OC Tech Start-Ups

I was at dinner with Chip Burczak last night at The Clubhouse (thanks again for dinner Chip) and proceeded to take a bit of a hazing for being a VC in what was perceived to be a town with “a different kind of silicon” (not exactly Chip’s words)….so this post’s for you Chip. It’s the least I can do after good food and even better conversation - it was great to catch up.

I returned home from dinner to a sleeping wife and son so I decided to do a little recon on just how many tech start-ups there are in OC and logged-in to VentureSource and ran a search. Turns out, there are 69 tech start-ups in OC (949 and 714 area codes) according to the their database. I realize that this number is just ballpark as some of the 69 are inevitably walking dead at this point and there are some that are in stealth mode that aren’t yet reported (e.g. RF Nano Corporation)…but it suggests promise as that works out to roughly 13.8 tech start-ups per square mile in OC. Hard to believe, huh? You should also consider that those 69 companies represent start-ups only in the traditional information technology sectors and do not include medical device or healthcare IT companies (sectors we’re very well represented in). I’d list the companies at this point but I don’t recall the terms and conditions of my fund’s service agreement with DowJones/VentureSource so I better not until I ensure doing so isn’t a breach of contract (sorry, it’s the recovering attorney in me)…. Stay tuned and I’ll see what I can work out to get you the info either way.

Speaking of OC tech start-ups, what do all of you want to read about here? After all, you are at the CORE of any thriving VC ecosystem so don’t be afraid to speak-out (publicly or privately).