16
September

Leveraging Complementary Businesses to Accelerate Growth

by Dave Gould,
Operating Partner, Technology Operators Fund & former Chairman and CEO, Witness Systems

Join us on Thursday September 11th when Dave Gould will share his personal insights into building your business. Specifically, Dave will explore how to exploit complementary businesses, including mergers and acquisitions to increase market share, strengthen management teams and expand technology platforms. Dave is a highly successful executive (and former Chairman and CEO of Witness Systems – now Verint).

Dave is currently an Operating Partner with the Atlanta-based Technology Operators Fund. The Fund provides growth capital and hands-on operating help to promising technology companies. Technology Operators consists entirely of proven technology executives that have successfully scaled companies and produced attractive value creation events, including IPOs and sales.

In Feb. 1999, Dave joined Witness Systems as Chairman and CEO. During his eight-year tenure at Witness Systems, now Verint, Dave led the company through a successful IPO, and to a leading position in the workforce optimization market. Through strong execution and successful acquisitions, Witness grew from less than $23 million of annual revenue to close to $221million, with operating margins in the 20% range. The company was sold in the spring of 2007 to Verint for more than $1billion.

Dave’s early career included several management roles at MSA during the boom days; then serving as President of DCA’s Remote Access Division before joining InStream Corporation as Chairman and CEO of the early-stage Internet electronic commerce company targeting the healthcare market.

Dave sits on the boards of the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG) and IBBS, and is a member of the Atlanta Technology Angels.

Dave holds a bachelor’s in economics degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a MBA from Emory University.

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16
September

Delivering Profitable Value

Michael J. Lanning
Chairman and Managing Director, The DPV Group, LLC

As most entrepreneurial managers realize, building a major new business requires discovering, then providing and communicating, a value proposition capable of achieving breakthrough growth at a cost allowing attractive returns. This is Delivering Profitable Value. Easier said than done, however. Many businesses struggle to find a truly breakthrough value proposition that is clearly superior for potential customers, yet profitably deliverable. Join us October 9, as Michael Lanning, original creator of the ‘value proposition’ concept shares insights from 25 year’s experience helping clients grapple with this crucial challenge. He explains why getting to a real winning value proposition seems straightforward but is often so elusive, and discusses key principles in a practical methodology for delivering superior and profitable value propositions.

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16
September

Bootstrapping An Inc. 500 Software Company In Atlanta

David Cummings, Founder And CEO, Hannon Hill

Directions to Event

A business and technology enthusiast, David Cummings founded Hannon Hill Corporation, an Inc. 500 company (#247 in 2007), in January 2001.  David will be sharing valuable lessons that he learned in building Hannon Hill – into an Inc. 500 company.  While a passion for the product and market and a determination to succeed are necessary conditions, David’s experience demonstrates that the ability to examine your company’s performance and to change and refine your preconceptions are critical ingredients for business success.  Adopting the motto “Iterate or Die!”, David stresses the importance of discovering exactly which product, market segment, business model, and value proposition will result in success.  In short, the key takeaway is finding out what works and decisively adjusting course.

David has also started three more companies out of Hannon Hill: Pardot marketing automation software, Clickscape real estate technology solutions, and Rigor web performance software. Pardot was named the fastest growing technology company in Atlanta in 2010 by the Atlanta Business Chronicle.

He has presented at the Silicon Valley Web Guild, Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC), Atlanta Electronic Commerce Forum, and the Technology Association of Georgia. David has also lectured on startups and technology at Duke University, Emory University, and Kennesaw State University. With more than 14 years of software development experience, David is an experienced programmer and has written code for commercial applications in Ruby, Java, PHP, ASP, and Visual C++.

David serves on the board of the Atlanta chapter of the Entrepreneur’s Organization. A native of Tallahassee, Florida, David earned a bachelor of science degree in economics from Duke University and studied at the London School of Economics. David blogs at DavidCummings.org, tweets at  (@david_cummings), and is co-author of the book Think Outside the Inbox.

So please plan to join us at the next breakfast meeting of the IEI Entrepreneurial Forum.  It’s a program you can’t afford to miss.

