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Spring 2010 Denver Area
Applications: Apr 25, '10
Sessions: May 04, '10 - Aug 24, '10

Vision

Our vision is to Globalize Silicon Valley by creating and fostering local startup ecosystems in promising markets across the globe. We aim to help launch 1,000 technology companies per year in over 30 cities worldwide.

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28 Mentors

Spring 2010 Denver Area

The Founder Institute carefully recruits approximately 25 Mentors per Semester, who are normally the CEO or founder of a successful startup. The Mentors are selected based on their ability to convey lessons learned on a topic in the curriculum and help participating Founders by sharing their relevant experiences. Mentors are accessible to Founders in the program during the sessions and through email. The shared equity upside of each Semester encourages supportive and collaborative relationships with the Mentors.

The Institute recruits some of the Mentors after a Semester has launched to match the needs of Founders with the skills of Mentors.

Adam Swiecki

Founder, Swiecki Enterprises

Adam Swiecki founded Swiecki Enterprises in 2003 after serving as an Army Officer and financier. Focused on the action sport market, he has built leading ecommerce businesses in skate (SkateboardsEtc.com), surf (SurfboardsEtc.com), and snow (SkiGogglesEtc.com). The quintessential bootstrapper, Adam avoided startup costs by learning to program a website, partnering with drop shippers, and housing inventory in his basement. After years, he is out of the basement, expanding his multi-million dollar ecommerce footprint, and still growing using free cash flow. Adam holds a BS from the United States Military Academy at West Point and an MBA from Georgetown University.

Adeo Ressi

CEO, TheFunded.com

Adeo Ressi is Founding Member of TheFunded.com, an online community of 17,000 CEOs to research, rate, and review funding sources worldwide. Adeo also runs the Founder Institute, a mentoring program that helps entrepreneurs launch hundreds of world-class companies each year. The Institute is the eighth start-up that Adeo has founded or built, four of which were acquired and three of which are still operating.

Bob Ogdon

CEO, Swiftpage

Bob Ogdon is an executive technologies and business professional with over 31 years of experience in the multimedia market. His background includes expertise in multimedia, telecommunications and computer-based high technology companies. Ogdon founded and served as CEO of four companies, the latest being the email marketing company Swiftpage. Prior to Swiftpage, Ogdon founded MSHOW.com, a leading web interactive broadcasting company he sold to Intercall Conferencing in 2002. Prior to MSHOW.com, Ogdon founded Mammoth Micro Productions, a pioneer in CD-ROM multimedia tools, technology and publishing that he sold to the Washington Post Company in 1995. Prior to Mammoth Micro Productions, he founded Action Graphics, a game design and software development company. Ogdon was selected as the winner of the 2005 award for “Outstanding Contribution to the Community” by the Colorado Software and Internet Association. Ogdon served as the 2008 Board Chair for the Colorado Software and Internet Association.

Brian Levin

Chairman of the Herd, Performance Enhancing Meat Snacks

Brian is “Chairman of the Herd” of the Performance Enhancing Meat Snacks Company, and the jerk behind Perky Jerky Brian is a serial entrepreneur who started and sold 2 technology companies before he found his destiny to bring perky jerky to the world. Mr. Levin was also CEO and co-founder of Useful Networks, a mobile technology company creating Location Based Services for mobile consumers. Useful Networks was acquired by Liberty Media in 2007 Prior to Useful Networks, Brian was co-founder and CEO of Mobliss, a wireless media and marketing company based in Seattle, Washington, USA. He worked with consumer brands, media, entertainment companies, and wireless carriers to create valuable wireless properties to engage consumers. Mobliss is best known for fueling the text messaging revolution by building the SMS voting services for American Idol, and providing mobile services for Coca-Cola, Yahoo, ESPN, Nike, Fox, and more

Bruce Dines

VP&MD, Liberty Global Ventures

Bruce brings over 20 years of technology and telecommunications experience to Liberty Global Ventures. Over half of those years have been spent in earlier stage environments, where Bruce has founded companies and led businesses from concept and model development, through the capital formation, revenue generation and team building phases, ultimately realizing successful exits on 3 different companies. The other half of his career has been spent in mid-size and large corporations, where he has either served as President or Division President, including comCables as President, Northstar Exchange as COO (sold to Construction Software Technologies in 2007), EHPT as President (sold to Ericsson in 2002), and Ericsson Mobile Communications as Division President.

