Editor, Author at Women 2.0

From Idea To Patent: Inventing Blinx And Replacing The Traditional Paper Business Cards

Editor7 April 2012

How one business-minded startup founder patented new mobile technology - Blinx. By Carrie Chitsey (Founder & CEO, 3Seventy)

When we started our mobile company over three years ago, we were attending several tradeshows to learn more about mobile and innovation. We developed a handy SMS (text messaging) technology using keywords for our company so people could reach us after the shows. We thought it was unique and would help us stand out from the piles of paper business cards.

With Blinx, people could now whip out their phones regardless of device (regular mobile or smart phone), text our name to a short code, then instantly get our business card.

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Why You’re A Startup Founder: Nature And Nurture

Editor7 April 2012

This article has been syndicated from TechCrunch. By Pokin Yeung (Founder, Askomatics)

Just over a month ago, a random conversation with another startup founder over lunch turned into a full-blown research project.

“You and I are both first-born children,” I mused to my friend, “I wonder if that had any influence on why we chose to start businesses.”

I theorized that first borns were often given more responsibility growing up, and wondered if this role served as training wheels for building startups. I also wondered if our upbringing had an influence on things like when we start, what we start, or how much money we raise — and ultimately, how successful we are with our businesses.

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Partner Event: Products Are Hard (May 1 in SF)

Editor6 April 2012

PRODUCTS ARE WHAT? That's right, we said it. Making products is hard — whether you're a product manager at corporation of 10,000 or a individual maker workin... Read More...

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On Cultural Competence In Product, Startup Success

Editor6 April 2012

By Avichal Garg (Co-Founder & CEO, Spool) Core competence is a factor that cannot be easily replicated and gives the business a competitive advantage in delivering their product or service to customers. Core competencies are how a business does something; the lens through which opportunities are identified and evaluated. Cultural competencies are how a business figures out what to do. [1]

Every business, no matter the size, has cultural competencies.

Cultural competencies are a reflection of the founders’ personalities. It’s no coincidence that Google was started and led by Ph.Ds, Apple by a designer-perfectionist... Read More...

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Why Women Continue to Lag Behind Men In The Startup Community – And What We Can Do About It

Editor6 April 2012

Interviews reveal five common themes contributing to the fewer number of women starting up. By Beverly Tam (Student, University of California San Diego)

Over the past few decades, women have overcome tremendous obstacles and have made a lot of progress in the area of gender equality in America.

We now make up 46% of the workforce and over 50% of college graduates, yet when we look at the number of women pursuing high-growth startups, there still exists a very apparent gap in numbers.

According to an article published by the Kauffman Foundation earlier last year, women only make up 35% of startup business owners.

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Female Founders To Follow: Women In Gaming From YetiZen

Editor6 April 2012

Meet the women founders working in and on Yetizen, the SF-based social gaming startup accelerator. By Angie Chang (Co-Founder & Editor-in-Chief, Women 2.0)

There is no shortage of accelerators and incubators today. Best part is, many of these are extremely focused and specialized for the industry.

Try Rock Health founded by CEO Halle Tecco for startups in the health space, Enrique Allen's The Designer Fund for designers starting startups, Blackbox.vc for European startuppers seeking an immersive Silicon Valley experience, Microsoft's Kinect accelerator for the like, and the list goes on.

For games, Sana Choudary founded YetiZen, a game community builder and platform startup accelerator

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Berkeley Pitch Mixer: Another Step Forward

Editor6 April 2012

Efforts to close the divide: Pitch Mixer, Black Founders, Latino Startups NewMe Accelerator... By Esther C. Moore (Co-Founder & CEO, HustleAndCode)

You need only put your ear to the ground these days to catch conversation about Silicon Valley’s diversity challenge as it relates to women, blacks, latinos and other underrepresented groups knocking at the door of what many consider “the land of milk and honey.”

Although I was born in the Bay Area, I grew up in the rural town of Bakersfield, California. I would say that an entrepreneurial spirit has always run throughout my family - which is probably why I find myself in the role of Co-Founder and CEO of HustleAndCode.

Several years ago, I teamed up with my son

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Are You Asking The Wrong Startup Product/UX Questions?

Editor6 April 2012

Some common questions about UX and how to get answers directly from users. By Laura Klein (Principal, Users Know)

When I’m talking with startups, they frequently ask me all sorts of questions. I imagine that they’re probably really disappointed when I respond with a shrug.

You see, frequently they’re asking entirely the wrong question. And, more importantly, they’re asking the wrong person.

It is an unfortunate fact that many startups talk to people like me (or their investors or their advisors or “industry experts”) instead of talking to their users.

