Jack Connor

I just met with the one of the top VCs in Phoenix. Here's how they believe AZ can be one of the top startup states in the next 10 years: 1. Company Formation ⏩ Starting more startups ⏩ Growing big companies ⏩ Selling for big exits 2. Capital Velocity ⏩ More investments into AZ startups ⏩ Reinvesting back into AZ once you've exited 3. Community Vibrancy ⏩ Small/Medium/Big creators hyping up AZ ⏩ Attractive events that bring true value And the community is thriving: Shawn Allard w/ private meetups for SMB owners Sean Huntington 🍯 w/ Founders N Funders events Josue Romero w/ AZ Tech Founder meetups Josue Romero and Daniela Santangelo with Freeway (amazing dashboard to see AZ venture stats + event calendar) No better time to be an AZ Founder 🌵🚀 *** Side Note: can we find a better name to unite the startup valley? YesPHX is okay Silicon Desert is okay but way too cliche at this point

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🌟 7 Crucial Elements for Scaling Startups to Successful Exits 🌟 Reflecting on my recent experience at the OPEN Silicon Valley Forum in Santa Clara, some of us engaged in a deep discussion on what repeatedly drives startups from inception to successful exits. Our collective experience pointed to these seven essential elements: 1️⃣ Timing is Everything: Ensure the market and technology are ready for your solution. Being too early or too late can hinder success. 2️⃣ Align with Your "Why": Success requires internal motivation. Knowing your “why” keeps you resilient and purpose-driven. 3️⃣ Master the Problem, Not Just the Product: Deep understanding of the problem is far more critical than focusing solely on a product or idea. 4️⃣ Define Culture from the Start: The first five hires set the tone. Invest in "A" players who embody the culture you envision. 5️⃣ Obsess Over User Experience: A relentless focus on user experience can make or break your product’s adoption. 6️⃣ Build for Scale from Day One: Architecting for growth is not optional—it’s essential for long-term success. 7️⃣ Map Out Your Go-to-Market Strategy Early: Before building, have a clear thesis on how to generate revenue and achieve product-market fit. These principles are tried and true across multiple industries. If you’re launching a startup or scaling a business, how do these resonate with your experience? What would you add to the list? #startups #entrepreneurship #growth #scaling #productmarketfit #OPENsiliconvalley #innovation #founders Tashfeen Suleman Amer Haider Umair Khan Junaid Qurashi Wardah Inam

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🚀 It’s a big day at Hoop! We’re excited to share we’ve raised $5m led by Index Ventures with participation from Origin Ventures, Chingona Ventures, Divergent Capital, and an inspiring group of angel investors. Two years ago, Justin, Brian, and I got together and started brainstorming. We had worked together as early executives at Trello for 7.5 years! We wanted to recreate the magic of the early days of Trello and respond to the epidemic of distraction we were seeing in the workplace. When I left Atlassian, I was in back-to-back meetings most days. Slack was constantly buzzing. My whole day was spent going between apps and praying I wouldn’t miss something important. I would wake up in the middle of the night remembering that DM I forgot to respond to. In an age of AI, this kind of mental fatigue across tools drains humans of our energy to do the work that really matters: the focused and creative work that comes when we can feel secure that we’re on top of all important work. Hoop is the product I wish I had. It connects to Zoom, Google Meet, Slack and email and automatically captures tasks for me using AI. It then centralizes everything in one spot so I never miss a task. Our vision is to rethink task management with an AI first principles mindset. There’s so much we can do now that we couldn’t have imagined back when we were building Trello. It’s an exciting time to be building in the space, and we’ve got a world class team taking on this challenge. Now’s the time to try Hoop out and let us know what you think! We couldn’t be more grateful for all the amazing support from our community, investors, and friends. Let’s go team! 👏🏼 Special thanks to our investors for all their belief and support - Damir Becirovic Neil Rimer Katie Shea Samara Mejia Hernandez Jason Heltzer Andy Dunn Wade Foster Linda Lian Michael Pryor Kristen Habacht Elizabeth Hall Barry Clark Nikita Miller Mihika Kapoor Jiaona Zhang (JZ) Maggie Adhami-Boynton Sonia Sahney Nagar Sean Harper Darren Murph Mike Arauz Job van der Voort Annie Duke Jay Simons Maria Christopoulos Katris Ezra Galston Sheel Mohnot Ilya Fushman #futureofwork #ai #startups #fundraising

