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.

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All About Minnesota’s Latest Angel Fund – and Now Its First Investment

April 10, 2015 / / 0 Comments

[NOTE: This post first appeared April 7, 2015 on Minnov8.com, where I am a contributor.)

SofiaFund-logo-250wThe news about a new angel fund in Minnesota appeared in the StarTribune in late January: “Sofia Fund receives nearly $4 million for angel fund”.  Just over two months later, the fund has announced its first investment — in Minneapolis-based Kidizen, a “kid resale marketplace to buy, kidizen-logosell, and swap your kid’s clothing, gear, toys, decor and more.” Here’s how Kathy Grayson at the Business Journal reported that news on April 3:

“Women-focused angel fund Sofia backs Kidizen.” The amount of the investment was not revealed. [UPDATE: A Twin Cities Business magazine story that appeared after I first posted this said it was $100,000.]

I’ve known three of the Sofia Fund’s members for some years, and have had the pleasure of working closely with one of them, Barb Stinnett, since late 2012. So, I decided to interview Barb to get some more background on the Sofia Fund.

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Lighting a Fire Under #IoT in Minnesota

February 4, 2015 / / 0 Comments

iotfuselogoIt turns out there’s a lot going on in the ‘Internet of Things’ space in our state. There’s also a ton of excitement and anticipation about where all this new technology is headed. Must be time for a conference! A group of technologists and early adopters in the Twin Cities decided to do just that, and are off to the races with plans for “IoT Fuse” in March — aptly described as “A Conference to Spark the Internet of Things.” Here’s the latest news from the team about the event:

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Mobile App Discovery Not Getting Easier; ‘Zombies’ Gaining

February 2, 2015 / / 0 Comments

[Note: This post first appeared earlier today at Minnov8.com, where I am a contributor. Image credit: Telegraph UK.]

appsBasically, app discovery is a bitch, and the App Store is no longer the answer. That is the gist of a report on “2015 App Store Competition” published a couple days ago by an analytics firm in Berlin called Adjust. (PDF of the full report here.)

Minnesota developers are of course not strangers to this problem.  It’s especially painful for startups looking to get traction in today’s “mobile first” startup environment — and moreso if they don’t have Silicon Valley sized funding rounds.  I asked a couple of experienced mobile industry players here in Minnesota for their reaction to this news.  But first, more on the report.

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Quantifying the Hype: A Data Analysis of #CES2015

January 13, 2015 / / 0 Comments

cesThink of it as the morning after. Actually, it was the Monday following the week when 2015 International CES ended, on a Friday. I was scrolling through my email, trying to decompress — feeling some pride in surviving multiple weeks of being blasted with hundreds (thousands?) of PR pitches from an absolutely cuh-razy variety of exhibiting companies, from all over the globe. The blisters on my feet weren’t hurting so bad anymore. Whew! Things were finally starting to… slow… down.

Part of this decompression process is always trying to form in my head my overall opinion of the show — this after writing a couple of posts (and shooting a ton of photos), but no one person can ever really write enough posts to describe their entire experience at this thing. Which begs the question, how the hell do I summarize yet another year of this massive tech-product sensory overload? It is not easy netting it out!

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Darn You, #CES2015 – You Made Me Buy a Pono Music Player

January 13, 2015 / / 0 Comments

ponoI didn’t go to the CES show looking to buy anything. I was already spending enough money getting there… and, um, making cabbies rich once I arrived. But the chance to listen to Neil Young’s Pono music player at the Showstoppers press event at CES on Tuesday evening last week convinced me to open my wallet. The experience was just so amazing.

Understand, now, I’m no audiophile or crazy-geeky music connoisseur. But I do know when I hear something that’s like nothing else. So I decided pretty instantly — yep, I’m a buyer! At $399, it’s a bargain to be able to have on-demand music experiences that rise above anything else, as Pono does. And as I considered the cost, I figured, hey, how many people paid this much and more for iPods back in the day? (Even though I admit I didn’t.) So, price is especially relative in this case.

Compare your iPod to the Pono sometime, if you can find someone who owns one, or if you can find a demo unit in a store. You will be convinced. Or compare it to the sound quality of any of the various modern smartphones out there today — those sure haven’t improved music listening much at all since the iPod, in any way I’m aware of.

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