Building a Cutting Edge Drone Technology Company: Tom Walker, CEO of DroneUp (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Did you learn that there was this segment that has this need in the shipping segment?

Tom Walker: Port and port security. The problem at that time was there were so many industries that we knew could use it. I’ll give you an example from the insurance industry. A storm comes through an area and they’re sending inspectors to walk around and assess the damage. We knew that we could put a drone out and capture all of this in high resolution. We just knew the insurance industry was going to embrace us.

Featured Videos

From Solo Techie Entrepreneur to High Growth, Profitable Enterprise AI Success Story: Findability Sciences CEO Anand Mahurkar (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: In launching this company, did you bootstrap? How did you get the company off the ground?

Anand Mahurkar: It was bootstrapped. I had a $10,000 bank account. Probably we are the only enterprise AI company that is profitable and revenue-making with no debt. I bootstrapped all these years. I got my first customer six months after starting the business.

Sramana Mitra: You wrote the software and you sold the software?

Building a Cutting Edge Drone Technology Company: Tom Walker, CEO of DroneUp (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Tell us how the side project turned into a business.

Tom Walker: I’ll tell you a funny story along the way. We had some people join the organization as volunteers. A retired CIO from a large company came on board. We were trying to build something, but we didn’t know what it was. We called it DART – Drone-Assisted Response Team. We were going to launch on Monday.

Video FAQs

579th 1Mby1M Entrepreneurship Podcast with Evan Zimmerman, Jovono

Evan Zimmerman, Chairman of Jovono, discusses his fund’s investment philosophy, especially around pre-seed and seed.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | TuneIn | RSS

Best of Bootstrapping: Master Bootstrappers with $1+ Billion in Exits

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

There’s a GIGANTIC myth in the startup ecosystem. Go BIG or Go HOME! Raise GOBS of venture capital. Otherwise, you can’t build anything big. It’s GIGANTIC BS!

Watch this inspiring 2 minute 09 second video and learn how the Turakhia brothers have created over a billion dollars of personal wealth through significant exits without raising any venture capital:

Capital efficient ventures often end up creating a lot more money for entrepreneurs.

Bhavin Turakhia, CEO of Directi and Flock, and his brother Divyank have bootstrapped Directi, a portfolio of Internet businesses over the last ~20 years. In 2014, they had their first $160 million exit. In 2016, they had a second $900 million exit. It’s a very interesting story of masterful business acumen and disciplined fundamentals-driven execution. Not a penny of external financing involved when we spoke in 2017, by the way.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your personal journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Bhavin Turakhia: I was born and raised in Mumbai. My parents are originally from there. I went to school there. In many ways, the seeds for my entrepreneurship career were largely sown there. I remember in 1989, I was in the sixth grade when the school installed their very first computer room. I’m talking about a time when there was no Internet. There was no Windows. It was just GWBasic and MS-DOS. It was love at first sight.

>>>

From Solo Techie Entrepreneur to High Growth, Profitable Enterprise AI Success Story: Findability Sciences CEO Anand Mahurkar (Part 1)

I always love doing stories of my readers. Anand has been following the blog since 2010. He has built a terrific, fundamentals-focused AI company. And I am thrilled.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s go to the beginning of your story. Where are you from? Where were you born, and raised, and in what kind of background?

Building a Cutting Edge Drone Technology Company: Tom Walker, CEO of DroneUp (Part 1)

The drone industry is a massive beneficiary of the Corvid pandemic. Read how Tom has shepherded DroneUp to hyper-growth from its bootstrapped beginnings and a slow start.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Catching Up On Readings: End of The Crypto Party

This feature from The Wall Street Journal looks at the crash in the cryptocurrency industry, which was built on swagger, enthusiasm, and optimism. For this week’s posts, click on the paragraph links.