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Friends/Fellow Founders - TIMELY– As many of you know, I recently visited lawmakers in #Sacramento to speak out against harmful #AI #legislation. This was an incredible experience, and I was grateful for the opportunity to share my story. Thanks to the advocacy of many AI startups, one bad bill was defeated, but another, SB 1047, is headed to the Governor who has not decided whether to let it become law or veto it. #SB1047 would regulate AI in unprecedented ways. Though the bill says it’s about corporate AI giants, I fear small startups will be hit the hardest. Companies like mine will struggle to overcome the new #regulatory hurdles enforced by this reckless #policy. I’m sure everyone agrees AI abuses and misuses should be prevented and prohibited, but SB 1047 would punish businesses that build technology instead of those that misuse it. The government should regulate misuse and harm, not core technology. Please consider joining other #startup and #smallcompany leaders in signing the letter below urging #Governor #Newsom to #veto SB 1047. Thank you! https://lnkd.in/gAJNDEDJ

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From 2017 - 2021, I lead growth efforts for Southern California’s largest innovation lab, Toolbox LA. 🚀 It was HQ for MiLA Capital, an early-stage hardware fund investing in tech you can touch. 🤖 I was fortunate to have amazing leaders who believed in my abilities and let me experiment. They also took the time to teach me new concepts about project management and finance. This was critical to our success. Without exceptional leaders, it's really hard to scale anything successfully. I feel so fortunate to have worked for smart, kind, and thoughtful investors who taught me so much. Thank you, Noramay Cadena, Carmen Palafox, and Shaun Arora for all that you've done to help my career. Here are some results I achieved through strategic marketing initiatives around customer acquisition (we had 2 business models: monthly membership fees and event space booking fees) 🚀 Grew memberships and revenue within the 24 months of operation from $4,000 to $35,000 MRR 🚀 Maintained a sales pipeline of over $500k in leads utilizing the HubSpot CRM system 🚀 Leveraged new and emerging industry-related digital channels (Peerspace, LiquidSpace, Croissant) for brand awareness and $150k in lead generation 🚀 Worked with LA Mayor Eric Garcetti’s team to launch Toolbox LA in tandem with LA’s Manufacturing Week, resulting in over 1000+ RSVPs, media coverage, and a continuation of successful government relationships 🚀 Launched First Fridays, a monthly event series showcasing local artisans, small businesses, creatives, and DTC brands There was a lot more we accomplished, but those achievements are the ones I am most proud of. Reflecting on this time, I am incredibly grateful for the ability to experiment. Freedom and trust within an organization are key to sustainable growth. We also had a major advantage in our value proposition: we were the only innovation lab in Southern California with open, community access to a full maker space, wet lab, and coworking amenities. I learned so much about product prototyping from the members and portfolio companies. I wish I could tell you this place still existed, but we were one of the unfortunate consequences of the pandemic. We shut down in January 2021. Now, it serves as home to Machina Labs, which is doing some truly innovative work in AI and manufacturing. I still use the Toolbox LA mantra when tackling hard problems: "Wake up, kick ass, repeat" This is just one chapter in my 16 years of experience in marketing, community building, and partnerships. Would you like to learn more about customer acquisition strategies? The RAR Studio is now accepting applications for Cohort 2 of Founder Bootcamp. You'll get to learn all my tips and tricks. And you'll also get 1:1 strategy sessions each week. Apply now: https://bit.ly/4aRHzF8 Would love to hear from anyone who's building something interesting and chat about growth strategies! #marketing #community #innovation #growth #leadership