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Etsy Hacker School Scholarships Support Women In Technology

Editor5 April 2012

Etsy wants to hire 20 women engineers, starts by providing scholarships to Hacker School for women. By Marc Hedlund (VP Engineering, Etsy)

Today, in conjunction with Hacker School, Etsy is announcing a new scholarship and sponsorship program for women in technology: we’ll be hosting the summer 2012 session of Hacker School in the Etsy headquarters, and we’re providing ten Etsy Hacker Grants of $5,000 each — a total of $50,000 — to women who want to join but need financial support to do so.

Our goal is to bring 20 women to New York to participate, and we hope this will be the first of many steps to encourage more women into engineering at Etsy and across the industry.

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Ms. Sankar Goes To Washington

Editor5 April 2012

On practicing her startup pitch and meeting the Vice President of the United States. By Pooja Sankar (Founder & CEO, Piazza)

At first I thought it was a phishing scam.

I received an email with an image attachment inviting me to meet the Vice President and his wife Dr. Jill Biden at a reception at their official residence in Washington, DC. All I needed to do was RSVP with my social security number. Hah! What kind of idiot falls for that?

But whoever put this together had done a nice job on the invitation, which looked very professional and contained none of the usual misspellings. So I showed it to

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HTML5 Frameworks For Developers, Users (The Mobile Future)

Editor5 April 2012

New developments in HTML5, including a HTML5-based website builder for non-programmers. By Kristen Nicole (Senior Editor, SiliconAngle)

HTML5 is said to be “the one” that would dominate all forms of computer language from desktops to mobile devices, toppling Flash along the way. Back in November, Adobe pulled the plug on their Flash for mobile to focus on HTML5, which was a hard pill to swallow since the late Steve Jobs was never really a fan of Flash, stating that HTML5 was the solution for everything and influencing the mobile sector’s perspective of Flash overall.

Though it seems Flash is already in its final stages life, some believe that HTML5 still has a lot of maturing to do.

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Young And Female In Startup Central: Inc. Interview With Shaherose Charania, A Founder Of Women 2.0

Editor5 April 2012

A founder of Women 2.0 explains how the startup scene is evolving for women and offers networking advice for aspiring female founders. By Jessica Stillman (Writer, Inc.)

Silicon Valley may earn praise for its creativity and dynamism, but rarely is America's foremost startup hub held up as a model of diversity. The world's engineers may flock to the area's startups, but when Shaherose Charania moved to the Valley to explore becoming an entrepreneur several years ago, she often found herself the only woman on product teams and at networking events.

These days, she and a few friends are doing something about this gender imbalance with Women 2.0, an organization that supports female founders and runs a host of women-friendly networking events around the world.

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Call For Applications: Bay Area Capital Connections Seeks Entrepreneurs To Pitch For Investment (Apply By April 11)

Editor5 April 2012

Apply to pitch by April 11, 2012 for Bay Area Capital Connections. By Darlene Crane (Executive Director, Alliance for Community Development)

This is a special call to members of Women 2.0 to raise visibility of women at the 5th Annual Bay Area Capital Connections Conference on May 10, 2012.

I am urging Founders of startups ready to pitch to apply today for our Pitch session on the afternoon of the conference.

The deadline to apply to pitch is April 11, 2012 - Apply here.

Since 2006, the Alliance for Community Development has held these Capital Connections conferences to showcase

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Blurtt: The Startup That Did Not Stop Believing

Editor5 April 2012

The idea to ‘blurtt anonymously’ from a website I used often while working on Wall Street where you could send anonymous tips to people. By Jeanette Cajide (Co-Founder, Blurtt)

Blurtt has a longer history than most startups as it originally launched in 2009. I spent most of my career funding and investing in leveraged and distressed companies. It was not a practical move for me to be an entrepreneur because I had a lot of school loans, but I felt deeply compelled to give it a shot.

Kuba Tymula asked me to join Blurtt as a founder in October 2010 and later in April 2011, I convinced Laura Gurasich, another Kellogg MBA who is consumer insights expert to join as a founder. Laura and I manage Blurtt day-to-day

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CEO Notes From Presenting At The Women Entrepreneur’s Festival

Editor4 April 2012

Notes from the Womens Entrepreneurship Festival. By Joanne Lang (Founder & CEO, AboutOne)

Did you know that women invented the cooking stove, refrigerator, dishwasher and ironing board? As well as the Apgar test, the circular saw, Scotchgard, fire escapes, liquid paper, the windshield wiper, the life raft, and the first software for computing? Women have always been change makers.

The festival started with a keynote from Arianna Huffington. She was tall and extremely funny – much more than I expected. Her speech was incredibly motivating with a focus on real life issues and the personal obstacles women face.

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