I thought I’d expand on a post written by Ben Kuo (Venture Capital Booms in the OC) and point out while our county’s start-ups have raised ~$110M in the last week or so, we have also had our recent share of liquidity events. A very big congratulations to Michael Hajeck and his team at SiliconSystems and to their new parent, Western Digital, as it was announced last week that WDC acquired SiliconSystems for $65M cash!!! I also feel compelled to congratulate the guys over at Miramar Venture Partners as they were early investors in SiliconSystems. Looks like a “3-way” win for Orange County to me…
For all you night-owl entrepreneurs who struggle to make it to our early morning affairs, we’ve heard you and are responding. Register FAST, this will “sell out” ’cause, what’s not to love??? Booze, food, digital media, and Laguna Beach… 3 of my favorite things.
At OCVG’s first evening event of ‘09, learn from some of the quickest minds in Digital Media how they’re challenging the powers that be, raising BIG $$$ from VC’s and creating some of the coolest companies on planet earth.As an added bonus, OCVG will host this mega networking event at [seven-degrees] in Laguna Beach — one of the hottest venues in Orange County.We’ll have lots of munchies and FREE wine & beer.Don’t miss out.Stake your claim and RSVP NOW at www.OCVG.com.Our panelists include:
Dennis Mudd, Founder & CEO, Slacker, Inc. – Slacker creates the perfect personalized radio station for every listener by combining the knowledge of music experts with your preferences..Since inception five years ago, the company has raised $53 million from “A-list” VC’s including Mission, Centennial, Rho, Austin Ventures and Sevin Rosen.Before Slacker, Dennis was CEO at MusicMatch, sold to Yahoo for $160 million in 2004.
Jason Feffer, Founder & CEO, SodaHead.com– SodaHead is the premiere opinion-based social community for user-generated Q&A on today’s hottest topics.Founded only two years ago, the company has raised more than $12 million from savvy investors including Mission Ventures, Mohr Davidow, the Tech Coast Angels and legendary Silicon Valley “über angel” Ron Conway.Before founding SodaHead, Jason was VP Operations at MySpace.
Mark Kern, Founder & CEO, RED 5 Studios Inc.– Red5 is an independent online game developer led by the talent behind Blizzard Entertainment’s Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) hit, “World of Warcraft.”To help fund their drive to become the leading studio for creative, original MMO games for global markets, the company has raised more than $18 million from top-tier Silicon Valley VC’s Benchmark and Sierra Ventures.
MODERATOR: Bong Koh, Venture Partner, Prism Venture Partners – An expert in starting, growing and selling companies, Bong focuses on digital media and consumer Internet investments at Prism’s Santa Monica office.With $1.25 billion under management, bi-coastal Prism is a leading investor in digital media start-ups. Before joining Prism two years ago, Bong was a VC at Advanced Technology Ventures.Prior to this, Bong was co-founder of Mobilocity, a mobile solutions provider he sold to a joint venture of Qualcomm and global ad agency Omnicom.
So far, so good. We’re averaging 8 entrepreneurs / VCs so I guess I’ll keep this party going and see where it ends up. This month, we will be meeting March 19th, 9am-11am, at the Pacific Whey in Ladera Ranch at 25672 Crown Valley Parkway (in the Mercantile West Shopping Center). Hope to see you there. As always, any last minute changes will be communicated via http://twitter.com/ocvc.
Well, January has come and gone and the year is off to a “shaky” start in case you haven’t been paying attention to what is going on in the global economy. Some are faring better…some worse. In the end, we will eventually pull out of it as life goes on.
Enough luke-warm pep talk. We had a whoppin’ 6 folks show up for January’s OC VC Office Hours, but since I didn’t know 3 of them I’ll keep this going for the time being and see what (if anything) comes of it. We had an excellent discussion about what is going on in the local, national, and global VC markets and I suspect this dialogue will continue for most of this year as funding continues to be elusive for start-ups.
The next OC VC Office Hours will be February 12th, 9am-11am, at the common area between Pacific Whey and Starbucks in Crystal Cove (between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach on PCH). Please join us as we continue to discuss the VC markets and local innovation.
After an overwhelmingly positive response, I’ve decided to give the “office hours” idea a go for the first six months this year and then will make a decision as to whether to continue them. My hope is that this becomes something that continues without my presence or involvement — a free, no-hassle, relaxed atmosphere for folks in the start-up ecosystem to network over coffee. I’ve decided the third Thursday of every month is good (at least for me for now), but will rotate between south and north county venues. So, the first OC VC Office Hours will be Thursday, January 15th from 9am-11am PST Pacific Whey in Ladera Ranch. If this begins to build a crowd, I’ll use a widget to list the upcoming dates, times, venues, etc. on this blog and will send out updates.
I will send out real-time updates via Twitter if things change. You can sign up for them at Twitter and rest assured that I’m not a prolific Twitterer. I look forward to meeting you on the 15th. I’ll wear be wearing a black hat with the Okapi Venture Capital logo on it to make it easier to find me the first few sessions.
I’ve been toying with the idea of holding regular “office hours” at a set time and place to meet with folks in the community — be they entrepreneurs, service providers, or others — in lieu of some of the traditional networking events and thought I’d throw the thought out to all of you to see whether this is something you would be interested in. I have ~ 150 subscribers (via email or RSS) and a thousand more readers so I can only assume that some of you are local. Anyway, let me know your thoughts here.
