Ideas to Invoices

David Sikora, a software industry veteran and former executive chairman at Stratfor, a global research, and intelligence platform, is the CEO of ALTR. ALTR launched its cybersecurity platform built with blockchain technology last June with $15 million in venture capital and after being in stealth mode for almost four years.

Adeo Ressi is the CEO of the Founder Institute, a startup launch program that operates in over 200 cities worldwide. He is also a        repeat entrepreneur who has sold two $1 billion companies, and he is a recognized mentor for fast-growing technology businesses. He spoke at SXSW in Austin on entrepreneurship. In this episode of Ideas to Invoices, Ressi talks about finding and pursuing your passion, traits for entrepreneurs, emerging global tech hubs and more.

Jeremy Rossmann is the co-founder of Make School, a computer science and software engineering school, based in San Francisco. He founded Make School in 2012 with his high school friend, Ashu Desai. Rossmann dropped out of MIT and Desai dropped out of UCLA to create Make School which now offers an accredited two-year Bachelor's Degree to its students. Make School is disrupting high education.

Amber Gunst is the CEO of the Austin Technology Council. She took over the job in January after serving as interim CEO since last May. She is determined to help ten Austin software companies reach $1 billion in revenue and another 100 reach $100 million in revenue in the next ten years. The Austin Technology Council, founded in 1992, is one of the most instrumental organizations for established companies that are earning at least $1 million per year in revenue, she said.

Chris Shonk is managing partner of ATX Seed Ventures, a venture capital firm launched in Austin, Texas in 2014. The firm has already raised two funds, which are committed. It will announce shortly its third fund. In addition to being a VC, Shonk is an entrepreneur. He has co-founded an investment bank and has operated, advised, and invested in consumer service and tech companies for fifteen years

Mark Rolston is the founder and chief creative at argodesign in Austin, Texas. Before argodesign, he was the chief creative officer of frogdesign. Last month, argodesign sold to $22 billion IT Company, DXC Technology, for an undisclosed sum. 

Five years ago, Matt Sanchez founded CognitiveScale. He serves as the fast-growing AI company's Chief Technology Officer. CognitiveScale this week held Cognite2018 in downtown Austin. Sanchez sat down with Ideas to Invoices to talk about Responsible AI and the company's core products.

John Zanni, President of Acronis, talks about the company's partnership with Williams Martini Racing Formula One team ahead of the Formula One race weekend at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. Acronis, a data protection and storage company, provides data protection software to the Williams Martini Racing team including backup, disaster recovery, software storage, and file sync and share.  This is a sponsored podcast.

Cristal Glangchai, Ph.D., was the founding director of the Blackstone LaunchPad and the director of the Texas Entrepreneurship Exchange at the University of Texas in Austin. She's also the founder and CEO of VentureLab, a non-profit that runs experiential learning programs in youth tech entrepreneurship. And she is the author of the bestselling book: Venture Girls. 

Eric Bear is the founder and CEO of Austin’s MONKEYMedia, an award-winning, independent R&D lab. Its patent portfolio includes in-house inventions that date back to 1992 and are incorporated in more than 184 million movies distributed on DVD & Blu-ray. Bear has over 30 years experience crafting and establishing user experience strategies for major corporations and is the first-named inventor on over 100 software and hardware patents and patent applications.

Doreen Lorenzo is the founder of the Center for Integrated Design and the Assistant Dean of the School of Design and Creative Technology at the University of Texas at Austin.  Lorenzo is a co-founder of mobile video insights firm Vidlet. She also previously served as president of Quirky and frog.

Cesare Fracassi is a Univerity of Texas McCombs School of Business associate professor of finance and he's the director of the newly formed Blockchain Initiative. The Blockchain Initiative at Texas McCombs is focused on providing support to faculty to do research on blockchain technology, Fracassi said. It also provides students with opportunities to learn more about blockchain technology, he said.

Trust Ventures, an Austin-based venture capital firm has raised an initial $35 million fund, backed by Koch Disruptive Technologies. Salen Churi and Brian Tochman lead Trust Ventures. Previously, Churi worked as a law professor and founded the Innovation Clinic at the University of Chicago Law School.  Tochman was the co-founder, president and chief operating officer of Kasita, an Austin-based startup that builds modular homes and apartments.

Morgan Flager, general partner of Silverton Partners, one of Austin's oldest home-grown VC firms, is an active investor in early-stage technology startups in Austin.  Last month, Silverton announced it had raised a $108 million fund, its largest to date. This is the firm's fifth fund. In this podcast, Flager discusses the firm's investment focus and how it decides to invest in an entrepreneur. 

Lorenzo Gomez, III is the author of the Cilantro Diaries, business lessons from the most unlikely places. He also serves as a Director at Geekdom and the 80/20 Foundation, a philanthropic organization, and co-founder of Tech Bloc, and he serves as board member, advisory board member and mentor for a variety of local and national tech and entrepreneurial organizations. He has also worked at two startups, Rackspace and CityVoice.