Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapped in New Zealand, Scaled in the U.S.

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

I have always said that you need to bootstrap your way to validation and traction. ProjectManager.com Founder Jason Westland did just that, and built a robust company from New Zealand. Read on, it’s a fabulous story from 2016.

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?

Jason Westland: That’s further back in time than I expected. I’m from New Zealand in the Southern Alps. My first job was managing a project of 25 people. I was 22, just out of university. I was in project management until around 15 years ago when I became the General Manager of a software company that grew fast. I was inspired to start my own business based on reporting to a Board that I learned a lot from. This is the third business that I’ve started.

>>>

Featured Videos

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator AI Investor Forum: With Yash Hemaraj, General Partner at BGV (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Lyzer sounds very interesting. So how does this company go to market? It sounds like it’s a horizontal technology. So presumably selling to the CIO.

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapped with Services from Houston

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

Identity Automation Founder James Litton built an identity management software company from Houston and then went upmarket. Here is our conversation from 2016.

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 circumstances?

James Litton: I am a native Houstonian. I’m a rare breed. I was born and raised in Houston. In terms of circumstances, I think I’m from your quintessential American middle-class family.

>>>

Video FAQs

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator AI Investor Forum: With Yash Hemaraj, General Partner at BGV (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Yash, I agree with you on workflow automation and very precise domain-specific AI being a much better opportunity to build businesses and do startups in than boiling the ocean and trying to do something much broader. In general, in startups, I don’t think broad brushed approaches work very well. They just burn a lot of capital. They don’t really produce very effective companies.

Analysis of Google’s Character.ai Acquisition

According to a recent report, the global generative AI market is expected to grow 34% annually over the next few years to reach $255.8 billion by 2033 from $13.5 billion in 2023. It is no surprise then that companies big and small are all reaching out to expand their presence in the industry.

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapped Using Services from Pune, India

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

Services companies are easy to bootstrap, but often, they grow slowly in the beginning. How do you accelerate? This discussion with Mindbowser CEO Ayush Jain is about the levers of acceleration.

Sramana Mitra: All right, Aayush, let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, what kind of background?

Ayush Jain: I was born and raised in a city in India called Agra, which is famous for the Taj Mahal. I was born into a middle-class family; education was the focus of the choices that our parents made. They always made sure that we were in the best of the schools possible. I did an integrated post-graduation course in computer science and management from Gwalior. It was a unique program, where you learn both tech as well as management. In introspection, it was a great program and it was a good experience.

>>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator AI Investor Forum: With Yash Hemaraj, General Partner at BGV (Part 1)

Yash Hemaraj is General Partner at BGV, and Founding Partner at Arka Venture Labs. This is a very interesting discussion that goes into the nuances of high velocity Positioning and Go To Market strategies.

Colors: Purple Rain III

I’m publishing this series on LinkedIn called Colors to explore a topic that I care deeply about: the Renaissance Mind. I am just as passionate about entrepreneurship, technology, and business, as I am about art and culture. In this series, I will typically publish a piece of art – one of my paintings – and I request you to spend a minute or two deeply meditating on it. I urge you to watch your feelings, thoughts, reactions to the piece, and write what comes to you, what thoughts it triggers, in the dialog area. Let us see what stimulation this interaction yields. For today – Purple Rain III

Purple Rain III | Sramana Mitra, 2022 | Watercolor, Ink | 8  x 8, On Paper