Best of Bootstrapping: Seismic Audio CEO Bootstrapped a $10 Million E-Commerce Business

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

E-commerce companies are relatively easy to bootstrap. In 2015, Steve Acree shared his journey bootstrapping Seismic Audio to almost $10 million in revenue.

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

Steve Acree: I was born in Tennessee, about 60 miles north of Memphis. I went to school for computers but I’ve never used my degree. I chose the wrong computer industry. I chose the repair side instead of the software side.

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Thought Leaders in Cyber Security: Saviynt CEO Amit Saha (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: In the different segments that you talked about, what is the competitive landscape and the market share situation? Who is the market share leader in each of these categories? Where do you fit in?

Amit Saha: On the access management side, there are two top leaders, Microsoft being one of them. There are other players as well. Saviynt has a strong partnership with all of those players. On the IGA side, which is one of our core foundations, Saviynt is one of the leaders. In the PAM space, one of the market leaders is CyberArk. Then there are other private offerings.

Thought Leaders in Internet of Things: Ayyeka CEO Ariel Stern (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: How much of system integration work is involved to implement a solution like yours?

Ariel Stern: Before Ayyeka, the majority of the projects were system integrations. We said, “Ayyeka will eliminate the need for the complicated system integration. We provide end-to-end solutions that have both the hardware and software.” It’s almost like plug-and-play. We provide support tools. We provide a software component, which gets as complicated as a full-blown private installation in a customer premise or fully-hosted cloud-based solution. With that, we eliminate system integration. 

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Thought Leaders in Cyber Security: Saviynt CEO Amit Saha (Part 1)

Amit provides an excellent overview of the Identity space and some new developments in the Managed Service Provider market that are consequential for long-term trends.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s introduce our audience to yourself as well as to Saviynt.

6 Udemy Courses on How to do a Startup as a Solo Founder

Have you started or are you stuck in your startup journey?

Many entrepreneurs think that they need a cofounder or a team to start, but it is really simple.

• Find a niche.
• Start solo and run lean.

Thought Leaders in Internet of Things: Ayyeka CEO Ariel Stern (Part 1)

IoT companies have often been system integrators. Ariel discusses an end-to-end solution strategy that includes both hardware and software.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself and Ayyeka.

Catching Up On Readings: Retail Tech 100

This report from CB Insights ranks the 100 most promising B2B retail tech companies in the world that have together raised $14.8 billion in funding. It also provides insights into the leading categories and trends in the industry. For this week’s posts, click on the paragraph links.

Thought Leaders in Artificial Intelligence: Martin Neale, CEO of ICS (Part 4)

Martin Neale: From our perspective, we understand that the Microsoft sellers provide a specialized service. They typically will be happy to talk to you if you have gone through some of the activities required. You are a Microsoft partner. You have signed up through their co-selling program. If you do those things and your proposition aligns, then that is the time where regular communications happen.

Sramana Mitra: The kind of price point you’re talking about, that’s not necessarily very large deals. But you’re saying that the direct sales force still works with that kind of deal size.