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Two weeks ago I spent 3 days with brilliant human beings discussing the state of AI investment with other angel syndicate leads, angel investors and VCs at Hustle Fund's #camphustle in Los Gatos. It was brilliant. Truly awesome to learn so much from insanely accomplished investors. But was so clear to me again is that the US and the UK are two countries divided by separate languages of ambition. Aspiration and ambition underlined by the cluster effect of successful exits, incredible talent and venture capital driven by operators and founders rather than accountants. But one reason why the US often trumps (pun not intended) the UK is they learn from failure. Run a startup that didn't reach the dizzying heights of venture-scale returns? Learn, reset and go again. What they certainly do not do is look at failure with glee and an "I told you so" attitude. Which is what I sense when I read most of the narrative around the failure of Cazoo. Alex Chesterman swung and missed. The business was flawed, unit economics didn't add up and in reality - there was very little innovation outside the vertical alignment of a well-understood business. But when we look down upon what he tried to do and 💩 💩 it all we're doing is making it harder for someone else to be equally as ambitious. Focus on what went wrong. Focus on the fundamental underlying business models that drive efficient use of capital and the push for profitability. But let's celebrate people shooting their shot and not celebrate the failures.

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To all my fellow Arizonans in particular… Here’s the Cliff Notes version of why our Silicon State focus on “atoms” in addition to bits is SO on point for our times. The world of atoms shall be underserved no longer. And Avanced Manufacturing (of all kinds of things in all kinds of industries) is right on the $! 🙏🏼🌵🚀 https://lnkd.in/gNbGmPsC

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Introducing Ocular AI (YC W24) 2.0 (rebranded and refreshed) and our first-ever Launch Week: https://lnkd.in/gAzPpBJa We stand at the chiasm of a technological renaissance, driven by the symbiotic partnership between humans and machines. This dynamic relationship has ushered in an era where Artificial Intelligence augments human intelligence, creating technologies that are more sophisticated, accurate, and practical—all while preserving human oversight and expertise. AI enhances human capabilities, empowering us to solve complex problems while maintaining agency and control. At the heart of this advancement is real-world data, enriched by human intelligence. Together, they form the foundation for cutting-edge AI that is both impactful and ethical. When Louis Murerwa and I started Ocular AI (YC W24) as an Open-Source Enterprise Search project during Y Combinator, our goal was to make information retrieval more intelligent. Early on, we realized that data quality was the decisive factor in achieving meaningful AI results. Over the past few months, we’ve engaged with hundreds of founders, executives, and engineers from startups, enterprises, research labs, and companies in robotics and self-driving cars. The message is clear: data is the lifeblood of AI. That’s why Ocular AI (YC W24) is building the Data Foundry for the Multi-Modal AI Era. By combining AI scalability with human insight, we’re creating golden datasets that go beyond training models, paving the way for AI breakthroughs. We’re excited to announce Ocular AI (YC W24)’s first-ever Launch Week, from December 2-6! Our team (Vivek Lahole, Louis Murerwa) will unveil two flagship products, Ocular Foundry and Ocular Bolt, which lay the foundation of our vision. Foundry and Bolt will strengthen the AI-human intelligence bond, enabling teams to create, refine, and deploy data with precision, efficiency, and speed. Companies spend huge amounts on training data, but Foundry and Bolt are AI-native tools that will lower costs, reduce manual effort, and accelerate high-quality data collection. We’re replacing outdated, clunky, and expensive data software! 💡 What to Expect: - Daily announcements and product demos - Insights into tackling AI’s biggest challenges - Opportunities to connect with our team 🎯 Be part of the journey: - Explore the Launch Week page: https://lnkd.in/gAzPpBJa If you’re working on AI for: 1. Computer Vision 2. Robotics 3. Self-Driving Cars 4. Foundational Models - Join our Slack community for live updates: https://lnkd.in/gVSeGTC2 - Sign up for our Beta Waitlist: https://lnkd.in/gsgkwsBB We’re already powering data for robotics companies and would love to hear and learn from you!

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The future of tech is here, and it's wearing glasses 🕶️ Here is an intriguing article about how Snap's CEO, Evan Spiegel, believes his company is leading the charge in AR smart glasses, with Meta and Apple set to follow. As someone who’s been following the AR space closely, I find it exciting to see companies like Snap pushing the boundaries of what smart glasses can do. Spiegel’s vision of using hands and voice to interact with augmented reality is a game-changer. Snap’s Spectacles, now in their 5th generation, are already making waves among developers. The goal is clear: to bring computing back into the real world, away from screens and closer to our daily lives. While Meta’s Ray-Ban Stories and Apple’s Vision Pro are also making significant strides, Snap’s approach to natural interaction and developer-friendly pricing could be the key to mainstream adoption. It’s an exciting time for AR, and I’m eager to see how these innovations shape our future. #AR #SmartGlasses #TechInnovation #FutureOfTech

