Bootstrap First, Raise Money Later from Oregon: Paresh Patel, CEO of PayRange (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What is your Ph.D. in? Paresh Patel: It’s also in e-business and organization management. Sramana Mitra: The vending machine company was yourself? Paresh Patel: There were employees. We grew to about 25 employees.

Building a Mid-Market Cyber Security Company from Utah: Peter Bookman, CEO of Guard Dog (Part 1)

Peter is a startup veteran who is building a new Cyber Security company from Utah. The key insight to focus on in this story is how he found white space in the mid-market. Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in

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Bootstrap First, Raise Money Later from Oregon: Paresh Patel, CEO of PayRange (Part 1)

Paresh did a superb job of validating in a bootstrapped mode and then raising significant venture capital. However, he made some mistakes after the fund raise. Eventually, he course-corrected and has built a wonderful business without further infusion of capital. Excellent case study! Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where

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Bootstrapping by Piggybacking: Evenica CEO Sadek Ali (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: If you tried to go into the Shopify marketplace with another e-commerce platform, that wouldn’t work. That was not an option. You were trying to build your own e-commerce platform. Sadek Ali: Shopify is a long-tail play. Sramana Mitra: Shopify, on many levels, is not the right marketplace for you. Sadek Ali: Shopify

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Bootstrapping by Piggybacking: Evenica CEO Sadek Ali (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: You had a diverse set of e-commerce platforms that were in that portfolio. Sadek Ali: That’s correct. We didn’t really know what the platform was. I picked up technologies my entire life. If you understand how e-commerce works, then you know the operational side of it that they’re looking for. We did that

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Building a 2-sided Farm to Table Marketplace from Indiana: Nick Carter, CEO of Market Wagon (Part 5)

Nick Carter: We can prove a few things though. We had gross margin profitability. We’re not losing money on operations. We have been building a playbook for scale. We had practice with opening – what the regulatory problems are, how you find a space, who you need to recruit. They backed us with $5 million

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Bootstrapping by Piggybacking: Evenica CEO Sadek Ali (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: They replaced you as the CEO. Sadek Ali: They tried to. I was the Founder and CTO. My business partner was the CEO. They hired a CEO. Sramana Mitra: The business got replaced by their CEO. Sadek Ali: Yes. Sramana Mitra: That didn’t go well.

Building a 2-sided Farm to Table Marketplace from Indiana: Nick Carter, CEO of Market Wagon (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: What happens when COVID strikes? Nick Carter: Everything in our company is measured on week-over-week sales. I can remember my co-founder texting me one Sunday afternoon saying, “We had a nice week today.” The sales volume grew 600% in one week. It’s because everybody had to stay home. They needed delivery. The traditional

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