Investing and mentoring startups to success
1423_ 8/27/13 -
Larry corralled David Cohen, CEO, TechStars, who just returned to Boulder after spending a month in London and it was good to be home. It's been quite a journey for David and the co-founders Brad Feld, David Brown and Jared Polis, and we talked about that. It was 2007 and David points out they go way back in the w3w3 Archives - you can check out some of those original interviews on w3w3.com. David became the active founder/CEO of the company, "We invested in ten little startups here in Boulder in 2007 and had a pretty interesting outcome, and said Wow!" Seven of them raised venture capital, and the reality was obvious, to use this great community in Boulder, to attract companies here, and bring in some new talent! Fast forward to current days and global success - a fabulous three month program focused on intensive mentorship with funding for each company. Back then it was only $18,000 - today it is $118,000. Their expansion first took them to Boston, their successes continued and now they are in seven locations including London. TechStars also works with and on behalf of corporations that run the program like Nike+ Accelerator, The Kaplan EdTech Accelerator, The Microsoft Accelerator, and R/GA Connected Devices Accelerator (just announced recently). Today, David tells us, "We are running about 12 programs a year globally and that's funding somewhere around 120-140 companies a year." PART 1 of 3
RELATED LINKS: TechStars || 2007 Interview David Cohen and David Brown || Foundry Group, Brad Feld || Entrepreneur Channel || KEYWORDS: David Cohen, TechStars, Brad Feld, David Brown, Jared Polis, Investing, London, Startups, Nike+ Accelerator, The Kaplan EdTech Accelerator, The Microsoft Accelerator, and R/GA Connected Devices Accelerator, Entrepreneurship, >bytes=3100737
LISTEN TO: David Cohen, Founder, TechStars
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RELATED LINKS: TechStars || 2007 Interview David Cohen and David Brown || Foundry Group, Brad Feld || Entrepreneur Channel || KEYWORDS: David Cohen, TechStars, Brad Feld, David Brown, Jared Polis, Investing, London, Startups, Nike+ Accelerator, The Kaplan EdTech Accelerator, The Microsoft Accelerator, and R/GA Connected Devices Accelerator, Entrepreneurship, >bytes=3100737
LISTEN TO: David Cohen, Founder, TechStars
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Awesome post.
Posted by: website | 03 September 2013 at 02:42 PM