Startup Boston Podcast: Entrepreneurs | Investors | Influencers | Founders
42 episodes - English - Latest episode: almost 7 years ago - ★★★★★ - 15 ratingsThe Startup Boston Podcast takes you inside the world of Boston startups, featuring interviews with Boston-based entrepreneurs, investors, and influencers. During each episode, someone involved with Boston startups will share their experience, advice, thoughts, predictions, and challenges with listeners. No industry or topic is off-limits as guests share their first-hand experience. Guests range from Kickstarter successes, to angel investors and venture capitalists, to SaaS founders, to product team experts and beyond. I believe that each person has a story to tell and we each can learn something from the experiences of others. Whether you are a founder, work at a startup, are an investor, interested in joining a startup, or are just curious about startups, you will find something here for you. This podcast is an attempt to help share those stories.
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Episodes
Ep: 042 - Brittany Dicapua - Boston Food Journal - Starting and Growing a Side Hustle
May 23, 2017 06:00 - 32 minutes - 20.1 MBBrittany DiCapua started The Boston Food Journal a year and a half ago by sharing food on Instagram and it has morphed into much more than a side project for her. She describes The Boston Food Journal as highlighting the food and dining industry through social marketing, blog and video content, and photography. The Boston food journal is a strong social influencer of local restaurants, small businesses, and technology applications throughout Massachusetts. In this episode, Brittany tal...
Ep: 041 - Beck Bamberger - BAM Communications - 'Success', Public Relations & Expanding Comfort Zones
May 10, 2017 06:00 - 45 minutes - 106 MBBeck Bamberger is founder and CEO of BAM Communications, a PR firm for startups. Beck graduated UCLA in two years and was then, the youngest MBA graduate from the University of Pittsburgh at age 21. She started BAM Communications while working as a news anchor in San Diego and won an Emmy in 2011. Shortly after, she also founded BITE, San Diego’s top-rated and largest food tour company in the country and sold it in 2016. In this episode, Beck talks about: How founders can know if...
Ep: 040 - Kevin Kinsella - Avalon Ventures - From Employee to Founder to Investor: San Diego's Most Interesting Man
May 04, 2017 06:00 - 48 minutes - 112 MBKevin Kinsella is a venture capitalist in San Diego. Kevin has been a part of the formation, financing, and development of more than 125 companies, including several public companies. In the past, Kevin has led international joined ventures for Solar Turbines International, he was an advisor to the Peruvian government in national nutrition planning, he ran a technology exchange program between the United States and Latin America, and he taught algebra at the American high school in Beirut, L...
Ep: 039 - Sumner Lee - Fuse Integration - Warfighter Focused Engineering & Design
April 25, 2017 06:00 - 36 minutes - 23.8 MBSumner Lee is founder of Fuse Integration. Before founding the company, Sumner was in the Navy, and then spent time in SPAWAR and design consultancy. Fuse is a design and engineering firm that brings warfighter focused design to commercial and defense applications. In this episode, Sumner talks about: Their unique office space in downtown San Diego, where their walls are covered with murals What he’s learned from his time in the military and how he applies it to Fuse Integr...
Ep: 038 - Brian O'Neill - Designing for Analytics - Designing Indispensable Data Products
April 04, 2017 06:00 - 55 minutes - 37.7 MBBrian Oneill has been a product designer for more than twenty years and in the last ten years has been an independent consultant and started his company Designing For Analytics last year. Brian has helped designed products for companies ranging from startups to enterprises including NetApp, TripAdvisor, Infinio, Fidelity, and DataXu. In this episode, Brian talks about: The differences between UI and UX and what the role of the product designer is How to measure the user exp...
Ep: 037 - Dave Smith - Liquiglide - Revolutionizing Packaging and Manufacturing Through Permanently Slippery Surfaces
March 21, 2017 06:00 - 24 minutes - 15 MBDavid Smith is CEO of LiquiGlide. LiquiGlide’s technology was developed at a research lab at MIT and its function is to provide permanently wet surfaces that can be used in a wide variety of applications including manufacturing, consumer packaging, and oil and gas. In this episode, David talks about: The amount of waste we produce every year from product that is left sticking to surfaces Who some of his mentors are and what he learned from them How the coatings differ...
