Long Journey Over 20 Years: Paula Tompkins, CEO of ChannelNet (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What year is that?

Paula Tompkins: 1985.

Sramana Mitra: Tell us a bit about the idea and how you came up with it.

Paula Tompkins: As I mentioned, the idea was that personal computers were gaining popularity. In 1985, there were about 10 million personal computers. There was the Macintosh, which had just emerged on the market, and then there was the IBM PC. Most of the IBM PCs were used in the business environment and about 50% of IBM PCs had a color card that would allow the computer to display four colors. >>>

Connected Medical Devices from France: Visiomed CEO Olivier Hua (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: How do you go to market? Are these sold as consumer devices? Are they sold as devices to doctor’s offices? How is the go-to market strategy structured?

Olivier Hua: Initially, our products were sold through pharmacies.

Sramana Mitra: A thermometer being sold through a pharmacy makes sense, but you’re talking about ECGs and stuff. That’s not a pharmacy product, right?

Olivier Hua: We had been selling essentially direct to consumers so far. For some of the products, we go to physicians and doctors who prescribe our medical devices. We can talk about the ECG for instance. It’s a mobile ECG. It’s a very small device. It’s something that can be carried by anybody. Typically it’s for >>>

Long Journey Over 20 Years: Paula Tompkins, CEO of ChannelNet (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What was the startup in 1981 and what was the environment in which that startup was coming together?

Paula Tompkins: It was a very interesting time, around the birth of the personal computer. Adam Osborne had introduced his luggable computer. It was a CPM machine. The man that I went to work for made the circuit boards for Adam Osborne who was very wealthy and was very jealous. He hired an engineer and he decided he was going to one-up Adam Osborne. He was going to make a luggable computer that was all inclusive. >>>

Connected Medical Devices from France: Visiomed CEO Olivier Hua (Part 1)

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

Connected Medical Devices is an emerging trend in Healthcare. Read on to see how a company from France has been navigating and pushing that trend.

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?

Olivier Hua: I was born in France 58 years ago. I started my career as a banker. After seven years, I decided to become an entrepreneur. We actually bought three companies in the automotive industry and I stayed there for 12 years. Back in the early 2000, the automotive industry was a very traditional business. I wanted to be part of the new things that were happening. I then changed careers and became an investor. I was an investor for 12 years and during that time, I’ve helped several companies grow. >>>

Long Journey Over 20 Years: Paula Tompkins, CEO of ChannelNet (Part 1)

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

Paula Tompkins started her bootstrapped digital marketing venture in 1985. She has navigated massive industry level shifts, three significant downturns, and has managed to remain relevant. The company today does $20M+ in annual revenue.

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?

Paula Tompkins: I was born and raised in Huntington, West Virginia. I was the first of my family to be college-educated. I went to Marshall University. It was a local university in my hometown. I graduated with a Business degree in 1974. My mother was a hairdresser. My father owned a shoe store. My father was a first generation Lebanese. My mother has a multi-generational Irish-English-Welsh background. >>>

Bootstrapped First, Raise Money Later: Manick Bhan, CEO of Rukkus (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: How did you find your investors?

Manick Bhan: Most of the investors that we were connected to came through our networks. Along the way, we went to various events. I don’t recommend going to all of the tech events, but sometimes, some of them are good. You know which ones are good because those are the ones that your entrepreneur friends are recommending. If you’re in New York, the New York Tech Meetup is one of the best meetups in the city about announcing cool technology. There are always investors there. There are always cool entrepreneurs there much more successful than you have been. We’re able to build together a network.

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Bootstrapped First, Raise Money Later: Manick Bhan, CEO of Rukkus (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: What happens next?

Manick Bhan: We figured out how to rub these two stones together and kept building up this small fire. We were doing maybe $50,000 in sales a month and slowly growing. By the end of the year, we had hit $1 million ARR (Annual Revenue Rate). In that process, we focused on the two fundamentals of what it takes for the solution to be successful. Understanding organic search is hugely important. You can’t just read it online and learn it. You have to be doing it and running experiments. We were running several experiments. >>>

Bootstrapped First, Raise Money Later: Manick Bhan, CEO of Rukkus (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: Let’s get back to the specifics of how you did it. Now that you are in the market, you have figured out that you can get to a million dollar run rate. What was the reason why people were buying from you versus these other players? You had all kinds of hypothesis intellectualizing before you started, but what did you learn from the market?

Manick Bhan: In that time, the only goal we had was, “Can we analyze the things that are happening with our users and our app?” What percentage of them are buying? When are they buying? The thing is we had a little bit of spark. All we were doing is we were gathering around this flame and just trying to study it. We were just studying all these details.

Sramana Mitra: I’m asking you a specific detail from that lot. Why were they buying from you? This is one of the fundamental positioning questions that people need to ask? Why? >>>