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6 reasons why Boston is America’s unlikely tech hub

Jun20
by on June 20, 2015 at 1:02 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Boston, Insider, tech hub

boston

When it comes to tech hubs, many entrepreneurs think they need to be based in Silicon Valley in order to thrive. Others look to tech centers like Silicon Alley or fast-growing Austin to establish their startup. Despite its rich history in technology and innovation, Boston is often a city that gets overlooked by those in the startup scene—until now.

There is a renewed energy present throughout Boston and the entire region that is making Beantown a tech mecca in its own right. This renaissance is being driven by local successes at companies ranging from early-stage startups to established technology giants, who are all taking an interest in talent and companies in the region. It’s not Silicon Valley or Alley – Boston has a unique tech DNA and culture; one that is collaborative in nature.

BOSTONNEWSROOM

Not convinced? Here are six reasons why you may want to reconsider Boston as the city to launch your startup or, at minimum, build a presence for your tech company:

1. VCs are taking an interest in local startups—and it’s paying off

The energy of local startups is contagious, and Boston VCs have taken note. In the last five years, area firms like Battery Ventures, Atlas Venture, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Matrix Venture Partners have relocated to the city to be closer to the upsurge of startups. And in 2014 alone, Boston’s innovation economy raised $4 billion in funding—up $1 billion from the previous year.

Adding to the impressive funding, a number of young Massachusetts companies have made their Wall Street debut from 2010-2014. HubSpot, Care.com, Demandware, TripAdvisor and Wayfair were among the nine IPOs, in addition to 196 smart acquisitions, by Massachusetts companies. This year about 588 tech companies across the nation are in the IPO pipeline—with Massachusetts home to nearly four dozen of those technology firms.

2. There is a city-wide support network for young startups and established tech companies alike

With over 40 university and industry incubators/accelerators state-wide, entrepreneurs will have no trouble finding the resources to grow their ideas into businesses. Boston is home to Blade, Bolt, Cambridge Innovation Center, Greentown Labs, Healthbox, LearnLaunch, MassChallenge and Venture Development Center. City Hall has built programs that support startups to help Boston evolve into a world-class tech ecosystem, including the hiring of the first “Startup Czar,” an advocate for the city’s entrepreneurs and early-stage businesses.

U.S. Coast Guard Escorts

For young companies and established ones alike, Boston also has an incredibly strong professional services infrastructure. It offers top-notch legal services, tech-focused public relations agencies, financial firms like Deloitte and KPMG, and other service companies to support every need of a tech company.

3. The city nurtures its tech talent – and in turn, is attracting high-tech giants

Boston is home to some of the top STEM schools in the country: MIT, Harvard, Tufts, Northeastern, BU and Wentworth Institute of Technology. In Cambridge alone, there is more tech academic research and development spending (about $4 billion) than in any other part of the country, including the San Francisco Bay Area ($1.3 billion).

Tech giants such as Facebook, Twitter and Amazon have taken notice, establishing East Coast headquarters or opening engineering and R&D offices in the city. Other major players have held offices in Boston for years, including Google, IBM, Microsoft and Oracle.

4. Women are major players in Boston’s tech ecosystem

Women in tech is a national dialogue, and Boston recognizes its importance. Women entrepreneurs have quite the presence here: CEOs Gail Goodman (Constant Contact), Sheila Marcelo (Care.com) and Brenna Haysom (Blowfish), Co-Patient co-founders Katie Vahle and Rebecca Palm and venture investor and mentor Katie Rae.

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There has also been a 21.4 percent growth rate among women in tech state-wide from 2009-2013—the second-highest among competing tech states. Women even make up 10 percent of Mass-based tech company board seats. While this is only a start, there are efforts to grow this number.

5. Boston is more than just biotech and pharma

It’s no secret that Massachusetts is a supercluster for pharmaceutical and biotech companies—there are over 500 in the area. The benefit of these industries is that there are hundreds of companies that have gone from labs to market and are spinning off startups, helping to spur the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Orig3n, a pioneer in regenerative medicine, is just one example, with founders that worked in R&D at PerkinElmer before launching their own startup.

And while there continues to be amazing innovation coming out of the biopharma industries, there are also big things happening in other industries, such a travel (Kayak and TripAdvisor), business services (Vistaprint and Constant Contact), gaming (Giant Spacekat, Disruptor Beam and Turbine), ecommerce (Shoebuy.com, RueLaLa and Karmaloop) and more.

