The "Lull," reality or perception This week, there is no central feature for Utterly Biased. Just a question. What is your current perception of the Boston startup community, tech ecosystem, or whatever else you may want to call it? Is it robust and thriving? Are there some incredible companies on the cusp of making national … Continue reading The Lull, through Grapevine, Maine and running
Do young founders evolve? Last Thursday, Jebbit, an interactive marketing platform that has recently expanded into more data-driven products, held its first-ever customer conference, which featured talks from co-founders Tom Coburn and Jonathan Lacoste, as well as HubSpot's Kipp Bodner. The long-planned event, however, hit a bit of bad luck that, in the end, was … Continue reading Jebbit and startup evolution, Skok on Zaius, UB on Medium
Boston technology startups get a new VC booster It was announced last week that Pillar was adding Russ Wilcox as an investing partner. It's a big move for the growing (in both size and influence) firm started by Jamie Goldstein last year. Wilcox is best known for his role as the CEO and founder of E Ink, … Continue reading Pillar adds a tech pillar, vision-tech maven, vets of all stripes
Choose Industry. Build Product. Grow. Exit. Repeat. It was reported this week that CarGurus, the online car shopping platform, has selected banks in preparation for an IPO at some point in 2017. CarGurus is one of Boston's most successful private consumer internet companies, and yet, it fails to garner the same attention as some of the … Continue reading CarGurus follows the plan…the TripAdvisor plan
Beyond Boston Earlier this week, it was announced that Steve Case, AOL founder and chairman and CEO of Revolution LLC, would be bringing JD Vance into Revolution in a special role. Vance, a principal at Mithril Capital Management, is best known as the author of Hillbilly Elegy, a highly-regarded account of life growing up in … Continue reading Investing in a few key startups alone won’t save struggling American cities
The Quiet Each week, I like to feature one company that a local VC feels is not getting enough attention. This week, we'll take a break from digging into the Boston venture capital portfolios and check out a few companies that you should be hearing a lot more about, but haven't yet. The way … Continue reading Heard of these companies?
Age Ain't Nothing but a Number... The two companies in the national spotlight the last couple of weeks, Snap (aka Snapchat) and Uber have some things in common. Chief among them has been a constant questioning of whether or not their leadership is qualified to run what could be Fortune 500 companies. Both have faced … Continue reading Age versus Experience
Snap, Pop...and Then? Snap, Inc., the parent company of Snapchat, went public this week. Opening at $24 (initially priced at $17) it has continued to rise to $27.01. There are quite a few takes being thrown out there relating to Snap's debut on the public market. Like the one that examines the interest from millenials looking to get … Continue reading Snap, Pop, Next…KB is an Inspiration and a Badass
The Anti-Travis Kalanick This has been a very, very bad week for Uber. One of the most valuable private companies in the world, Uber was the focus of a blog post earlier in the week from a former engineer, which describes a culture of rampant sexism within the company. If that wasn't enough, it was revealed … Continue reading The Anti-Travis, Nasuni and EverQuote, Next Move NextView
The end of IPO limbo? Snap Inc., set the price for its expected IPO this week — with a valuation in the range of $18 billion to $20 billion — and judging by how ALL the angles of it are being covered by media outlets from Variety to USA Today to the usual suspects … Continue reading Utterly Biased Beta Newsletter
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