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Very excited that VitalStage Ventures is a small part of Groq’s new round of funding. We are all-in on AI infrastructure as the picks and shovels enabling this new generation of innovation. With respect to Groq, we particularly love their new hardware + software approach to accelerating AI inference. Just try out Groq.com and you can sample what the fuss is about. Having specialized Language Processing Units (LPUs) for inference enables dramatic performance gains at higher efficiency with less thermal impact. And now by hosting models via GroqCloud, Groq lowers the barriers for teams to be able to leverage many models without having to set up and deploy their own AI infrastructure. #ai #groq #ainative https://lnkd.in/gcEcXfme

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I'm excited to announce our newest product💥 💥 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐍𝐞𝐯𝐚𝐝𝐚 𝐃𝐲𝐧𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐲 𝐭𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐭 **You do not need to live in Nevada to use this trust. You just need a licensed Nevada trustee. This product works best for: ▶ Startup founders and execs ▶ VC and PE investors The benefits of this trust include: ---> ZERO state capital gains tax (Nevada is a 0 tax state) ---> Bulletproof asset protection (better than a prenup) ---> Unlimited QSBS potential (you can stack trusts to eliminate federal taxes) My cofounders and I started Dynasty 2 years ago specifically to bring this product to market 🤠 We were 1st employees at Carta and were fortunate enough to take some money off the table. But we paid enormous taxes (over 50%)! On the flip side we met a serial founder who leveraged Dynasty trusts and paid ZERO taxes on over $50m in capital gains 😮 The second we heard about this, we knew we needed to start Dynasty so this product could be available to everyone... So if you are a founder, investor, or anyone with high growth assets - check us out!

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soooo who's #hiring engineers in LA? I'm putting an uno-reverse on the hiring process 😂 for TECH WEEK by a16z where startups pitch themselves to engineers in LA, show what makes their engineering culture unique, & why top engineers should work there! DM me if you want pitch at the event. We will give a preference to companies actively interviewing for 3+ open eng roles in October. Register directly if you're an engineer who wants to attend: https://lnkd.in/gtHsfXRU #LATechWeek

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𝗘𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻’𝘀 𝗝𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆: 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗗𝗶𝗿𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗦𝗮𝗹𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗰 𝗜𝗻𝗳𝗹𝘂𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 In San Francisco’s vibrant tech landscape, Ethan, founder of “InnovateX,” struggled to gain traction for his software “Nexus,” designed to enhance online collaboration. Despite his passion, potential clients were resistant to move away from established systems. Seeking guidance from mentor… -- The journey of a founder is never a straight line. Take Ethan, the brain behind InnovateX, a promising startup in the bustling tech scene of San Francisco. Ethan poured his heart into creating Nexus - a software tool designed to bring a new level of dynamism to online collaboration. But even with his relentless passion and the software’s undeniable potential, he found himself hitting a roadblock. 🚧🔒 Why? Because potential clients were hesitant to break away from their established systems. Change is hard, but it's also the only way to innovate and grow. 🌱🚀 Ethan, however, didn't let this challenge break his spirit. Instead, he sought guidance from a mentor. Why? Because he understood that even the most successful entrepreneurs didn’t get where they are on their own. They had mentors, advisors, people who've walked the path before them and have wisdom to share. Innovation doesn’t happen in isolation. It happens when we challenge the status quo, learn from others, embrace the power of collaboration, and persistently drive forward. Stay tuned to see how Ethan’s journey unfolds. 👀 #Entrepreneurship #Mentorship #Innovation #TechStartup #OnlineCollaboration #InnovateX #Persistence. https://lnkd.in/g-fX5UTK I am #Stevenchinyl and I co-founded #AidavaxTech, #UCloudAsiaSG and founded #VentureDomainHosting. I am into #AIsolutions, #EnterpriseSecurity #EnterpriseEmailSecurity and #EnterpriseFileSecurity. We #makeITsimpleforYourBusiness Read about the latest SME IT News at www.smeitnews.com I am also a member of the #LBFalumni & #SkyHighTower