Ep: 036 - Andy Ory - 128 Technology - On A Mission To Fix the Internet
March 14, 2017 06:00 - 48 minutes - 36.7 MBAndy Ory sold his last company, Acme Packet, to Oracle for $2.1 billion and soon after co-founded 128 Technology. 128 Technology is on a mission to fix the broken internet. The internet isn’t used for what it was originally designed for and that is putting a major strain on the networking infrastructure. 128 Technology provides greater network security delivered with a much simpler experience for a fraction of the usual cost. In this episode, Andy talks about: Why the Internet is...
Ep: 035 - Liz Powers - ArtLifting - Creating Opportunities Through Art
March 01, 2017 07:00 - 20 minutes - 14.6 MBLiz Powers is co-founder and “Chief Happiness Spreader” at ArtLifting. Liz co-founded ArtLifting with her brother after creating art groups in homeless shelters only to see amazing pieces of art end up in basements and closets of shelters. ArtLifting empowers artists dealing with homelessness and disabilities through the sale of their artwork. In this episode, Liz talks about: The differences between handouts and opportunities Why she didn’t want ArtLifting to be a non-prof...
Ep: 034 - David_Delmar - Resilient Coders - Addressing Tech's Diversity Problems
February 14, 2017 07:00 - 34 minutes - 23.3 MBDavid Delmar is the founder and executive director at Resilient Coders and formerly was a design lead at PayPal. Resilient Coders’ mission is simple: they take students from traditionally under-served communities and teach them the skills needed to be web developers during an eight-week boot camp. Upon completing the boot camp, Resilient Coders helps connect them to job opportunites. In this episode, David talks about: When he first recognized the need for a program like Resilie...
Ep: 033 - Annie Wang - Her Campus - From bootstrapping to over 10,000 contributors
February 07, 2017 07:00 - 40 minutes - 28.2 MBAnnie Wang is co-founder, Chief Product Officer, and Creative Director at Her Campus. Annie co-founded Her Campus at Harvard University after she and her co-founders saw the potential of bringing a women’s college-focused lifestyle and fashion magazine online. Today, Her Campus has over 10,000 contributors and over 320 campus chapters. Annie has been named to Inc.’s 30 Under 30, BusinessWeek’s Top 25 Under 25, and Forbes’ All-Star Student Entrepreneurs. She has served as a National Women’s H...
Ep: 032 - Rachel_Spekman - MassChallenge - The Most Startup-Friendly Accelerator
January 31, 2017 15:52 - 21 minutes - 19.8 MBRachel Spekman is currently the Director of Programming at MassChallenge, which describes itself to be the most startup-friendly accelerator on the planet. MassChallenge awards over two million dollars in equity-free prizes every year to help high-impact startups succeed. In this episode, Rachel talks about: What sets MassChallenge apart from other accelerators What the curriculum looks like and which mentors are available Traits she has noticed in the most successful...
Ep: 031 - Semyon Dukach - Techstars- From MIT Blackjack to Startup Founder to Angel Investor
January 24, 2017 07:00 - 36 minutes - 29.4 MBSemyon Dukach is currently the Program Director at Techstars Boston and is an angel investor with roughly over 100 investments. He is also the chairman of SharpSpring, which he took over in 2002 and then took public in 2011. He lead one of the MIT blackjack teams in the early nineties, has started a few companies, and in 2012 Semyon created “The Troublemaker Award”. In this episode, Semyon talks about: His time leading one of the MIT blackjack teams in the nineties Why he l...
Ep: 030 - Rob MacLeod - Neoscape - Virtual Reality, Hiring, and 20+ Years of Startup Experience
January 17, 2017 07:00 - 48 minutes - 38.9 MBRob MacLeod is founder of Neoscape, a one-stop shop for clients including real estate developers, architects, designers, and corporations for everything from 3-D renderings, imaging, filmmaking, animation, interactive development, branding, and strategy. Rob was a full-time carpenter and went to school for architecture before founding Neoscape twenty-one years ago. In this episode, Rob talks about: Virtual reality, including where Rob sees the field going and how Neoscape’s clien...