6. This city celebrates its tech scene like its sports teams

Tower Records in Cash Trouble

In the last decade, Boston sports teams have won three World Series, three Super Bowls, one NBA Championship, and one Stanley Cup. For every win, the city celebrated with parades, meet and greets, happy hours—you name it. Bostonians enjoy a good celebration, whether it is in honor of its sports teams or its tech scene.

Groups like MassTLC, Boston New Tech, Boston Tweetup, Greenhorn Connect, MITX, The Capital Network and VentureFizz all host networking events on a regular basis. Annual events such as Inbound, MassTLC Unconference and Boston TechJam showcase the best in the area’s tech and startup scene.

It’s clear that the state of technology in Massachusetts is strong, and Boston’s long-term momentum as a home to startups and innovation is the direct result of collaboration and innovation starting from the bottom up, a passionate and talented workforce and an abundance of investors and government support—all the things that position this city as a high-tech force to be reckoned with.

Read Next: Lithuania: Europe’s secret tech powerhouse?

Image credit: Shutterstock

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Wikileaks’ new batch of Sony files reveals a survey asking stars if they’ve had oral herpes

Jun20
by on June 20, 2015 at 12:02 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Insider

wikileaks sony

Well, this keeps becoming more bizarre.

Following the Sony hack last winter, Wikileaks has uploaded a second batch of files containing 276,000 more documents obtained from the incident this week. Although most of the documents are related to legal and financial affairs, Radar Online uncovered a set of unusual questionnaires asking whether or not stars have had oral herpes.

The survey titled “Cold Sore Questionnaire” looks to be a part of what Sony sent to actors as a “Risk Management Packet,” presumably to help prevent the spread of the contagious virus. Below are some of the example questions Sony asked actors to fill out.

1. I currently have a cold sore (describe cold sore locations):_______________

2. I have had the cold sore since:_____________

3. My last cold sore was approximately (date): ______________

4. I have had____cold sore breakouts over a period of _______ years.

Looking through Wikileaks, it appears not all actors responded to the form, but provided health insurance coverage information.

In one email thread, an account manager for the “Untitled Hawaii Project” (released in the US last month as “Aloha”) responded to the questionnaire saying one actor used Abreva to treat his symptoms, and promises to use prescription medication if the cold sore returns during filming.

“Aloha” is a Cameron Crowe (“Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” “Jerry Maguire”) production with other castmates including Bradley Cooper, Emma Stone, Rachel McAdams and Alec Baldwin.

If you want to have a look through the plethora of new Sony files, Wikileaks tweeted a link that takes you straight to the set of recently uploaded documents.

In addition to Sony files, Wikileaks has also uploaded more than 500,000 Saudi diplomatic documents.

➤ Hollywood Herpes Scare! Sony Drafts Cold Sore Contract For Big Stars, Require Meds On Set, Hacked Emails Reveal — Who’s Infected? [Radar Online]

Read next: WikiLeaks has started accepting secret documents again after nearly five years

 

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Wikileaks’ new batch of Sony files reveals a survey asking stars if they’ve had oral herpes

Jun20
by on June 20, 2015 at 12:02 pm
Posted In: Around the Web, Insider

wikileaks sony

Well, this keeps becoming more bizarre.

Following the Sony hack last winter, Wikileaks has uploaded a second batch of files containing 276,000 more documents obtained from the incident this week. Although most of the documents are related to legal and financial affairs, Radar Online uncovered a set of unusual questionnaires asking whether or not stars have had oral herpes.

The survey titled “Cold Sore Questionnaire” looks to be a part of what Sony sent to actors as a “Risk Management Packet,” presumably to help prevent the spread of the contagious virus. Below are some of the example questions Sony asked actors to fill out.

1. I currently have a cold sore (describe cold sore locations):_______________

2. I have had the cold sore since:_____________

3. My last cold sore was approximately (date): ______________

4. I have had____cold sore breakouts over a period of _______ years.

Looking through Wikileaks, it appears not all actors responded to the form, but provided health insurance coverage information.

In one email thread, an account manager for the “Untitled Hawaii Project” (released in the US last month as “Aloha”) responded to the questionnaire saying one actor used Abreva to treat his symptoms, and promises to use prescription medication if the cold sore returns during filming.

“Aloha” is a Cameron Crowe (“Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” “Jerry Maguire”) production with other castmates including Bradley Cooper, Emma Stone, Rachel McAdams and Alec Baldwin.

If you want to have a look through the plethora of new Sony files, Wikileaks tweeted a link that takes you straight to the set of recently uploaded documents.

In addition to Sony files, Wikileaks has also uploaded more than 500,000 Saudi diplomatic documents.

