Welcome to StartWest

June 23rd Start West - Entrepreneurial Success Story

RSVP Now! 

Our speaker for June has done what many entrepreneurs dream: he cashed in on a business he co-founded over twenty years ago. 

December 11, 2009- Morningstar, Inc. announced on Friday that it would acquire Logical Information Machines, Inc. (LIM) for $51.5 million, subject to post-closing adjustments.

LIM can tell you how much things really cost when your dad was a boy. Founded in 1988, LIM provides software (branded as Market Information Machine, or MIM) that enables users to perform price analysis on historical trading data from energy and financial markets. The company supplies MIM users with data — such as the historical prices of bonds and equities, as well as commodities like oil and metals — from its Historis database; the analyzed data can be used to determine present and future market trends. 

Dr.  Ruben Gamboa, one of the founders of (LIM) and associate professor of computer science at the University of Wyoming and will speak at StartWest - Wednesday, June23rd at the Holiday Inn, Sheridan. 

Dr. Gamboa will present ”An Entrepreneur’s Education from the School of Hard Knocks” based largely on his experiences with LIM and other companies. His presentation is thought provoking, entertaining, funny and all true.  His business started as an idea twenty years ago with a couple of fellow college students and blossomed into a multi-million dollar business.  It has all the classic elements of a great story.  You won’t want to miss this!

Dr. Gamboa has been described as “…one of the most skilled entrepreneurs in Wyoming” and rightfully so.  As one of the founders of LIM he led the development of LIM’s proprietary software which ultimately resulted in it’s recent purchase by Morningstar. 

Don’t miss the chance to hear a true entrepreneurial success story right here in Wyoming.  

StartWest on Sheridan Media’s Public Pulse

Greg Jordan and I had the opportunity yesterday to chat about StartWest, e2e, and our upcoming meeting with Kim Love on Sheridan Media’s community forum, Public Pulse. I’d never done a live radio broadcast before, but Kim does them everyday and made the whole thing look easy.

You can download a free podcast from the iTunes store or listen to the program online here (but see the usability note below).

Later in the day we found out that Sheridan Media just won a prestigious digital journalism award, a “2010 regional Edward R. Murrow award for best website in small market radio“.  Here’s Sheridan Media’s own coverage on their web site.

(Usability note:  When you open up the Sheridan Media archive page here, landing on the archive to our broadcast, some folks are reporting that the piece starts to air and then cuts out after a minute or two.

The page actually contains two distinct controls for playing the piece.  One is the ‘traditional’ play button - the triangle inside a circle symbol.  On my computer this plays the whole broadcast just fine although, apparently, this is the control that cuts-out for some folks. 

The other way to get the piece to play is to click on the Listen hyperlink which brings up a player widget.  Now, for me, in the browser I use, this widget never even starts playing but I’m told that this control will play the whole piece for some folks who for whom the play button doesn’t work well.  [We have now reached a working definition of the classic programmer’s warning:  YMMV — your mileage may vary.]

I haven’t heard from anyone accessing the podcast who had problems with that version, but you’re either set up to hear podcasts or you aren’t.

There is a reason why usability is the hottest topic in application development and deployment today.  We just aren’t there yet.)

StartWest - April 21st

Our next Speaker is Mark Lake - Author of “the Inventor’s Puzzle”  

April 21st - Holiday Inn, Sheridan - 5:30 to 7:00 PM - Register Now!

The Inventor’s Puzzle: Deciphering the Business of Product Innovation

Every year billions of dollars are invested in businesses launched to bring new inventions into the market. Unfortunately many of these businesses fail due to the inexperience and poor judgment of their leaders. In his recent book, Mark deciphers the business of product innovation and exposes essential issues that can lead to failure when evolving an invention from concept to market ready product.  The book serves as a how-to guide and a business primer for the myriad of product innovation stakeholders including inventors, entrepreneurs, and investors who are drawn to this dynamic business sector but who might lack first hand experience.  Rather than presenting these issues from a distant academic perspective, The Inventor’s Puzzle is written from Mark’s first-hand experience of trouble shooting real world problems in product innovation businesses. At this month’s e2e meeting in Sheridan Mark will present an overview and brief reading from his new book, and be available to sign copies of the book and to answer questions on the subject of being successful in product innovation business.

Mark Lake is a consummate senior executive, change agent, and entrepreneur for high technology research and product innovation businesses and is considered a visionary in workforce leadership, organizing for innovation, and technology development tactics. He is a prolific researcher, writer, and platform speaker with engaging and humorous personal style and is an expert facilitator providing a wide range of executive consulting services to businesses that are innovating in software, medical devices, alternative-energy systems, and other markets.  While not working, he enjoys life with his wife and two sons in the beautiful Rocky Mountain Front Range of Colorado.

StartWest - February 23rd Recap

Wow!  What a great event we had.  If you did not make it, you missed a fun one!  StartWest finally touched the 50 attendee mark.  It was great to see we needed to pull a few more chairs off of the stack.  Networking went really well with almost everyone showing up at the opening bell and many staying afterwards and closing the place down.I think one of the most exciting things I heard was people leaving after the meeting to meet somewhere else with someone they had met at StartWest.  Deals were begun and partnership connections made at this meeting.  Like the hokey pokey “that’s what it’s all about”.The Panel discussion began with an introduction by Anne Gunn who introduced the format and gave each panelist a brief time to introduce themselves.  The panelist spoke of three different technologies they use in their every day business:Melissa Butcher led it off with Constant Contact which she uses to provide a monthly newsletter for her customers at the Rendezvous Trading company.  She explained the benefits of using email campaigns in general and talked about strategies to assure that your client’s accept the process.Greg Jordan showed the Salesforce Customer Relationship Manager (CRM). He explained the features of CRM’s and how they can help keep track of client information.  He also explained that saleforce is a cloud computing platform that allows other companies to rent space on it and sell add-on products like Vertical response emailer and Acteva RSVP as an event management tool.Deb Anderson finished the discussion by demonstrating Go To Meeting which is an online collaboration tool.  She had an assistant outside the room running her powerpoint and computer mouse and keyboard and even spoke through the mike for a brief presentation of her own.  Deb pointed out that go to meeting can save the cost of travel and in Wyoming that can be a huge savings.PDF’s of all three of the PowerPoint Presentations are attached.Panel 1, Panel 2, Panel 3