Ep: 029 - Enrico Palmerino - botkeeper - Artificial Intelligence meets Bookkeeping
January 12, 2017 14:37 - 32 minutes - 37.3 MBEnrico Palmerino founded botkeeper to focus on the software solution for bookkeeping by using artificial intelligence. Enrico started his first company ThinkLite while attending college at Babson. ThinkLite is a lighting designer, manufacturer, and installer that allows customers to pay for lighting solutions as a percentage of their savings with no upfront costs. After ThinkLite, Enrico was co-owner and managing director at SmartBooks and eventually founded botkeeper. In 2011, Bloomberg Bus...
Ep: 028 - Maya Rafie - Bistara - The Freelance Marketplace to Hire College Students for Creative Gigs
December 13, 2016 07:00 - 23 minutes - 21.4 MBMaya Rafie is founder of Bistara, the first freelance marketplace to hire college students for creative gigs. Maya, a freelance photographer, founded Bistara while attending Emerson College. Bistara encourages students to “be your own boss” in order to build up a portfolio of work prior to graduation. Today, there are over 700 freelancers and over 300 clients on the platform. In the episode, Maya talks about: How they originally started building out the marketplace for Bistara ...
Ep: 027 - Doug Morgan - Lola Travel - What it's Like to be Acquired
December 06, 2016 07:00 - 27 minutes - 23.1 MBDoug Morgan is the Director of Engineering at Lola Travel. Doug joined the company when Lola acquired HopOn, the company he co-founded. Lola connects travelers with in-house personal travel consultants who help customers plan, book, and manage their travel in an effort to make trips more personal and rewarding. In this episode, Doug talks about: The process of being acquired The transition from founder to employee The key to building a successful engineering team ...
Ep: 026 - Win Smith - Sugarbush - Going from Merrill Lynch to Owning a Ski Resort
November 29, 2016 07:00 - 25 minutes - 21 MBWin Smith’s father was a founding member of Merrill Lynch and he worked there for twenty-eight years as the executive vice president. However, when new management was brought in and disagreed with the values that the firm had been founded on, he left. Win moved from New York City to Warren, Vermont to run Sugarbush ski resort full-time, which he had purchased a few years prior. At the time, Sugarbush was nearing bankruptcy, but thanks to investments made by Win and others they were able to t...
Ep: 025 - Rory Crawford - BevSpot - Real-time Bar and Restaurant Analytics
November 22, 2016 07:00 - 25 minutes - 21.4 MBRory Crawford is co-founder and CEO of BevSpot. BevSpot is a hospitality management software that allows restaurants and bars to monitor and order inventory three times faster and provides visualizations to help identify trends in usage, inventory, profitability, sales, and variance. In this episode, Rory talks about: Why building out a prototype allowed him to stand out and attract co-founders Biggest trends happening in the bar and restaurant industry Why they want...
Ep: 024 - Cort Davies - Startup CMO - How Early-Stage Startups can still Achieve Marketing Results
November 15, 2016 13:14 - 45 minutes - 38.8 MBCort Davies is founder of StartupCMO, an aid to small companies with limited budgets for marketing. Cort first got into online marketing after realizing that the Internet was the next big platform after real estate. After helping friends generate leads for their companies, Cort founded StartupCMO to help more companies with marketing budgets too low to hire someone full-time, but adequate enough to still achieve great results. Along with his primary passions, Cort is also a mentor at MassCha...
Ep: 023 - Karin Brandt - coUrbanize - Community-Driven Urban Planning
November 10, 2016 07:00 - 26 minutes - 24.6 MBKarin Brandt is founder and CEO of CoUrbanize. CoUrbanize allows residents to participate in the development process of their neighborhood. Ideas can be exchanged and considered without having to physically go to meetings and sort through piles of paper. In this episode, Karin talks about: What the Techstars experience was like for her The benefits of CoUrbanize for real estate developers and municipalities How planners and developers can go about getting engagement f...
