From Croatia to Silicon Valley, Cleaning Up The Environment: Neno Duplan, CEO of Locus Tech (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: In 1997 you recognized the potential for the Internet to be the front end interface to large amounts of data. What was your next step?

Neno Duplan: That led to the beginning of Locus, which I founded in 1997. We had more domain expertise than anyone else in the world. I then set out to develop a web-based application which would organize all of the environmental data information that various companies had. That would allow client to manage, store and report through the website. We started that mission in 1997 and we are still on it.

Sramana Mitra: What were your first steps taken to launch Locus?

Neno Duplan: There was an interesting set of circumstances that helped launch the company. In order to start a new venture when you are happily employed can be tough. The company I was working at had just been acquired. I had gone through a few large acquisitions, and each time I went through one things got worse and worse. Promises are always made that things will be better and that you have the resources of a larger company with bigger market share. Nothing ever materialized in any of the scenarios I had been a part of. The company acquiring us was from southern California, and they wanted to move people around, consolidate teams, and a lot of other things. I had no intention of moving, so I felt it was the right time to start my own company.

I resigned and a few people who I had worked with came over to work for my new company. An interesting thing happened when several of my previous companies clients around the valley decided to continue working with my new company rather than the company that I had acquired. That provided us with instant funding.

Sramana Mitra: Were these clients whom you had been working with at your previous company?

Neno Duplan: Yes, I had known them for years. I had great relationships with them and at the end of the day that is key. I did not even tell those companies that I had started my own company. When they found out I had resigned they asked where I had gone. Those companies came and tracked me down as well as the people who came and worked for me.

At the same time I had gone to the Bank of America office in San Francisco and asked for money. I was so naïve at the time because I thought that was a way to get funding. I had perhaps the most impressive encounter of my life. I met the San Francisco branch manager a few months prior at a social event, and I asked him if I could come and talk to him. I told him my story and that I needed funding and believe it or not I got a $250,000 line of credit from Bank of America on a handshake. Things were different in 1997. They put a lien on my house, which was not a big deal for me because I owed more money on the house than what the lien covered. That was how I paid for salaries while I waited for clients to pay their bills.

This segment is part 3 in the series : From Croatia to Silicon Valley, Cleaning Up The Environment: Neno Duplan, CEO of Locus Tech
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