Jason Fried on Bootstrapped vs. Funded Startups

Add comment October 25th, 2009

“The mindset on Day One of a bootstrapped startup is: ‘Make Money.’
The mindset on Day One in a funded startup is ‘Spend Money.’”
Jason Fried, Founder, 37signals

From Gabor Cselle’s “The Best Quotes from Startup School” in “Gabor’s Positive Thoughts“

Hacker Dojo: Something is Happening in Mountain View

Add comment October 20th, 2009

We stopped by the Hacker Dojo today after the breakfast in Sunnyvale, it’s located at 140 S. Whisman in Mountain View.  Dean Mao was kind enough to give us a tour, he was jazzed his startup Plurchase had recently been covered by TechCrunch: “Online Shop Til You Drop With Your Friends on Plurchase“.

It’s still early days for the dojo, but a lot is happening there. While we were touring the folks organizing the 2009 Silicon Valley Data Mining Camp that will be held at the dojo were also there making preparations. It’s an interesting unconference format event.

It costs $100 a month to join the Dojo for co-working, this gives you access to the building and all events held there on a first come first serve basis. They are open 10am to 10pm for co-working most days, check the “Scheduled Staff” page for particulars.

Update Oct 28: I just came across Mike Swift’s Mercury News article from Oct-15 titled “Hacker Dojo in Mountain View Sparks Ideas and Tinkering” which includes a slide show and audio interviews.

A Double Breakfast Week: Tue in Sunnyvale and Friday in Mountain View

Add comment October 19th, 2009

Check our calendar for details but we are at Coco’s in Sunnyvale Tuesday at 7:30am and Red Rock Coffee in Mountain View Friday at 9am. Both are our regular round table format and have a number of folks signed up already. Please RSVP, especially for the Red Rock so we can tell if we need to run two tables or not.

Also came across a great list of events for entrepreneurs in this week collated by Chris McCann it’s imaginatively titled “Tech and Entrepreneurship Events in the Bay Area 10/19 to 10/26”

Update: I should make clear that the best all-around calendar for Silicon Valley entrepreneurial events is still WorkIt.

Beware of False Solicitations for CA State Fees

Add comment October 14th, 2009

Several members have gotten very official looking letters in the mail that ask them to pay the LLC Statement of Information fee and were astounded that LLCs fees had gone up to $239. The problem is, fees have not gone up, the letters are scams. Here is the language from the real form for LLC Statement of Information:

FILING FEES: The fee for filing the initial or biennial Statement of Information is $20.00. Checks should be made payable to the Secretary of State. If this statement is being filed to amend any information on a previously filed statement and is being filed outside the applicable filing period, as defined above, no fee is required.

The California Secretary of State has issued an alert on “Misleading Business Solicitations” that advise the solicitations tend to have one or more of the following characteristics:

• Appear similar to a Secretary of State Statement of Information form;
• Contain an official-looking seal;
• Quote a specific statute or other law on the form to be filled out and returned;
• Imply that failing to return the form and pay the requested fee may place the entity in legal jeopardy, or might cause the entity’s filings with the California Secretary of State to be in default or noncompliant status;
• Contain a reference to a “file number,” “Corp Number,” “Corporation Number,” or “Control Number” that does not match the number assigned to the entity by the California Secretary of State;
• Reference or quote Corporations Code sections inapplicable to the type of entity being solicited, such as Code sections applicable to corporations when soliciting a limited liability company;
• Reference an “annual fee” or “annual payment” rather than a filing fee and that is in excess of the filing fee for a Statement of Information;
• Provide an estimated processing time for “minutes” to be prepared and mailed to the entity;
• Indicate the submitted information will be treated as private and confidential.

Check directly with the  https://businessfilings.sos.ca.gov/ site for CA State filings and fees related to your corporation (C, Sub-S, or LLC).

Great Talk on Strategic Planning by Lenny Greenberg Today

1 comment October 9th, 2009

Lenny Greenberg, a serial entrepreneur and frequent attendee led the discussion this morning about the importance of planning and a long term view business. His slides are here: http://www.slideboom.com/presentations/102214/Developing-Your-Strategic-Product-Plan

Lenny is currently CEO at Assistyx, a software company specializing in products for non-verbal autistic children. Prior to that, he was co-founder and CTO of Pathlore Software Corporation. Lenny led technology direction and development at a variety of enterprise software start ups including HxManagement, Sigma Imaging Systems, Document Automation Corporation and Instinet. He started his career in the Cleveland, OH office of Accenture with a specialty in banking and law firm automation.

One of the neat things about attending the Bootstrappers Breakfasts is that you get to watch a number of startups develop and launch their products. Lenny has been working on Assistyx  with his partner for more than a year, making steady progress and overcoming a couple of setbacks. It was a great discussion.

Pre-Entrepreneurs and Entrepreneurially Curious Also Welcome

Add comment October 6th, 2009

I got a question in our contact form this week, and when I answered it directly I asked for and received permission to use the text of the question as the basis for a short blog post since I think a number of potential attendees have the same concerns:

I am a first time pre-entrepreneur with multiple ideas. I have only just started networking and talking to people. I am very interested in attending. I am also interested in finding a co-founder to team up with and work on some of these ideas. I wanted to know if you get a lot of people like me on the brink of starting a startup and looking for other people, help and ideas.

If you are giving serious consideration to starting or joining a technology startup you are welcome at a Bootstrapper Breakfast®. Every session is different and we always get an interesting mix of first time and experienced entrepreneurs, men and women, some just out of college others who have been in the workforce for decades.

This Friday we are meeting at 7:30am at the Omega Restaurant in Milpitas, it might be a good one for you, Lenny Greenberg of Assistyx will take the first 10-12 minutes to talk about a company he launched and some lessons learned.  We also have a “regular” Bootstrapper Breakfast scheduled tomorrow (Wednesday) at 9am Boudin Bakery at 4 Embarcadero Center in San Francisco.

We get a number of folks who are just starting out. You might also take a look at the presentation I made at SV CodeCamp 2009 on Sunday (see http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2009/10/04/startup-maturity-checklist-slides-from-todays-svcc-session/ ) it may give you a framework to look at bootstrapping a software business.

If you have other questions that are not answered by our “First Timer Guidelines” or our “Frequently Asked Questions” pages please contact us.

Over 100 Entrepreneurs in Linkedin Group

Add comment October 4th, 2009

We have over 100 members in the LinkedIn group for Bootstrappers Breakfast! Anyone who has attended a breakfast is welcome to join.