Ep: 022 - Rob Biederman - Catalant - The World's Top Experts On Demand
November 07, 2016 07:00 - 39 minutes - 22.6 MBRob Biederman’s co-founded Catalant (formerly HourlyNerd) while getting his MBA at HBS as a requirement to for his Field III Course. They started by going to small businesses surrounding the campus and asking what problems they were facing and how they could help. MBA students from surrounding schools would then carry out the work needed for the small businesses. Today, Catalant has over 28,000 experts on their platform and has completed projects for small companies and enterprises such as G...
Ep: 021 - Ken Cowan - Openview - Investing in Expansion-Stage Software Companies
November 03, 2016 06:00 - 1 hour - 36.4 MBKen Cowan has made his way from a consultant, to CEO of an automotive services company to an investor. Currently, Ken is an associate at OpenView Venture Partners, a venture capital firm that focuses on expansion-stage software companies. Ken quit his first job at age 13, caddying at a local golf course, because he found it too boring and quickly found a new job working at a startup organizing and running tests on laptops. Since graduating from BC, Ken has mostly been involved with startups ...
Ep: 20 - Rory Cuddyer - City of Boston - Boston's Startup Czar
October 31, 2016 06:00 - 37 minutes - 21.4 MBRory Cuddyer was named the City of Boston’s Startup Manager by the Mayor in March of 2015. But what does that mean and what does he do? I sat down with Rory to find out. Previously, Rory was an advisor the Mayor’s Chief of Staff and was named the Startup Manager because the Mayor wants to ensure the city is doing as much for startups as it’s doing for more well established companies. In this episode, Rory talks about: What the Startup Manager does on a day to day basis What...
Ep: 019 - Ellen Chisa - Lola Travel - Connecting Travelers and In-House Personal Travel Consultants
October 28, 2016 06:00 - 39 minutes - 23 MBEllen Chisa started her career in Program Management at Microsoft then moved to Kickstarter as a Product Manager where she was the fiftieth employee. In 2015 she joined Lola Travel as the first employee as the VP of Product. Lola is Paul English’s second travel company, and connects travelers with in-house personal travel consultants who help you plan, book, and manage your travel, allowing you to have a more personalized and rewarding trip. In this episode, Ellen talks about: ...
Ep: 018 - Ben Rubin - 10% Happier - Taking The 'Woo Woo' Out of Meditation
October 26, 2016 06:00 - 45 minutes - 26.4 MBBen Rubin started his first company, Zeo, while attending Brown University, to help people learn how to measure and manage their sleep. Following Zeo, Ben co-founded the Change Collective, focusing on helping people drive change through courses and coaches. After partnering with Dan Harris, Ben and his co-founders decided to focus solely on meditation and changed the name to 10% Happier, the name of Dan Harris’s book. Ben’s initial focus on improving sleep helped him realize how small change...
Ep: 017 - Sean Grundy - Bevi - Eliminating Plastic Bottles
October 24, 2016 06:00 - 53 minutes - 31 MBAfter attending Princeton, Sean Grundy worked in the environmental business before going to business school. It was after business school when he started Bevi, whose goal is to eliminate plastic bottles. Sean doesn’t consider himself to be a natural entrepreneur and in-fact, used to think business wasn’t interesting. He does however, enjoy the idea of being able to set your own rules and do things in a way that makes sense to him. Sean and his co-founders identified the bottled water busines...
Ep: 016 - Nathan Eagle - Jana - Bringing One Billion People Unrestricted, Free Internet Access
October 21, 2016 06:00 - 37 minutes - 21.5 MBNathan Eagle’s background while at MIT involved doing data analytics for mobile operators trying to get an understanding of the underlying dynamics of their subscriber base and while there he started to work with operators in emerging markets. Soon after on a Fulbright scholarship, Nathan headed to Kenya to teach computer science students how to program for mobile phones. Nathan then started Jana in 2009. Jana is the largest provider of free internet in emerging markets and is dedicated to ...