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16
September

The Truth About Leads

If you’re a B2B executive looking to increase the effectiveness of your company’s lead generation and nurturing programs – and sales follow-up, this presentation is perfect for you. Learn the little-known secrets that focus your lead-generation efforts, align your sales and marketing organizations, and drive revenue growth. Seminar instructor Dan McDade will present 10 provocative questions to help you determine the effectiveness of your sales and marketing efforts … and then will offer 10 steps you can take right now to help you boost your company’s performance.

Dan McDade is the president and CEO of PointClear, a company that provides prospect development services to B2B companies with complex sales processes. He is the author of The Truth About Leads, which sheds light on the little-known secrets that help focus B2B lead-generation and revenue-driving efforts. The Sales Lead Management Association named Dan one of the 50 most influential people in sales lead management in 2009 and 2010. In addition, he serves as a board member for the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG), and chairman of TAG’s Education Collaborative, an organization promoting STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education in Georgia’s middle and high schools.

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16
June

Top Line Growth from Data Driven Decisions

How many of your customers would volunteer that they’d pay more than they currently do? How do you know that you are making the most off each transaction? How do you know what your customers really want?

Revenue Management is a disciplined process of understanding and reacting to consumer behavior in order to maximize revenue or profit. It has helped create top line growth for many Fortune 500 companies by using sophisticated analytics to scrutinize customer responsiveness and improve decisions in pricing, discounting, promotions and inventory allocation.

Robert Cross is the Chairman and CEO of Revenue Analytics. He is widely recognized as the foremost expert in the field of Revenue Management.

Mr. Cross guides Revenue Analytics’ strategic vision and provides a wealth of industry expertise. He is actively involved in client work, and his leadership has been instrumental in helping develop industry leading Revenue Management capabilities for Revenue Analytics clients, including General Motors and InterContinental Hotels Group.

Labeled the “Guru of Revenue Management” by The Wall Street Journal, Robert Cross, prior to Revenue Analytics, founded Talus Solutions, Inc., a company credited with creating billions of dollars in value for clients such as Delta Air Lines, Marriott International, Ford Motor Company and UPS. Talus was acquired by Manugistics Group, Inc. in December of 2000 for $366 million.

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14
September

Growing Profit through Product Innovation

Sam Zaidspiner
Founder & CEO
Slingshot Product Development Group

Achieving excellence in product innovation is a competency that is critical to the success of most early-stage ventures. To gain insight into this critical process and take away practical tips about at it, please join us at the next breakfast meeting of the IEI Entrepreneurial Forum, for an illuminating presentation by Sam Zaidspiner, founder and CEO of Slingshot Product Development Group and a preeminent expert in the field of product innovation.

Slingshot, the firm which Sam leads, is a vertically integrated product development firm with a unique approach that balances innovation and implementation. The firm’s core competency is focus on two key areas: (1) creating innovation in a new category, and (2) productizing a technology. Since its founding in 2001, Slingshot has built a solid reputation for helping companies, large and small, to grow revenue and profits through successful product innovation.

Slingshot’s approach to product innovation incorporates research, ideation, collaboration, and prototyping to broadly explore solutions while zeroing-in on the innovations that meet all the business criteria. At our December 4th meeting, Sam Zaidspiner will describe Slingshot’s proven approach to launching products and launching companies and he will provide a glimpse into the processes the Slingshot team has developed to yield consistent results. Sam will discuss the importance of building a solid business case for a project before moving forward into more capital-intensive development and manufacturing. And when working with new technology, Sam will also emphasize the need to capture the voice-of-the-customer, voice-of-distribution, and business criteria into the product definition.

This is a program you can’t afford to miss.

Sam Zaidspiner is the Founder and CEO of Slingshot Product Development Group, Inc.

Founded in 2001, Slingshot is a vertically-integrated product launch firm, offering a balanced set of innovation and implementation services. Slingshot’s team in Atlanta employs the skills of more than 35 designers, engineers, scientists, and project managers and currently focuses on 3 industries: consumer products, medical products, and security/military products. Slingshot has helped many companies to successfully launch innovations including Coca-Cola, Char-Broil, Lockheed, and Plantronics and has developed new products for recognized brands such as Con-Air, Tide, Craftsman, and Black & Decker. In addition, Slingshot has a special department dedicated exclusively to working with start-ups and inventor-entrepreneurs.

