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: Venture Capital/M&A/Angels (Page 23 of 53)

DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter Skout

March 4, 2009 / / 1 Comment

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~blog interviews Ben Pollack, director of products, and Christian Wiklund, CEO, of Skout — at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

One of the most talked about presenters this year was a location-based online dating service called Skout. It used to be just another dating site till the founders came up with a new wrinkle that uses large touch-screen plasma displays in bars and night clubs — so you can find and flirt with other singles in the immediate vicinity, meaning in that bar or anywhere within about a mile and a half radius. The CEO, Christian Wiklund, and VP of bus dev, Redg Snodgrass, did a high-energy stage pitch, which included the unveiling of one of their new kiosks that will soon be in 10,000 night spots all over the country in a town near you — in various sizes, some freestanding, some wall-mounted. I spoke with Ben Pollack, director of products, who’s pictured at right (that’s CEO Christian Wiklund at left). Note: Skout was one of seven “DEMOgod Award” winners announced as the final conference session wrapped up  Tuesday afternoon. Yes, it’s true: it seems the judges are really into flirting…. 🙂

Skout-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter BitGravity

March 4, 2009 / / 0 Comments

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Perry Wu, CEO of BitGravity, at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

This interview was with a company that both presented on stage (for a second year running), and provided technology for the event — specifically, the video streaming technology behind the “DEMO Live” broadcast, which was enjoyed by a worldwide audience over the past two days. I managed to run down BitGravity’s CEO, Perry Wu, to tell us more about his growing content distribution startup.

BitGravity-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter Silverstone Solutions

March 4, 2009 / / 0 Comments

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews David Jacobs, founder of Silverstone Solutions, at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.
At this DEMO, which has to be about my ninth or tenth, I saw a product pitch I never thought I would: for an application that actually saves lives. Silverstone’s “Matchmaker” is a clinical app that lets transplant organizations manage their Kidney Paired Donation program. The founder, David Jacobs, told a poignant story of how he lost a brother to kidney disease and, later, had to deal with getting a transplant himself. He saw firsthand the difficulty medical centers have in matching donors to recipients and, as a longtime software professional, saw it as a problem that software could solve. (I apologize, the first 30-60 seconds of this interview got clipped off — okay, I must not have hit the on button at first! — so, we join David in mid sentence. But I think you’ll get the gist of what this life-saving startup is all about.) Note: Silverstone later was awarded one of seven “DEMOgod Awards.”

Silverstone-DEMO09-350w

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DEMO 09 – Interview With DEMO Presenter Jadoos

March 4, 2009 / / 1 Comment

Graeme Thickins of Tech~Surf~Blog interviews Afrus Tavakoli, CEO, and Lukas Rosenstock, CTO, of Jadoos at the DEMO ’09 conference, which was held March 1-3, 2009, in Palm Desert, CA.

The concept of a remote control for the web was, I’ll have to say, something I hadn’t really thought of till I heard about this next company, whom I interviewed on Tuesday: Jadoos. Their remote control is all about helping you manage your identity online. The company’s backend technology they call a cloud-based web operating system. Their remote control shows up in your browser window at the upper right, a nicely designed visual UI with icons that click to access various web apps, features, or sites. I spoke with Afrus Tavakoli, CEO (left), and Lukas Rosenstock, CTO.

Jadoos-DEMO09-350w

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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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