Portland Oregon Startup and Tech News
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.
Screenshots used to be a fairly convenient way of sharing visual information with support folks and the like. Droplr made taking, marking up, and sharing those screenshots faster and easier. But it wasn’t really until the advent of Slack—and the increased use of screenshots that came with it—for Droplr to truly come into their own. Now, the Bend startup is the third fastest growing app in the Slack app ecosystem.
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a million times: It’s lonely being a founder—or even the cofounder—of a startup. That’s why I’m always happy to see events and programs that bring founders together. So just imagine how psyched I am when a founder focused event collaborates with a founder focused program. Founder founder founder. Well, and coffee.
Sometimes, I think that I miss podcasting. But then I listen to myself on a podcast. And then I realize… Yeah. Probably best left to others. Others who are more well spoken and entertaining. Oh. And interesting. Don’t forget interesting. Nonetheless, I may have said one or two compelling things. Either thanks to the talent of the interviewers or because, you know, even the broken clock is right twice a day.
By now, you’ve likely encountered the lean business canvas. It’s single page worksheet that helps folks build a high level business plan for their startup. Alternatively, its’a quick and easy way figure out that your idea for a company has no chance of succeeding as a business. Either way, it’s a useful framework. So if you can use that formate to help understand your business, what if it a similar worksheet could help you understand the culture of your business? Enter The Praxis Department and the Startup Culture Canvas.
