All in Venture Capital
Welcome back to another FUTRtech video podcast. Today we were going to be talking about data, but we get into some other topics including what it is like to be the CEO of a startup and what it takes to be a good leader, building a sales organization and fostering culture. We talked about data too, because data is a strategic asset, and it has driven some significant changes in IT in its efforts to deliver greater top-line value to the business.
Welcome back to another FUTRtech video podcast. Today we were going to be talking about data, but we get into some other topics including what it is like to be the CEO of a startup and what it takes to be a good leader. We talked about data too, because data is a strategic asset, and it has driven some significant changes in IT in its efforts to deliver greater top-line value to the business.
Welcome back to another FUTRtech video podcast. Today we have with us some very special guests.
John Thompson started off his career at IBM back in the 70s as a salesman. He rose through the ranks to become General Manager of IBM Americas, but after 28 years at IBM in 1999 he was lured away to become CEO of Symantec building it into a true enterprise focused company. In 2014, John Stepped into the role of Chairman of the Board of Microsoft Corporation following Bill Gates’ departure. John has been an active investor and in 2018 he became a partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners and has put together a portfolio of truly impressive companies. One of those companies is the cyber security company Confluera, which we are really excited to talk to him about today.
In this episode, I talk about some more of the companies I met on my most recent trip to the valley.
The companies featured are:
Lightstep - lightstep.com
Obsidian - obsidiansecurity.com
Orkus - Orkus.com
OverOps - overops.com
Retool - tryretool.com
Snowflake - snowflake.com
Split - split.com
Trifacta - trifacta.com
YugaByte DB - yugabyte.com
Many of the VC offices are built around a fabulous old tree. This one is from the courtyard of Lightspeed Venture Partners. We visited with Lightspeed Venture Partners, Greylock, Sutter Hill, Sequoia, and IVP.
In this episode, I focus on some of the portfolio companies I met with.
Companies discussed in this video are:
Blameless - blameless.com
Epsagon - epsagon.com
Fiddler - fiddler.ai
Several times a year, we take CIOs, CTOs, and other key decision makers of large enterprise companies to Silicon Valley to meet with Venture capital firms and Leadership of emerging tech companies, to get a good look at what is happening in the emerging technology space. These trip provide tremendous insight into what is happening in the market and provides a good overview of the trends that are driving investments.
We regularly sponsor dinners where we invite company founders and VCs from the valley to tell their story and lead a small group of industry leaders in conversation around relevant technology trends.
At this dinner, we discussed the changing nature of cloud and the rise of SaaS.
SXSW is the most important technology conference of the year. There, I’ve said it. The problem is, very few people in IT are aware of it, and that is a shame. This is the one show of the year that not only highlights emerging technology but wraps it in context. This conference is also very international with different countries showcasing their unique companies, technologies and talents. We can get so lost in our own small world that we miss new market opportunities and technologies from around the globe.
Lacework is a company that has been on our radar since Mike Speiser at Sutter Hill Ventures introduced us to them. They have some very strong backing from the VCs community, and they offer some interesting insights into the flow of data across your environment. They have some handy tools to do forensic analysis on events.
I am always interested in keeping an eye on what is happening in the autonomous vehicle space, and I am particularly interested in what Sequoia invests in. For those of you unfamiliar with this storied venture capital firm, they have been the money behind many blockbuster investments like, Apple, Cisco and Oracle.
