Monday, May 07, 2001

Garage.com's Bootcamp for Startups

With 14 other Bootcamps under their belts, Garage.com held their 2nd New York event on May 7th and 8th at the lovely Chelsea Piers. With high-powered panel topics like "The Fundable Deal," "Technology Market Outlook" and "Perfecting your Positioning Workshop" attendees got hands-on advice and information from leaders in the industry. Garage.com CEO Guy Kawasaki moderated the lively panel "Surviving the Storm" with iVillage Co-founder Candice Carpenter. Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati Managing Partner Alex Lynch, StarMedia CFO Steve Heller, Grant Thornton e*tech Practice NY Partner-in-Charge Mark T. Oster and Guru.com Co-CEO James Slavet participated as well. Guy moderated another panel with the heavy VCs: Impact Ventures' Managing General Partner Adam Dell; AOL Time Warner Ventures' Executive Director Brud Rossman; SONY Corporation's Strategic Venture Investment VP Martin Kuhn; Draper Fisher Jurvetson Gotham Ventures' Managing Partner and Co-Founder Daniel Schultz; and MSD Ventures' MSD Capital, L.P. Co-head Andrew White. They doled out wisdom, as did Garage.com's Chris Melching for his presentation on "Perfecting Your Pitch."

With more illustrious speakers, the second day was just as informative. I was honored again to appear on the "Let's Do Launch" panel with such noteworthy gents as Advanced Technology Ventures' GP Mike Frank, Forbes' VP of Marketing Bruce Rogers, Official Design Agency's Creative Director Paulo Simas and The Industry Standard's Executive Editor and New York Bureau Chief Richard Turner. Guy Kawasaki rounded out the two days of events with his keynote, "From Gulfstream to Airstream." The days were packed with information, and once again Garage.com offered a conference that will most likely help a few entrepreneurs move out of the garage!