Bryan Thatcher

CEO, Fusebox Inc

Bryan Thatcher is CEO of Empressr, a leading Web application that allows users to create, manage and share rich-media presentations. As CEO and Founder of Fusebox, Bryan applies his mind for innovation to some of the most revered brands in finance, media, and pharmaceuticals—Discover Financial Services, JPMorgan Chase, MTV, CNN, ESPN and Pfizer—helping them increase profits and stay relevant in an ever-changing world of marketing opportunities.

Dan Daugherty

Founder & CEO, Rent Marketer

Dan Daugherty is CEO and Founder of rental search engine rentbits.com. His experience includes four years with Google during which time he spent in various management positions including running the operations team for the Mountain States Region. He helped to grow the region from $1 million in annual sales to over $100 million within four years. He is also active in commercial and residential real estate investing in Colorado and received his business degree in International Business from Ohio Wesleyan University.

Drew Massey

Chief Maniac, maniaTV

Massey originally trademarked the name maniaTV in 1998, launched the company in 2004 with major charter advertisers Dodge, Norelco and U.S. Navy, secured blue-chip Venture Capital investment, and successfully grew the company from zero revenue to over $500,000 per month before retiring to Chairman in 2007. ManiaTV was launched as the world’s first live Internet TV network on Labor Day 2004 with a non-stop 24/7 hosted MTV-style broadcast. Then in 2006 Massey and Tom Green launched the first live celebrity Internet talk show with Tom Green Live—which was live and interactive every weeknight from Tom Green’s living room. Over 150 episodes aired with celebrity guests like Tony Hawk, Pam Anderson, Brooke Shields, Val Kilmer, Bob Saget and more. A year later Massey and Dave Navarro launched another Live show from the Dragon Fly club in Hollywood. In the Spring of 2009, Massey bought back maniaTV and refocused the company on the live Internet TV roots he pioneered. Leveraging his expertise in live broadcasts, high quality original and premium Internet programming, celebrity talent relationships and a track record of working with over 200 leading marketers, Massey is building the leading Internet TV network, focused exclusively on network-quality live celebrity TV shows. And joining Massey’s new board of directors is former NBC Entertainment Chief Warren Littlefield and advertising executive David Verklin, whom Advertising Age describes as “perhaps the only visionary left in advertising”. Prior to maniaTV, Massey launched national men’s magazine POV which was named Adweek’s 1997 “Startup of the Year” and Adweek’s 1998 “Hot Up & Comer”.

Duncan Mccall

Co-Founder & CEO, Place IQ

Duncan McCall - currently Co-Founder & CEO, Place IQ. This is a pre launch startup working on next generation location intelligence. Some of Duncan’s previous experience includes: - Founder and CEO of PublicEarth, a venture funded consumer internet company, focused in the geoweb / local space. - VP of Systems and Technology for Organic to Go, a retail startup that expanded rapidly to become a national business. - VP of Client Services for VES, an RFID startup - GM and CEO of IS Solutions, a Silicon Valley based system integrator. Duncan has a background spanning technology and business. His interest and passion in applying technology solutions in the business and consumer world has led him to work and live in Europe, Asia, Australia and North America.

Jake Nickell

Founder, Threadless

Jake Nickell is a gigantic brain on an unassuming body. Threadless's young and fearless entrepreneurial leader uses his quick-firing noggin to come up with new ventures, encourage nutty employee ideas, and tinker with countless side projects (no really, he’s lost count). He also continues to keep up his geek cred through a love for programming. When he’s not working, he’s busy hanging out with his wife Shondi, his daughter Arli, and their son Dash in their Colorado home.

Jeff Herman

CEO, HotShoo, Inc.

Jeff Herman is CEO of HotShoo.com, a stock photography site focused on the underserved market of designers and architects of the built environment. Previously he was CEO of Fuser.com and VP Product at Webroot Software. He holds both a BSBA and MBA from the University of Florida.

Jim Franklin

CEO, SendGrid

Jim is the CEO of SendGrid, the leader in email deliverability. Previously, James Franklin was the VP and General Manager of the Crystal Ball Global Business Unit and the VP for Enterprise Performance Management for Oracle Corporation. Previously Jim was the CEO of Decisioneering, Inc., CFO at Vericept Corporation and was a founder of webfamilies.com. Jim has a BBA in accounting and a JD/MBA all from the College of William and Mary. Jim is a past president and current board member of the Rockies Venture Club. Jim has also served as a mentor for Boulder Techstars and has invested in early stage startups.