Sam Zaidspiner has 20 years experience in the entire process of product development from product brainstorming through production coordination. He has developed products for a variety of markets including consumer products, dental, medical, aerospace, and packaging. Before founding Slingshot, Sam held engineering positions with GE Plastics, NCR, and Compression. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

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25
March

Entrepreneurial Forum

2010 Breakfast Series
The Secret Ingredient to Innovation
Joe Bankoff

CEO, Woodruff Arts Center

Before joining the Woodruff Arts Center, Joe was a senior partner for 25 years the prestigious Atlanta based law firm of King & Spalding. Joe was a successful and highly regarded trial lawyer who specialized in a wide variety of media, technology and communication disputes and intellectual property matters. As Television Counsel to the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) Joe negotiated the television rights agreements for the 1996 Olympic Games in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, Latin and South America. Joe has been recognized as a leading lawyer in his practice area and has been included repeatedly in the lists of The Best Lawyers in America, “Atlanta’s Best Lawyers” and in Georgia Trend magazine’s “Legal Elite”.

Joe has also been active in various civic roles in Atlanta and Georgia. He served as Board Chair of the Atlanta Speech School, the Atlanta Legal Aid Society and as a member of the Board of the Metropolitan Atlanta United Way. He served on the Governor’s Telecommunications and Technology Task Force and led a Legislative Advisory Committee on Emerging Communications Technologies.

Joe earned his B.S. degree from Purdue University and his J.D. degree from the University of Illinois. He was invited to become a visiting scholar for several months in 1992 at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign and International Patent, Copyright and Competition Law in Munich, Germany.

With over 25 years in the corporate world and 4 years in the non-profit sector, Joe brings us a wealth of experience on business innovation. The goal of innovation is always to create positive change, to make something better. This talk will focus on the elements necessary for businesses to be successfully innovative.

Since becoming President and CEO of The Woodruff Arts Center, Joe has led a campus wide Strategic Planning effort resulting in a renewed commitment to excellence in arts and education throughout the Center. The Strategic Plan sparked a new Master Plan for the future growth of the Center’s Midtown Atlanta campus. The Woodruff Arts Center is currently one of the four largest visual and performing arts centers in the country.

This breakfast offers the rare opportunity to sit with one of the most accomplished non-profit CEO’s in the country.

So please plan to join us at the next breakfast meeting of the IEI Entrepreneurial Forum. It’s a program you can’t afford to miss.

When: Thursday, April 15th: 7:30-9:00AM (Register Now!)

Where: King & Spalding , 1180 Peachtree NE
(On the North-West Corner of 14th & Peachtree)

Registration Fee Options for April 15th, 2010:

Register at the door for $35.

Up-coming Thursday morning Forum meetings:

May13th, 2010
Radhika Subramanian
President
Emcien Corporation

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23
March

Bridging the Marketing & Sales Gap

Bridging the Marketing & Sales Gap
Do you know what your customers want? Generally speaking, you could say that customers want solutions to their problems. But, just saying you have a solution doesn’t make it so. Becoming a true solution-centric organization requires an awareness of the customer’s perception of value.

Unfortunately, too many organizations create “pseudo-solutions”. They fail to align the buyer’s needs and perceptions with the actual benefits of their product or service. This misalignment can occur between company and customer or even within a single organization. Left alone, the misalignment can create significant issues, including problems differentiating and positioning the offer, being perceived as a commodity provider, and a multitude of symptoms based on inefficient sales and marketing efforts.

Co-Authors of The Solution-Centric Organization, Keith Eades and Robert Kear, present the:

  • The parallels between crash dieting and perennial “fix the sales force” initiatives
  • Key market forces driving the solutions movement
  • Solution-centric concepts and the prevalence of “pseudo-solutions”
  • A practical framework for initiating and executing a transformation in your organization.

You’ll also be shown a structured approach for assessing the health of your organization. This assessment pinpoints key barriers to performance improvement, the effect they have on achieving sustainable revenue, and recommendations for improvement.