➤ Hollywood Herpes Scare! Sony Drafts Cold Sore Contract For Big Stars, Require Meds On Set, Hacked Emails Reveal — Who’s Infected? [Radar Online]

Read next: WikiLeaks has started accepting secret documents again after nearly five years

 

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I launched a startup with my mom

Jun20
by on June 20, 2015 at 8:38 am
Posted In: Around the Web, Entrepreneur, startup, startup story

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It was August 2013 when my co-founder at SportsManias called to tell me that we had raised $1 million in angel funding. I was a second-year in college on my way to the library at the University of Chicago; she was back in Miami, where our company is based. This moment confirmed that our vision for sports journalism wasn’t crazy after all. The investors believed in our mission to blend social media with the reporting of sports beat writers.

“Mom,” I said. “That’s great news!”

Yes, I founded SportsManias with my Mom, and it continues to surprise friends, investors and partners. People say, “Vicente, that’s really cool, but I don’t know if I could ever do that.”

mom and baby with tablet via thinkstock

When I was 1,400 miles away in Chicago, there was no one else I trusted more than my Mom to represent SportsManias in front of Miami’s most respected investors. In fact, I would argue that our mother-son relationship is a competitive advantage in the harsh startup game.

Resistance

Before I make a case for the mother-son duo, let me be honest: I was not the most willing co-founder, initially. During the winter of my first year in college, starting a company with my Mom was absolutely the last thing on my mind. I hadn’t even declared a major, yet out of nowhere, my Mom called with a plan for my career:

“Vicente, I have this idea to start a sports website for diehard fans. We should do it together.”

“Mom, you’re crazy. Where is this coming from?!”

She refused to back down. She believed that diehard sports fans, like me, were the prime audience for a new type of media experience. In true mother form, she called me every other day to talk about this startup. Instead of resisting, I started to meet her half way. And finally, when I returned home for summer vacation, we hammered out the vision for SportsManias during a car ride.

startupbuzz

What I began to realize is that my Mom’s proposal wasn’t out of the blue. We had been developing a business relationship for years. When I was growing up, my Mom ran her own advertising agency, Aymara & Associates, and I used to swing by after school every day to do homework and hang out. In junior high, my Mom invited me into her world. I started to participate in brainstorm sessions and client work. We learned to be in business together long before we officially went into business.

Family Cross-Training

Before we launched SportsManias, my Mom and I had spent 18 years learning to be mother and son. How many other startup co-founders can claim to have that amount of team practice?

One of the biggest advantages of that history is that we can be blunt. When my Mom criticizes my ideas, I know she’s not attacking me personally. We don’t have to do verbal gymnastics with corporate-speak and niceties to make a point. Our family training gives us an edge in communication and teamwork.

10 Startups 13 Intense Weeks Episode 10

As mother-son co-founders, we also share a responsibility to family that supersedes all matters of equity ego and power. Inside SportsManias, we’re building the 21st century news source for diehard fans. Outside SportsManias, we care about the wellbeing, health and safety of all the same people. Our professional and personal lives are aligned, and that’s uncommon in the startup world.

When co-founder relationships break, they make a mess. Friends become arch rivals; companies drown in their own interpersonal riptides. As mother and son, there is no “breaking up” – blood can’t be erased and rewritten over like a flash drive.

Who “Should” Be Your Co-Founder?

I’m not arguing that every mother-son duo is going to be a good match in business. Some people can’t stand to be on the phone with their mother for five minutes let alone run a company with her. Here’s the point that matters: your choice of co-founder should not be limited by cultural baggage we attach to roles and identities.

Ultimately, you need to find someone with a complementary skillset and mutual respect. If that person happens to be your mother, father, sibling, neighbor, dentist, florist, landlord or the guy who crashed into your car yesterday, so what?

startups

A mother-son duo sounds odd because we have invented expectations about the relationship between mother and son, and between ourselves and everyone we meet. The whole adage about keeping family and business separate is based on the assumption that we can somehow separate our personal and professional lives. We can’t. They either feed or starve each other.

At SportsManias, we operate like a family; my mom has practically adopted our Millennial co-workers. If they feel welcome, loved and motivated at work, that’s a good thing. When my co-founder brings in a cake for each birthday, we all grow closer.

Throw out all the superstitions about who your co-founder should be. If your Mom is the right business partner, go for it. My mother, my co-founder and my current landlord are all the same person. I’m ready for the peanut gallery because launching a business with my Mom is the best career decision I have made.

Read Next: How to name your startup

Image credit: Shutterstock

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