John Kanarowski

President, Zerista, inc.

Co-Founder and President of Zerista, Inc. Zerista provides a mobile community platform, which allows users to create mobile web apps for any group, club, association, business or event. Before Zerista, John was in in senior business development and sales roles at Merced Systems and Siebel Systems. Previously, he led marketing, business development, and strategic partnerships at iDeal International, an ecommerce company that he helped launch and grow to more than half a million users in less than 24 months. John has degrees from Harvard Business School, Univ. of California, Berkeley, and Dartmouth College.

Jon Nordmark

Co-Founder, CEO, UsingMiles.com (Wambo, eBags)

After presenting a number of potential internet start-ups to potential co-founders, Jon and a small team founded eBags.com in 1998. He remained CEO until spring 2008. From 2000 through 2007, eBags' CAGR was 33%. As a "drop ship" and "customer voice" pioneer, eBags sold 9.4 million bags and collected 1.4 million product reviews from customers during Jon's CEO tenure. In 1998 and 1999, eBags raised $30 million from Technology Crossover Ventures, Benchmark Capital, Amerindo and many high net worth individuals. eBags became profitable in 2001, having never done a "down round" of funding despite the dot bomb, terrorist attacks (which stalled luggage sales) and the 2000-1 recession. In January 2011, after investing and providing business guidance 18 months earlier, Jon became CEO of UsingMiles.com. UsingMiles is the world's first travel search engine (metasearch like Kayak) that delivers award- and paid-travel-results simultaneously. The site also includes a customer retention engine anchored by a miles/points aggregation dashboard, which is currently managing over 3 billion miles for frequent travelers while in beta. The Company has raised $2.7 million. In 2003, Jon was awarded the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award for the Rocky Mountain Region. In 2009, Colorado Software and Internet Association gave him the Lifetime Achievement Award for dedication to Colorado's technical community. Multichannel Merchant Association awarded eBags.com the USA's best retail website in 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008. Jon graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Colorado Business School.

Luke Beatty

Vice President & General Manager, Yahoo!

Luke is a Vice President and General Manager at Yahoo! Associated Content, which he founded in 2005, was acquired by Yahoo! 2010. Associated Content is known as the web’s first crowd sourced media platform. Prior to founding Associated Content, Luke was the VP of Business Development at WAND, a leading developer of media search and advertising taxonomies technologies. Luke is recognized for his expertise in social media collection and distribution platforms, online advertising models and digital media trends. In 2007, Luke was selected as one of the Business Journal's "40 under 40." Among other advisory roles, he serves on the board of directors of Publish2, a next-generation platform for journalists. Luke is an avid fly fisherman, youth lacrosse coach and sits on the Board of Directors for the Denver Sports Commission. He holds a bachelor's degree from Connecticut College and a master's degree from Harvard University.

Marc Braunstein

President, ShopAtHome.com

Marc Braunstein is CEO and Co-Founder (along with wife Claudia) of Belcaro Group, Inc., a 23 year old direct response company that has evolved from the largest paper based catalog of catalogs into the largest coupon site on the web (ShopAtHome.com). ShopAtHome.com offers more than 100,000 online coupons at more than 20,000 merchants. In 2009 alone, nearly 31 million people shopped through ShopAtHome.com, saving money through the use of coupons and earning millions of dollars in Cash Back rewards. In his spare time, Marc enjoys the great Colorado outdoors, gardening and producing his own music. He holds a BA in Biochemistry from the University of Rochester, and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Matt Mandell

Director, Simple Storage

Matt is a serial entrepreneur and the founder of several companies, and currently operates SimpleStorage.com and Store4Summer.com, storage companies in the Washington DC area. Matt has directed strategy of a $2.5B strategic procurement company and consults to government and private companies. Matt recently sold DCSnacks.com, a food delivery company and has operated companies in the food, logistics, technology, entertainment and consulting space. Matt's companies have been widely covered in national and local news outlets. He serves as a board member for non profit and for profit companies.

