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Bootstrapping Using Services From Houston: Identity Automation CEO James Litton (Part 7)
Sramana Mitra: So you’re trying to find a mid-market niche now where you would be able to compete with these very large players. That security and identity management space for both enterprise and mid-sized enterprises is a very crowded space. I’ll tell you what bothers me about your enterprise strategy. James Litton: There’s a couple
Building an IPO-Ready Identity Software Company from Colorado: Andre Durand, CEO of Ping Identity (Part 5)
Sramana Mitra: Who were the customers you were going after? Were these enterprise customers? Andre Durand: We didn’t know at that time. The truth was it was big enterprises that had this problem. Sramana Mitra: Since your background was selling to bulletin board kind of people, you didn’t really have any enterprise software sales experience.
Bootstrapping Using Services From Houston: Identity Automation CEO James Litton (Part 6)
Sramana Mitra: The growth rate did not shift when you went from services to product? James Litton: During the transition, on some level, it probably slowed. There were some critical things that we had to go through. As an entrepreneur, it’s scary. You’re going from something that you know into a world that you don’t
Building an IPO-Ready Identity Software Company from Colorado: Andre Durand, CEO of Ping Identity (Part 4)
Sramana Mitra: They were people who had made money off you before, so they had confidence in your ability. Andre Durand: Exactly. On January 4, I moved my computer from the corner office in Jabber. I think we had 50 people working at the company. I announced that I was going to start something new.
Bootstrapping Using Services From Houston: Identity Automation CEO James Litton (Part 5)
Sramana Mitra: All your existing K-12 services clients came with you to this product? James Litton: Yes, because we were extremely focused on the customer. That continues to be a central part of the Identity Automation ethos. It’s not just paying lip service to it, but actually living up to that. I think the real testimony
Building an IPO-Ready Identity Software Company from Colorado: Andre Durand, CEO of Ping Identity (Part 3)
Sramana Mitra: What happened to the Jabber project? Andre Durand: Jabber continued on even in my absence. I left in 2002 to start Ping. Sramana Mitra: When you left to sail around with your friend and wife, you quit Jabber? Andre Durand: No, I just took a sabbatical. I just said, “I’ve been at this
Bootstrapping Using Services From Houston: Identity Automation CEO James Litton (Part 4)
Sramana Mitra: Was K-12 also consulting services and implementing identity management solutions kind of projects? James Litton: Yes. Keep in mind that as we were doing this, we were doing projects for all types of organizations. It’s just that the majority of them was K-12. Sramana Mitra: The business, however, were these projects? You were
Building an IPO-Ready Identity Software Company from Colorado: Andre Durand, CEO of Ping Identity (Part 2)
Sramana Mitra: How long did this continue? Andre Durand: We actually did about $600,000 worth of business that first year. Sramana Mitra: That’s pretty significant. These were all from newsletter ads? Andre Durand: This all began with a black and white, half page advertisement that went into a little newsletter of 20 pages that shipped once