8 Validated Enterprise Software Startup Ideas for the DataStax-1Mby1M Challenge

The DataStax-1Mby1M Fall 2021 Startup Challenge launched on September 9th. Here is the kick-off video with Chet Kapoor, CEO of DataStax, Ed Anuff, Chief Product Officer of DataStax discussing the program with me.

DataStax has significant enterprise customers that are using their Apache Cassandra-based database products to solve real world problems. They are putting these use cases out in the public domain for startups to build companies around. DataStax would be helping the startups on the technical and customer acquisition side, and 1Mby1M would be helping the startups on the positioning, mentoring, and financing side. $10,000 of grant money is also included in this challenge.

Let’s look at some of the use cases. They’re all related to the increasingly digital nature of most businesses. The ever-growing use of IoT is a good example. Verticals that manage many assets need real-time access to data for visibility and decision purposes. Organizations interacting directly with customers need to ensure they are engaged with the right customer, and they have a digital twin of the customer to drive services and experiences. These experiences and services are entirely digital and depend on real-time data access. Finally, organizations drive their intelligence and decisions by understanding and leveraging the increasingly vast amount of data they manage. Here are more details.

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12 Udemy Courses on How to Come Up With New Tech Startup Business Ideas

You want to do a startup. So, you need an idea to build around. The Covid-19 pandemic has changed consumer behavior in a major way. As we move through the virus-era, much more will likely change. With this realization, we ran a poll asking which topics readers would like me to cover and discuss. The overwhelming winner was startup ideas. So, after much thought, here are eight of my most recent startup ideas. My hope is to stimulate and help my fellow entrepreneurs catalyze these ideas into profitable businesses.

546th Roundtable Recording on September 16, 2021

In case you missed it, you can listen to the recording of this roundtable here:

Video FAQs

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapping LittleThings First, Raising Money Later

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

Joe Speiser, Founder & CEO of LittleThings bootstrapped his first digital media/ad network business to $50 million in revenue and then sold it to private equity. Later he started a second business, an e-commerce company, that he bootstrapped for a year and then raised venture capital. His third business, LittleThings, is a spin-off within the second business that took him back to his digital media roots. Since our conversation in 2015, LittleThings was acquired by RockYou Media, an entertainment and media company aimed at millennials, in 2018.

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?

Joe Speiser: I’m from New York and I went to school in the city. I studied at the Columbia University. I’ve been doing all sorts of businesses from a very young age. I always had a passion for trying to start something from scratch and make a living. My dad is an entrepreneur. I used to work in his warehouse for most of my summers. It definitely taught me a lot watching my dad run a business. I don’t know if it’s something that’s taught or something that you’re just genetically predisposed to. I enjoy it so much.

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Roundtable Recap: September 16 – Startups from Tanzania, New Delhi and New York

During this week’s roundtable, we did a global romp through startup land.

Beem

First up we had Taha Jiwaji from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, pitch Beem, a terrific cPaaS company that is already doing over $1M in revenue.

OneNDF

Then we had Nitin Khandelwal from New Delhi, India, pitch OneNDF, a terrific FinTech company that is also doing over $1M in revenue, although not all of it through their FinTech platform yet.

Green Transport

Next Mohammed Tai and Jian Ming Lin pitching Green Transport, a concept stage idea. Mohammed is an intern in the 1Mby1M program.

You can listen to the recording of this roundtable here:

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Thought Leaders in Cloud Computing: John Davagian, CEO of L2L (Part 1)

John discusses trends and opportunities within the manufacturing shop floor. 

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself as well as L2L.

John Davagian: I’m the CEO at L2L. I’ve been the CEO for just about six months. I’ve spent 20 plus years in the SaaS industry, primarily on the go-to-market side, and most recently, in significantly scaling a business called Salsify. L2L is a leading SaaS platform built for global manufacturers. At its core, we deliver a pragmatic, innovative, and transformative solution.

9 Udemy Courses on How to Raise Pre-seed Startup Funding

The toughest round of funding an entrepreneur seeks to raise is pre-seed investment. It sports the lowest probability of success, the highest amount of ambiguity, is poorly defined, and is causing the greatest amount of confusion and road wreck out there.

10 Udemy Courses on How To Build an Artificial Intelligence Startup

Udemy has over six million students who are learning Machine Learning on the platform. Many of these students are aspiring entrepreneurs.

Here is a list of Udemy entrepreneurship courses based on the 1Mby1M methodology that would help them put one foot before the other to get a startup strategy figured out.