Graeme Thickins on Tech

Reflections & analysis about innovation, technology, startups, investing, healthcare, and more .... with a focus on Minnesota, Land of 10,000 Lakes. Blogging continuously since 2005.

Category: IT/Software (Page 22 of 58)

DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter 7 Billion People

March 4, 2009 / / 0 Comments

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Mark Nagaitis, CEO of 7 Billion People, at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

I’d been wanting to get to this company since hearing their on-stage pitch Monday morning, and I finally got a chance on Tuesday afternoon when, for once, their booth wasn’t mobbed. Talk about a company with an interesting naming strategy: some think names beginning with “A” are good, to get you to the front of the alphabetical listings — well, this outfit jumped even ahead of that by using a number. A big number. I asked CEO Mark Nagaitis to tell me more about his firm’s new approach to personalized online shopping.

7BillionPeople-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With Cazoodle: Future DEMO Presenter?

March 4, 2009 / / 0 Comments

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Govind Kabra, CTO of Cazoodle (a future DEMO “hopeful”), at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

I was pinged late Monday by a DEMO attendee, Govind Kabra, who wanted to give me a look at his startup’s new search technology. My first thought was, gee, I hardly have time to cover the official presenters here…but I thought, what the heck, I admired his tenacity.  So, I emailed him back before I went to the DEMO Jam Session Monday night and told him to find me at breakfast Tuesday morning. I was about chow down with Don Dodge and couple other folks when he introduced himself, and I learned he was from the University of Illinois. I told him, with that bloodline, I definitely wanted to hear more. So, after I ate, we sat down in the back of the big room just before the lights were to be lowered for the start of another big day at DEMO, and I let him tell me what his startup is doing to disrupt the apartment search business.

Cazoodle-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter Gwabbit

March 2, 2009 / / 1 Comment

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Todd Miller, CEO of Technicopia, about its product called “Gwabbit” at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

I thought one of the most effective on-stage demos today was one from Technicopia, for a product called “Gwabbit.”  It got some of the best reaction from the audience, as in noticable oohs and ahhs.  It lets you grab contact info that appears anywhere in email messages, instantly — and quickly get that data into your Outlook contacts, with just a click. Pretty cool. In this interview, the founder and CEO, Todd Miller, tells me the story of how it all came about.

Gwabbit-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter Ensembli

March 2, 2009 / / 0 Comments

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Mike Wheatley, CEO, and Ian Pringle, CTO, of Ensembli at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.
I stopped at the station where a UK company was showing off its new technology to do web search using “relevance analysis.” As they like to say, search engines, feed readers, and aggregators can’t sense who you are and what interests you, and they certainly don’t anticipate what will excite you. Instead, they overwhelm you. CEO Mike Wheatley (pictured) and CTO Ian Pringle tell me more about what Ensembli is doing to make web search better.
Ensembli-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With Christine Herron, First Round Capital

March 2, 2009 / / 1 Comment

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Christine Herron, principal, First Round Capital, at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

Christine Herron has been active in the VC industry for several years, and is now with the very well respected and active seed-stage firm First Round Capital. I chatted with her on the Pavilion showfloor here at DEMO, just as the lunch hour was approaching. We talked about her take on early-stage investing, some of her firm’s recent investments, and the panel she was about to participate in at DEMO this afternoon.

ChristineHeron-DEMO09-350w

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