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"Further to our discussion yesterday of IGNITE’s value, I spent Nov. 1999 to April 2000 on my own trying to start this business…I made very little progress, and my wife rightfully was begging me to get some partners…We have worked together for 6 months now, fairly intensively and fairly systematically. The results are outstanding…Contrast the last 6 months to the first 6 months…feel free to use me as an example of "igniting" a wallowing technologist."
Thanks,
Steve (an IGNITE! startup technology partner)
We IGNITE! High-Tech Startups
Some of the world’s best technology fail to achieve their potential because either they aren't effectively commercialized or they just sit on the shelf and are never used. The reason for this is that starting a technology company is a daunting challenge, whether for inventors, a corporate R&D team, or an academic lab. Scientists and engineers often try both to run their startups and to drive product development; industry doesn’t know how to spin off technology into new ventures; and great technologies languish in university licensing offices for lack of entrepreneurial initiative.
Because starting an effective business to commercialize technology is not easy, it is not surprising that most people make even the most basic mistakes trying. Like most difficult challenges, startup experience makes a huge difference in avoiding serious pitfalls in favor of making good decisions that build great companies. The more companies you start, the fewer mistakes you’ll make, and the better the companies you’ll build.
That’s where IGNITE comes in. We do nothing but start technology companies…high-tech startup specialists, if you will. We’re not venture capitalists, we’re not an “incubator,” and we don’t join existing companies as consultants. Instead, we start companies when nothing exists but the technology, fully engaged as co-founders to do the hard work required - whatever it takes - to get companies up and running.
We are seasoned, multi-skilled and technically-trained business professionals with large networks of talent, capital sources and other resources who start companies quickly, smoothly, and on a solid financial and management foundation. IGNITE is the startup executive team, handling the countless startup details. We conceptualize the business, including positioning and going-to-market strategy; we assemble all the pieces required to attract high-value funding; we identify and help secure savvy, helpful investors and negotiate the best terms possible; we build world-class teams and boards; and we tap some of the world's best strategic business partners and initial customers. Post-startup, IGNITE transitions our management responsibilities to the permanent executive team, the board and the investors we have helped recruit. As a co-founder and owner, however, we remain involved, e.g., as board member and as ongoing business and personal advisor to the technologists.
We start companies in several ways. One way is to team with technologists to launch and build their company around them, allowing them to remain focused on further developing the technology while still remaining in control of their startup. With IGNITE as their startup management partners, technologists avoid becoming consumed by business details, accelerate the commercialization of their technology, maximize their long term financial gain, and trust that IGNITE is expertly launching their business in their best interest. IGNITE’s compensation typically is founders stock, which makes our interests perfectly aligned with the technologist’s and which keenly motivates us to help technologists succeed.
Another way we start companies is to license technology from a company or university and to build the entire company from scratch, including the technology team. This enables the inventors of the technology to remain at their current jobs, although typically they contribute to the startup in a part time role. This approach gives the licensee of the technology confidence that it will be fully commercialized.
Our entire focus is to successfully commercialize technology by starting companies when nothing exists except the technology, i.e., before the company is launched. We are engaged in only a couple of startups at any one time and, therefore, we carefully select only those with enormous potential. Typically, this means disruptive technology that requires further development before commercialization in threshold areas of the internet, wireless, broadband, semiconductors, nanotechnology, network infrastructure, software, energy and biomedical devices.
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