Colin McEnroe Show: Building A Connecticut Startup
We talk with innovators and inventors from across the state.
Published: Mar 22, 2011
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Matthew Nemerson
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Peter Longo
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Nick Jaensch
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Colin McEnroe Show: Building A Connecticut Startup
On today's show we''re going to look at the elaborate networks -- pipeline is too straight and straightforward a word -- that exist in Connecticut to nurture new businesses -- which came to be called, in the last two decades -- "start ups."
The term became fashionable during the dot com explosion of the 1990s, I think because it carried a suggestion of turning on a computer. We also refer to the latter as "booting up" which comes, apparently, from the term bootstrapping. And bootstrapping has its roots in the 19th century and in the phrase "to pull yourself up by your bootstraps."
In the 19th century, Connecticut was full of bootstrappers. I'm sitting not too far from where Charles Billings developed modern forge drop hammer -- whatever that is -- in the 1870s.
You know many of the other names. Linus Yale at his locks. Eli Terry and his clock teeth. Today's meet their 2011 counterparts.
Leave your comments below, e-mail colin@wnpr.org or Tweet us @wnprcolin.
***Today's episode was produced by Liz Walczok.***
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It's a great strategy. I
It's a great strategy. I recently moved in a new house and I am hoping that I take advantage of this law. I have to paint the walls and to put modern vanities in my bathroom, also to remodel the kitchen. With the renovation of the house I can fit the parameters of this "green-law".
Show Idea
As a small child, I remember playing this game where we’d try to figure out how soon our city would be struck and vaporized when the nuclear holocaust came. I don’t suppose kids still play that game (not so much a game as a children’s discussion). But CT was really ground zero for the Ruskies, at least we thought so. CT had Pratt and Whitney, Electric Boat, Sikorsky, Kaman Aerospace and a host of things we thought would be great targets. Anyhow, the show idea is "fear of nuclear war" and memories of it.
E-mail from Beth
Hi Colin - noticed that all your guests and most of your callers have been men - but I've always heard that women start their own businesses at higher rates. Wondered if you could ask your guests about women entrepreneurs and also wondered if you realized you had no female representatives for this show.
E-mail from Tanya
It IS amazing how much there is out there for FREE...I would suggest your public library! Here in Danbury we have a computer lab and have run a series of small business seminars.
E-mail from Tony
Great show! I firmly believe that start-ups can go a long way toward alleviating our unemployment problem.
I remember being out of work back in '96 and networking like crazy. I hooked up with a software guy I worked with at ITT in Shelton and got called in for an interview in . . . Science Park, New Haven!
As it turned out, I became the first paid employee of a network equipment start-up, which immediately moved to nicer digs in Wallingford and bloomed, to the point that we were bought (60 employees; $96M) by a California company the following year. Two years later, we joined the parent company in California. Two years later the parent was bought by another company!
The keys to our success were:
1. A great, smart team: an idea guy; a finance guy; a software guy; and a nuts-and-bolts engineering guy.
2. Hard work. Long days. Overnighters, when necessary.
3. 100% committment by everyone in the company. "I've got your back; you've got mine."
4. A flat organization structure. Anyone could walk into the President/CEO's office with an idea.
It was the best work experience of my life, although it only lasted seven years. Later, I joined another start-up and worked there for a year . . . for free! We couldn't get funding, so I went out and consulted. After a few years, I became an entrepreneur, myself, and started a successful handyman business.
Life is full of opportunities. You just have to root them out.
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