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North Carolina, at one point, had a large concentration of cellular technology companies. Some of that talent then came together around IoT, including Bob Witter, CEO of Device Solutions. He shared his journey with me in 2016.
Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of circumstances?
Bob Witter: I was born in Springville, New York. It’s in the western part of New York. I grew up in central New York. I went to school at State University of New York and graduated in 1981 with degrees in Computer Science and Mathematics. I started my career in Rochester with Eastman Kodak company in the medical products division that was brand new at that time. I learned a great deal about how to do medical products that has certainly served me well even today at Device Solutions.
Sramana Mitra: Could you double click down and explain with a bit more color and depth exactly what it was that you were doing at Retention.com, which had a different name at that time. Explain the workflow, the value proposition, and the complexity of it.
Adam Robinson: The value proposition was that we can identify 35% of your web traffic and give you email addresses of people that don’t fill out forms.
>>>Fred Luddy started ServiceNow, a Multi-Billion Dollar Unicorn, as a solo entrepreneur bootstrapping with a paycheck. Fred shares his early entrepreneurial journey in great depth here.
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NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) last week reported its second quarter results which beat all estimates. However, after three straight quarters of revenue growth above 200%, its growth of 122% seems a tad disappointing and its shares fell 8% in extended trading. This is a slight pullback after an astronomical rally following the AI boom. Its stock has zoomed over 750% since 2023 and 150% this year.
>>>Adam has bootstrapped his first company to exit, and before the acquisition, incubated his second one within it. He’s repeating the same incubation model by incubating a third company within his second one. Really cool strategy and a great interview.
>>>I’m publishing this series on LinkedIn called Colors to explore a topic that I care deeply about: the Renaissance Mind. I am just as passionate about entrepreneurship, technology, and business, as I am about art and culture. In this series, I will typically publish a piece of art – one of my paintings – and I request you to spend a minute or two deeply meditating on it. I urge you to watch your feelings, thoughts, reactions to the piece, and write what comes to you, what thoughts it triggers, in the dialog area. Let us see what stimulation this interaction yields. For today – The Long Road II
The Long Road II | Sramana Mitra, 2022 | Watercolor, Ink | 8 x 8, On Paper
Sramana Mitra: I’m going to conclude with some general questions about how you see the industry developing. How do you view General AI?
>>>I’m publishing this series on LinkedIn called Colors to explore a topic that I care deeply about: the Renaissance Mind. I am just as passionate about entrepreneurship, technology, and business, as I am about art and culture. In this series, I will typically publish a piece of art – one of my paintings – and I request you to spend a minute or two deeply meditating on it. I urge you to watch your feelings, thoughts, reactions to the piece, and write what comes to you, what thoughts it triggers, in the dialog area. Let us see what stimulation this interaction yields. For today – The Long Road I
The Long Road I | Sramana Mitra, 2022 | Watercolor, Ink | 8 x 8, On Paper