EP: 015 - Mo Plassnig - Codeship - Continuous Delivery & Remote Teams
October 19, 2016 09:00 - 44 minutes - 25.6 MBIn today’s episode, I sit down with Mo Plassnig, co-founder and CEO of Codeship. Originally from Austria, Mo moved to Boston to join Techstars in 2013. His first company focused on fostering entrepreneurship in Europe by hosting events and encouraging people to start their own company. Codeship started as a side project for him and his co-founder after noticing that companies were having a difficult time rolling out changes in their software fast enough. After picking up enough paying custo...
Ep: 014 - Vanu Bose - Vanu - Bringing the Telephone to a Billion People
October 17, 2016 09:00 - 44 minutes - 25.5 MBToday I sit down with Vanu Bose, Founder and CEO of Vanu. Vanu attended MIT and in-between his undergrad and graduate work, spent two years working at a non-profit which brought him to over thirty countries around the world. After MIT, Vanu started a company based off of his PhD work, which was around the idea of software upgrades instead of hardware upgrades to update cellular network standards (2G to 3G to 4G etc), potentially saving the wireless industry billions of dollars. Their technol...
Ep: 013 - Alice Rossiter - Alice's Table - Prioritizing Living Well and Working Hard
October 14, 2016 06:00 - 32 minutes - 18.6 MBIn today’s episode I sit down with Alice Rossiter, Founder and CEO of Alice’s Table. Alice’s Table brings women together to learn new skills, and live a social and creative lifestyle through the art of flower arranging. Events are hosted at top restaurants and bars offering a night out with a twist. Alice’s Table works to empower women to create a community that prioritizes living well and working hard. After working at multiple startups Alice realized that there needed to be a flexible car...
Ep: 012 - Brett Maloley - Ladder - Using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to Drive Results
October 12, 2016 06:00 - 52 minutes - 30.2 MBIn today’s episode I sit down with Brett Maloley, Co-Founder and CEO of Ladder. Brett grew up in the fitness industry with his father being an owner of health clubs and an owner of an equipment distribution company. Brett uncovered his passion for the fitness industry when he realized he wasn’t going to become a professional athlete and spent time working for his father’s friend in the fitness industry selling flooring. From there Brett went on to start multiple companies in the fitness ind...
Ep: 011 - Rob Go - NextView Ventures - High Conviction, Hands-On Seed Investors
October 10, 2016 06:00 - 1 hour - 37.6 MBIn today’s episode I sit down with Rob Go, Co-Founder and Partner at NextView Ventures, a seed-stage VC firm focused on internet and software businesses, investing in both B2C and B2B companies. NextView has investments in companies such as Drift, InsightSqaured, Bridj, and TaskRabbit. Before founding NextView, Rob was at Spark Capital and focused on early stage consumer web and mobile companies. Prior to Spark Capital, Rob worked at eBay as the Business Product Lead overseeing the launch of...
Ep: 010 - Braden Golub - SPOT - The Airbnb of Parking Spaces
October 07, 2016 05:00 - 39 minutes - 22.6 MBIn today’s episode I sit down with Braden Golub, Founder and CEO of SPOT, essentially the Airbnb of private parking spots. If you’ve ever been driving around the city, not able to find a parking spot and wondering why you can’t just park in someone’s driveway or parking spot since they’re not using it, then this app is for you. SPOT allows people who have a parking spot they’re not using to list it for when it is available such as between nine to five or twenty four hours a day. People seeki...
Ep: 009 - Bettina Hein - Pixability - Succesful Video Advertising
October 05, 2016 05:00 - 54 minutes - 31.4 MBIn today’s episode, I interview Bettina Hein, founder & CEO of Pixability, a software platform that helps brands and their agencies place video advertising on platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Bettina’s first company, SVOX, which worked on text to speech, was sold to Nuance and that technology can be found on mobile phones and cars today. Bettina was born in Berlin, attended college in Switzerland, and moved to Cambridge to become a Sloan Fellow at MIT. It was the...
Ep: 008 - Shea Coakley - Leanbox - Integrating Technology with Fresh Food Kiosks
October 03, 2016 05:00 - 57 minutes - 32.9 MBIn this episode, I interview Shea Coakley, founder and CEO of Leanbox, which provides businesses with a fresh food kiosk by blending technology and food service. Their target customer is the ~150 person office that wants to provide employees with a fresh and healthy food service without the need to build a cafeteria. Leanbox eliminates the need for customers to place orders when supply runs low since each Leanbox and its contents can be monitored by the Leanbox team. This means they’re able ...