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🎉 Gavel won Best Technology of the year from the California Lawyers Association ! We are thankful for this recognition of our team's relentless work and innovation in 2024, taking strides towards making the law universally accessible. What a year so far: 🚀 Gavel expanded its reach to PDF automation, making it simple and powerful for law professionals to turn any legacy PDF forms into modern web applications 🚀 Our new AI agent was released to automatically turn PDF forms into legal apps. 🚀 Our AI stack became capable of benchmarking and optimizing agents for new large language models from major players OpenAI, Anthropic, #Llama, Mistral AI in hours -- bringing the best of AI innovation to our customers. 🚀 Our new add-in for Microsoft Word came out, making powerful automation directly available while drafting Word documents. 🚀 Our no setup required, pre-built workflows are becoming available in many legal areas and jurisdictions at a record pace, thanks to our powerful platform that makes it easy to create legal apps. 🚀 A flurry of testimonials of happy customers, ranging from family and estate law, to corporate or mortgage law. And importantly a growing number of low income families helped via Gavel's automation for legal aid. 🚀 Absolutely outstanding customer support and fast response time to any of our customers (paying or not), rethought with AI at the center of our customer success workflows. 💜 All of this would not be possible without our outstandingly talented, creative passionate team, committed to making a difference in making the law universally accessible to all. We couldn't be prouder of all the legal innovation we are witnessing from our customers and our team, and can't wait to see what next will be #BuiltOnGavel cc: Dorna Moini #LegalTech #Startup #Gavel #ArtificialIntelligence #GenAI #Awards #Innovation

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One realization we've made at Convoi is if we hear something 50+ times we need to build it for the Utah Startup Community. We've built three things so far, and just about to launch number 4 in a couple of weeks. First, we started Convoi Ventures to bring more capital to the earliest stage of startups. ~2.5 years in, we've backed 40 companies, 2/3 that are pre-revenue and 50% are first-time founders. Second, we started Utah Tech Week to create a grassroots event that will be forever focused on Utah and it's early stage startup community. The first year there was 114 events, and this past January, there were 197 events and 15k attendees. Third, we started a program for early stage founders that we think is going to be the flagship program for early stage founders in Utah. Our alpha program was a big success, and beta this summer will be even better. We'll announce after we're out of beta. :) Fourth, we constantly hear of folks at the largest companies we have in Utah that want to support our early stage startups. We're going to be pretty quiet about this one #IYKYK, but if you're a VP or above at a tech company (public, or Utah based series A/B) company, please DM if you'd like more details. Thank you for letting me interrupt my social media fast for this post. Back in my cave for a couple of months.

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The Fundraising Workshop in Santa Monica with our friends at Expert Dojo! 💵 Get the FREE Fundraising Playbook here: https://hubs.li/Q02Csnf_0 Last week we had an incredible group of startup founders gather just outside of Los Angeles at the Expert Dojo offices for a workshop on preparing for fundraising. Brian Mac Mahon, Ashutosh Kumar - Jha and the team at Expert Dojo have created quite the startup community in their mission to help founders grow their companies faster. If you, or any founder friends, are planning to raise capital in the coming 12 months, check out the Fundraising Playbook for Startup Founders. This playbook will help you run a successful fundraising process that starts well before you actually need the capital. Hope this is helpful! ------ ♻️ Please feel free to share with other founders who may find this resource beneficial.

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Senior devs: I'm opening up 3 spots for my exclusive "Closing Clients" offer. We’ll work together to add €80-150k to your business in 3–6 months. This is for the dev whose contract is ending in 4+ months. For the courageous dev jumping headfirst into a freelancing biz. — First, we create your high-ticket offer and validate it — Second, we’ll show you our proven strategies of how you’re going to sell it — Next, we’ll tap into your network to turn ready-to-buy businesses into clients in <30 minutes a day. Okay, there’s a lot more to it. Send me a DM with the word “curious” to get some insights into my method. But I warn you… This is only for the dev that’s ready to supercharge your biz and 1.) earn a very healthy income, 2.) while getting back your time. PS: Don’t worry — we don’t do endless commitments. See you in my DMs :)

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