Sramana: Oracle must have been a difficult place for you with that psychology. Max Schireson: I liked it because I got to work with a lot of smart people and I got to learn a lot. I also got to work on a lot of different things. I think that Oracle was a much better
Sramana Mitra: Tell me a little more about WGU. Ray Martinez: WGU was founded 16 years ago by a group of governors who were representing western states. This is back in 1996 – a little more than 16 years ago. In 1996 at a meeting of the Western Governors’ Association, the idea of using technology
If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. The technology startup market is red hot in 2014, and private company valuations have sky-rocketed. MongoDB has raised over $200 million, and is trying to disrupt the Database market. The company they see most often in deals is Oracle. A very interesting case study of a
If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. Adult education is becoming more of an issue. Competency-based learning that ties into employment directly is necessary to mitigate the unemployment problems in America and elsewhere. WGU has an interesting model. Sramana Mitra: Ray, let’s start by giving our audience a little bit of background about
Sramana: Was Terapeak based in Toronto as well? Kevin North: No, it was based in Victoria, BC. It was on Vancouver Island. Sramana: What was the financing strategy of the company before and after?
Sramana Mitra: You seem to have a regional emphasis. Does that mean that your sales cycle has been an in-person sales cycle? Mike Carter: Yes. Traditionally, our sales process has been person to person. We have invested quite a bit in our digital presence and we are doing things from creating ourselves as an inbound
Sramana: What was the state of the company when you came in? Kevin North: There were some really good people who had been making great technology. The founders were great and they understood Big Data very well. The only issue was that their organization was not scalable. The goal was to turn it into a
Sramana Mitra: How did revenue track in that timeframe? Mike Carter: The first 10 years, we were very immature from a strategy standpoint. It’s only been in the last five years that we evolved in what we’re doing, in terms of investing, and saw a much more strategic approach emerge. Quite honestly, there’s an aspect