Ep: 007 - Andy Levitt - The Purple Carrot - Starting a Subscription Based Business
September 30, 2016 05:00 - 42 minutes - 24.5 MBToday I sit down with Andy Levitt, the founder and CEO of The Purple Carrot. Founded in 2014, The Purple Carrott is a plant-based meal kit that Andy started after seeing the lack of a plant-based meal kit being offered by the current players in the national meal kit space(Plated, Blue Apron, Hello Fresh). Purple Carrot ships its subscribers all of the raw ingredients they need to cook two to three dinners every week with recipes developed by chefs with a focus on different flavors and ethni...
Ep: 006 - Jonathan Kim - Appcues - User Onboarding
September 28, 2016 05:00 - 49 minutes - 28.4 MBJonathan Kim took an interesting path to becoming the founder of a tech company. A journalism major at BU, Jonathan taught himself how to code before becoming a software engineer at HubSpot. It was there that he identified the problem companies face with onboarding users to platforms. Instead of wanting to solve this problem with people, he wanted to solve it with product. To solve this he started Appcues, a user onboaring company for software companies. In this episode, Jonathan share...
Ep: 005 - Sam Saltis - Core dna - SaaS & Dynamanic Content
September 26, 2016 05:00 - 1 hour - 36.2 MBSam Saltis moved to Boston from Australia to start his second company, Core dna. Sam spent over ten years working for one of Australia’s largest banks before getting his MBA and deciding soon after, in 2000, that he was going to start his own business. It started off as a consulting business that then morphed into building websites for businesses. That company, bwired, continues in Australia as CoreDNA was started as a separate company in Boston after seeing the demand for the product gettin...
Ep: 004 - Vinayak Ranade - Drafted - Creating a Better Hiring Experience
September 23, 2016 05:00 - 50 minutes - 29.2 MBVinayak Ranade started as a software engineer at Kayak.com and ended up running the Kayak mobile engineering team as well as technical recruiting. At the time, Kayak didn’t have an in-house recruiting team, instead the recruiting was being done by the engineering managers. It was during this time, running the recruiting process at Kayak, that Vinayak realized this was something he really enjoyed. When he left Kayak, Vinayak knew the next problem he needed to solve was hiring, and thus, Draft...
Ep: 003 - Ty Danco - Being Attractive to Investors
September 22, 2016 07:00 - 48 minutes - 27.9 MBTy Danco is an entrepreneur, angel investor, and Program Director at Techstars Boston. Ty started his career on Wall St. then moved to Vermont where he founded, in 2000, and later sold, in 2006, eSecLending. A few years later he got involved with angel investing and made ‘every mistake in the book’. He has made ~75 direct investments into companies, including Crashlytics (sold to Twitter), Codeship, EverTrue, Appcues, and Drizly. Ty currently splits his time between Boston and Burlington, Ve...
Ep: 002 - Ali Kothari - New Grounds Food - Keys to Kickstarter Success
September 21, 2016 09:00 - 27 minutes - 31.9 MBAli Kothari is still a student at Northeastern University but that hasn’t stopped him and his co-founder, Johnny Fayad, from founding New Grounds Food. After getting tired of not having time to make breakfast or coffee in the morning before class, they had an idea to create a way to eat their coffee. Thus, their product, the CoffeeBar, was born. In this episode Ali shares amongst other things: His secrets to Kickstarter success When he realized they had a strong idea Northeastern’s I...
Ep: 001 Startup Boston Podcast Preview
September 17, 2016 11:26 - 20 minutes - 11.6 MBThe Startup Boston Podcast takes you inside the world of Boston startups, featuring interviews with Boston-based entrepreneurs, investors, and influencers. During each episode, someone involved with Boston startups will share their experience, advice, thoughts, predictions, and challenges with listeners. No industry or topic is off-limits as guests share their first-hand experience. Guests range from Kickstarter successes, to angel investors and venture capitalists, to SaaS founders, to prod...