Matt Galligan

CEO, SocialThing, SimpleGeo

Matt Galligan, 25, is the CEO and Co-Founder of SimpleGeo, based out of Boulder, CO that provides comprehensive solutions to enable location-based services in mobile, web and desktop applications. He previously founded Socialthing, a company that was chosen to be part of the inaugural year of TechStars. Socialthing.com went into private beta in March, 2008 at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. The company was acquired five months later by AOL. His background is in graphic design and user experience, working for MonsterCommerce (acquired by Network Solutions), based out of St. Louis, MO. He got his start in the internet and design while working for a disaster restoration company out of Illinois before he turned 16. Matt currently resides in Boulder, CO and is an active member of the startup community there.

Matt Frary

Founder, SmarterChaos.com

Matt Frary is CEO and Founder of SmarterChaos.com, an Internet Marketing and Sales Agency focused on large brands such as Medicare.com, InsuranceAgents.com, and many more. Matt is a also a Founder of one of the top 30 online Ad Networks in the US called ROIRocket.com, and a frequent speaker and influencer in the Affiliate Marketing and Online Marketing arena. Matt has an MBA from #1 International Business School in the world, Thunderbird Graduate School, an education in marketing and business from the University of Colorado, with a strong focus in Russian and Brand Marketing and Finance. Matt enjoys working with start ups to realize their positive ROI quickly and is a passionate and serial entrepreneur.

Michael Kranitz

CEO, Kranitz Media Consulting

Michael Kranitz, CEO - Kranitz Media Consulting. Michael Kranitz is a former lawyer with 11 years of practice in the field of corporate reorganization and bankruptcy. Since 1996, Kranitz has created and sold more than 10 businesses. Kranitz founded Kaango.com in 2005 and sold 80% of it to Hearst Corporation and MediaNews Group in 2007. In 2010, Kaango was acquired by Atex Corporation. Kranitz has been a featured speaker in the auto, finance, hobby and internet industries. Kranitz was a finalist in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2008.

Mike Stemple

Founder, Mosoro (SkinIt, OriginalWraps, nReach)

Mike currently is CEO/Founder of Mosoro which builds a developer platform that enables real-world objects to communicate with smartphone apps. Mosoro streamlines the hardware-to-app development process, differentiates apps in the overcrowded app stores, and creates new revenue channels for monetizing smartphone users. Prior to cofounding Mosoro, Mike served as Founder and CEO of Odojo, which allowed parents to monitor their child's Social Networks for inappropriate content & the Internet for leaks of their personal information. Odojo was acquired by SafetyWeb in July of 2010. Previous to Odojo Mike served as Founder and President of SkinIt, and Original Wraps. After leading SkinIt Inc. through two years of revenue growth and international expansion, Mike navigated the successful sale of the company to Global Wireless Entertainment, Inc., a leading provider of brand management services. Skinit has gone on to be the leader in consumer electronic personalization and in June of 2010 the company raised $60 million dollars on a +$100 million valuation (6th year in business). Original Wraps has become the leader in vehicle personalization and now powers every major car companies personalization program. Mike's background also includes serving as Founder, Chairman and CEO of nReach Inc. which was purchased by SmartServ, Inc., a leading provider of Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) infrastructure services and TRIPDA/Nomad Labs Inc., a developer wireless technologies for the retail market. Mike is a Colorado native, a graduate of Metropolitan State College, a sponsored athlete, a mentor for The Founders Institute, a governor appointee to The Colorado Governors Council for Physical Fitness, a semi-famous artist, and a proud veteran of the US Army.

Perry Evans

CEO, Closely, Inc., (MapQuest, Jabber, Local Matters)

Perry Evans is CEO of a start-up called Closely, Inc., focused on the real-time social media industry. Mr. Evans has led the formation and early-mid-stage development of MapQuest, Jabber and Local Matters over the past dozen years. He is active on the Board of the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship at Colorado University and was 2006 Ernst & Young Software Entrepreneur of the Year for the Rocky Mountain region. Mr. Evans received his MBA from the Schulich School of Business at York University in Toronto, Canada.

