Portland startups, open source, and tech news, jobs, and events #pdx
Admittedly, I get a little cranky about the posts that appear on the Portland Startups Switchboard from time to time. But there are also a bunch of good posts that pop up there all of the time—posts that might not get the attention they deserve. So rather than focusing on the negative, I thought it might be nice to accentuate the positive.
This. We need more of this. In addition to continuing to hustle and grind on your startup, you need to take time to reflect. And take stock of your accomplishments. And be proud of what you’ve managed to get done. And tell people about it. Because it’s important.
One of my concerns about the Portland startup community is that it often takes a significant amount of time for companies to find their way to an exit. And for venture funded companies, it’s all about the exit. So it was a pleasant surprise to see two Portland companies involved in an acquisition—especially when one of those companies was still on the earlier stages of growth. Puppet has acquired Reflect.
For all of the amazing stuff that’s happening in Portland, there’s one thing that we in the startup and tech community are fairly bad at doing. Documenting all of the stuff that’s happening, as it happens. But you know who’s good at documenting stuff? Documentarians. And lucky for the Cartoon Network Game Jam 2016 crew, there were documentarians there. Which makes all of us lucky.
When it comes to outdoor product startups, the nexus of that activity in Oregon is the Bend Outdoor Worx accelerator and their annual pitch competition BOW BreakOut. So if you’re building an outdoor product company, you’ll want to showcase your efforts there. And here’s your chance.
We all know the myths. Scrappy founders creating something out of thin air, raising millions of dollars, becoming an overnight success, and exiting with wealth beyond their wildest dreams. And if you’re happy with those myths, then you can stop reading, right here. But if you’d like to hear the not-so-pretty-and-often-unhappy truth about being the founder of a venture funded startup, then you’re going to want to join Rand Fishkin when he swings by Portland to talk about his new book.
Hope you’re having a good weekend. Caught a couple of awesome photos on the Portland sub Reddit, today, and thought they’d be good to share.