Southeast VC

Entrepreneur's Series: Building Market Leading Companies

Following the success of Venture Outlook which we hosted earlier this month, we launched "Entrepreneur's Series: Building Market Leading Companies." We are holding it on March 15 in Raleigh.

We're excited about this one since it will be a panel of all leading entrepreneurs and three of them had exits in the last 12 months. Panel includes:

• Sean Glass, co-founder and former president, High One (NYSE:ONE), IPO in 2010
• Rich Lee, co-founder and former CEO, Hosted Solutions, acquired by Windstream (NASDAQ:WIN) in 2010
• Garth Moulton, co-founder, Jigsaw, acquired by Salesforce.com (NASDAQ:CRM) for $142 million in 2010
• Earl Galleher, CEO Basho Technologies, former EVP and Series A investor, Akamai Technologies (NASDAQ:AKAM), IPO in 1999

We will have them talk about how they started their company, raised capital, selected their team, sold to their first customers, how they scaled successfully and what challenges they faced.

One of our goals is that entrepreneurs will be able to walk away from from this with actionable items they can implement in their own business.

If you're attending and there are specific questions you want us to ask the panelists, send me an email [email protected] and we'll try and address it as well.

Like Venture Outlook, we will save time for Q&A and lots of networking before and after the event with both attendees and panelists.

Register and use "southeastvc" and save $5.

Bull City Startup Stampede

Guest Post by Adam Klein, Director of Strategic Initiatives, Durham Chamber

The idea for the Bull City Startup Stampede came during a conversation with Preation founder and iContact co-founder, Aaron Houghton. We were talking about how the startup scene in downtown Durham is thriving and that we'd love to expose more entrepreneurs to this environment. That's when Aaron started talking about a wacky sort of spectacle geared at giving Triangle-based startups a first-hand experience of Durham...from there we launched the Startup Stampede.

The Stampede is really an event, not a program or initiative. Its 60 days of free space starting April 1and running until May 31. We're offering startups a chance to launch their business from downtown Durham free of charge. We're covering parking, office furniture and office space. We've also secured the state's fastest wi-fi connection, just for the Stampede.

The programming for the event will be light but we are planning to bring in some very successful Durham entrepreneurs each week to talk with the Stampede participants about the ups and downs of launching a company. We're working with Downtown Durham, Inc., CED, Bull City Forward, Launchbox Digital and Joystick Labs to get the programming right and make sure the entrepreneurs get the help and connections they need during the 60 days.

Interested entrepreneurs can get more information about the Stampede and apply online at www.startupstampede.com or follow us @startupstampede. We have room in the space for about a dozen companies. Applications are due March 11 and selected participants will be notified by March 18. We do not have a specific industry focus but are mostly interested in the background of the founder/team, the market opportunity and the scalability of the concept.

There are over 50 startups in downtown Durham alone, employing over 500 people. This is an incredible place to launch a company and we want to make it as easy as possible for people to be here. Already, we're getting great feedback on the Stampede and hope it will be a place that helps launch several future all-star companies.

Venture Outlook - Summary

We hosted Ventrue Outlook 2011 last week in Raleigh. Thanks to everyone for showing up. The event was sold out and we had a lot of fun.

We ran a short survey afterwards with really good feedback. Here is a good summary of the event. 

True Ventures' John Burke: Create a Business Based on Passion and Interest, Not for the VCs

Good Q&A worth reading with John Burke from True Ventures. Thanks to John Cass for posting this interview to his blog and of course, thanks to John for the responses.

If you want to hear more from John, join us this Wedesday morning in Raleigh for Venture Outlook 2011. Advance registration is required.

Flybridge Capital's Matthew Witheiler: Tips on Developing a Business Model and Pitching Investors

Thanks to Matthew Witheiler for flying down next week to Raleigh. He will be one of the four panelists at Venture Outlook, which is hosted by our firm.

John Cass asked me to bounce off questions off the panelists in advance for his blog. Here is the interview with Matthew. Read Matthew's advice on building a business and how to avoid common mistakes when meeting with investors. Matt is from North Carolina and a Duke grad. It will be good to have him back.

If you'd like to come to Venture Outlook and you went to register a couple of days ago, you would have seen it was sold out. Well, we worked with the venue yesterday and moved to another room to accomodate a bigger crowd. So, if you go register now, you will see we now added some more seats. Hope to see you there!