Peter Bryant

CEO, TransTech USA LLC

Peter Bryant is currently CEO of TransTech USA a corporate strategy firm and founding Partner of software solutions company Executuive Simulations. Peter is an executive business strategist with more than 30 years of experience developing and driving high growth strategies for companies in the US, Asia Pacific and Europe. He has advised executive teams at a range of enterprises, from emerging tech businesses through to Global Fortune 500 companies. He has expertise in a broad range of sectors including technology, energy and CPG. Prior to founding these companies Peter spent 25 years in the technology industry including the following roles CEO of Clear Technology, President InfoNow, VP North America Mincom; COO Computer Associates Asia Pacific and Director Business Applications Asia Pacific for GEISCo (SI). Mr. Bryant holds a Bachelor of Commerce and Administration from Victoria University in Wellington, New Zealand and is an alumnus of the Kellogg School of Management. Peter is also a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a Chartered Accountant of the NZ Institute of Chartered Accountants. He is a Senior Advisor to the investment bank Q Advisors, is a Senior Fellow of The Kellogg Innovation Network part of the leading Kellogg Business School and is an active mentor for CTEK and CleanLaunch. He also holds numerous board positions including Syft Technologoes, TribeVibe and Zoomani plus a directorship at a nonprofit for under privileged children. He has a broad range of interests including energy policy, innovation, foreign policy, welfare of underpriviliged children (active with Kempe Foundation) and most of all his wife and two young daughters.

Sandra Hanna

Co-Founder and CEO, The Smart Cookies

As co-founder and one of five faces of the brand known throughout North America as The Smart Cookies, Sandra plays a pivotal role in the development and execution of a PR strategy that has resulted in appearances form the five financial mavens on Oprah, The Today Show, CNN and in The New York Times. She is the author of two books; The Smart Cookies Guide to Making More Dough, and The Smart Cookie's Guide to Couple's and Money. She also developed and stared in two seasons of The Smart Cookies television series.

Stacey Kramer

Founder, Brandplay

Stacey Kramer is the founder of Brandplay, a naming and brand strategy agency based in Boulder, CO. For over 15 years Stacey has helped to create compelling messaging and brand names for products and companies, working with clients ranging from Nike, Levi-Strauss, Nestlé and Coca-Cola to entrepreneurial startups including Zayo, Circadence, 6pm.com and Twist natural cleaning products. Previously, Stacey worked for Lexicon Naming in Sausalito, CA and in advertising for Chiat/Day in San Francisco and Saffer Cravit in Chicago. Client experience including working with Apple, Intel, Montgomery Ward, G. Heileman Brewing Co. and Atari. Stacey graduated from Stanford University with a BA in Communications and a BS in Economics.

Thomas Filippini

Co-founder, Exclusive Resorts

Tom Filippini is an experienced startup co-founder and executive with a proven ability to identify market trends and build companies from the ground up. Tom has specialized in building private equity backed businesses, most recently as co-founder of Denver-based Exclusive Resorts. Co-founded by Filippini in 2002, Exclusive Resorts is the definitive leader in the global Luxury Destination Club industry. The company now boasts more than 3,000 members and owns a real estate portfolio valued at over $1 billion. Collectively, as an investment banker and executive, Filippini has been involved in raising over $500 million in equity and debt capital for his businesses.

Vane Clayton

CEO, KPA, LLC

Vane Clayton is CEO of KPA, LLC, a profitable, private company with 150 employees providing e-commerce and compliance SaaS solutions to the auto services industry. Prior to KPA, Clayton has a strong background in growth and turn-around situations as President/CEO of 3 companies, including ZOLL Data Systems (www.zoll.com - NASDAQ), TROY Wireless (www.troygroup.com - ), and SOS Wireless Communications (co-founder and board member). Clayton has been a board member of 4 companies and currently serves as the audit chair for Ironclad (www.ironclad.com). He has a mechanical/agricultural engineering BS from Purdue and MBA from Harvard Business School. He has been a Vistage member since 2004 and was a board member of the Colorado Software and Internet Association from 2006-9.

Vince Jones

President & CEO, eBags

Vince joined eBags in January 2009 as President and CEO. Prior to joining eBags, he was Vice President of Operations and Finance at Sharpcast where he led all operations for the maker of the award-winning SugarSync online storage, syncing and file sharing service. Prior to Sharpcast, Vince was the sixth employee at Walmart.com, where he was a key architect of the company's backend infrastructure. As a senior director in the company's operations group, Vince helped build the company into a leading e-commerce business. Earlier in his career, he held operations and finance roles at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) and Texas Instruments. Vince received an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a BS from the Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas where he was named The Outstanding Graduating Senior.

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