Eades, Chief Executive Officer of Sales Performance International, is best known for dramatically changing the face of selling, as a best-selling author of The New Solution Selling, and is acknowledged as the master of the consultative sales process. Mr. Kear is Chief Marketing Officer for Sales Performance International.

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16
January

About

Institute for Enterprise and Innovation – (“IEI“) is an all volunteer, non-profit organization that promotes and accelerates innovation and entrepreneurial development through education and service to the community. IEI seeks opportunities to collaborate with others by applying IEI’s people, energy, ideas, and resources to improve the competitiveness and economic growth of Metro Atlanta, the state of Georgia and the Southeast region.

IEI continues the tradition – now in our tenth year – of bringing you the best and brightest speakers, business executives, thought-leaders and entrepreneurs to share their experiences in creating high-performance business enterprises. ??IEI remains committed to bringing you the most informative programs to support your company’s continued success and your professional growth.

IEI offers:

Breakfast Series of Entrepreneurial Forum
Fundamentals for Entrepreneurs
Special Courses

IEI’s Entrepreneurial Series sessions are held at the offices of King & Spalding, 1180 Peachtree NE, 16th Floor, Atlanta, GA 30309-3531. Parking for meetings is validated by our host King & Spalding.

IEI’s mailing address is: IEI, Inc. 85 5th St., NW, Suite D-120,
Atlanta, GA 30318-1000

Meetings are HD video recorded by hiMOTION Videography.

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16
January

Entrepreneurial Forum – 2009 Breakfast Series

Entrepreneurial Forum – 2009 Breakfast Series -

When: Thursday, February 12th: 7:30-9:00AM (Register Today)
Where: King & Spalding, 1180 Peachtree NE
(On the North-West Corner of 14th & Peachtree) View Map

Get to Positive Cash Flow Forever:
Re-Position, Restructure, Re-Price
Charlie Paparelli, President
Paparelli Ventures

This economic tsunami is disrupting even the best-run businesses. Everything was going along just great … and then consumers abruptly stopped spending. We just stopped. Seemingly overnight, mortgages were upside down, credit was non-existent, portfolios dropped 40 percent, and personal liquidity was gone.Consumer behavior is having a dramatic effect on businesses. First, it was the investment banking houses; then, the mega-banks and the big-three auto manufacturers; and now perhaps your business. But some businesses are continuing to prosper and making lots of money. Who are they and why is their model working?

This session will present a unique model that you can use to evaluate your business for the short and long-term. This is a wonderful opportunity to get focused on your buyer, reposition your product, change your message, restructure your company, and maybe even simplify your pricing model. But first you need to gain perspective on your buyer, your business, and where you will be when the new “normal” economy shows itself.

Charlie Paparelli, an experienced CEO and Professional Angel Investor, is never short of insights and ideas. He will be sharing what he sees happening and the changes he is recommending to his portfolio companies and the entrepreneurs he regularly counsels. Companies with positive cash flow always succeed. This can be your company.

Speaker Bio:

Charlie Paparelli is a professional angel investor who helps experienced managers achieve their dream of starting and building their own companies.

Charlie is President and founder of Paparelli Ventures, a pre-formation investment company focused on entrepreneurs in the Atlanta technology market. PV has funded over 18 Atlanta startups in the last 15 years. Currently, he is the managing partner of his two active investments, iPartners, LLC and Torad Engineering, LLC.

Prior to starting PV Charlie was President of Computer People USA, a subsidiary of a London-based public company; President of Sterling Software Professional Services; Group Vice-President of Vertical Market Software for Informatics General Corporation; and General Manager of MCS, a successful Atlanta Startup that automated CPA offices nation-wide. In 1976, MCS was Charlie’s start in the information technology industry as a partner, developer, salesman, and support rep. Back then, we did it all.

In addition, Charlie is Chairman of the Board of High Tech Ministries, the sponsors of the Atlanta High Tech Prayer Breakfast. He is also a co-founder of Angel Lounge, a subsidiary of StartupLounge.com. The Angel Lounge mission is to stimulate startup investments by helping angels meet and learn from each other with a focus on new investments.

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