me every two weeks and it is outstanding. It is on a subscription and therefore, it’s one less thing that I need to think about getting at the grocery store. In return, the brand has me locked in as a loyal customer where I’m not tempted by the other options while walking down the aisle. It’s such a win-win! Subscription Commerce or Relationship Commerce, as Ordergroove has coined it, is just expected these days. However, this wasn’t the case when Greg started the company. At that point in time, just 3 companies offered it. Sometimes when you are early to market… it can be catastrophic, but in the case of Ordergroove, it gave them the opportunity to build a platform that was ready for primetime once the market caught up. When you look at Greg, it’s not a shock that Ordergroove has thrived. Entrepreneurship has been rooted into his DNA and it even dates back to his high school days when he started a couple of businesses - one of which was selling sports paraphernalia on eBay and another was a computer consulting firm. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Advice on managing your company through an early to market scenario. * Creating his own major in Entrepreneurship at George Washington University. * His foundational experience at Liquidation.com, a B2B eCommerce marketplace which went public. * The early days of Ordergroove in terms of how the company got started and a great story on how he raised initial funding. * All the details on Ordergroove and where the business is today, plus some customer examples. * Advice on hiring for your executive team. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

We have such a great and inspirational story to share with you from this interview with Moah, who prefers to go by her last name btw. It goes something like this - immigrant founder, attends MIT, starts to build a career in User Experience (UX), becomes the co-founder of a category creating product, where she is now the CEO, and the company proceeds to grow with very little capital raised… and it’s generating about $10M a year with only 11 employees. I don’t know about you, but this is definitely the type of business that I find inspirational. It’s proof that you don’t need to raise gobs of venture capital to be successful. Boomerang makes productivity tools and I’m assuming many people in our audience are familiar with their Gmail plugin that lets you schedule emails to send later, track emails, and other useful features. Well, another piece of their product, which I’m really excited about, is their scheduler product. Ironically, after we recorded this episode, there was a debate on Twitter about the etiquette of sending out scheduling links like Calendly. I think it comes down to a personal preference, but I’ve definitely struggled with this approach, as I feel like I’m asking someone to take on the burden of scheduling a meeting with me when I’m usually the one requesting it. I even took the step of surveying my LinkedIn connections about scheduling links and the majority of the people felt like it was part of the norm now and a timesaver. However, I still struggled with the process. Well, Boomerang has fixed my dilemma with their scheduling product, as it allows you to send available times in an email to review and the recipient can just click on the time in the email that works and it’s done… meeting booked. It saves me a ton of time and in return, it’s not expecting the other party to click on a link, which takes them to a website to book time on your calendar. This experience works much, much better for me and I highly recommend that you check it out. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * How having a design / UX background has helped Moah as an entrepreneur. * Her story growing up and coming to America to attend MIT, plus her experience as a designer at tech companies. * The background story of Boomerang from the early days to its incredible launch and the company’s continued innovation and progress. * Lessons learned from transitioning into a CEO position. * Her experience as an angel investor with ANGELS.vc. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.

At this point, it’s assumed that companies have a content strategy pulled together for their marketing plan. However, even though content marketing is not a new concept, it is still really difficult to get it right. The challenge is on multiple levels. You need to consistently write content that is meaningful and not loaded with keywords and links that add no value to the article. Search engines are too sophisticated now and they will sniff that out. But, when it is done right… it can be magic, especially if you end up ranking as the authority for keywords that will help drive business to your website. Jeff saw this problem firsthand and it was a meeting with his future co-founder, Aki Balogh, where he saw the opportunity for a automated solution that bridges the gap between SEO and content marketing. Fast forward to today… MarketMuse is an AI driven platform that enables companies to create predictably better content at scale that increases traffic and engagement, improves productivity, and drives revenue. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * The current state of content marketing and the latest on SEO best practices. * Jeff’s background growing up and his professional experience at KnowledgeStorm and TechTarget. * All the details on MarketMuse and how the company’s platform works. * His experience as a Co-Founder of Silver Bluff Brewing Company and the similarities of being a tech entrepreneur. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.