January Venture Breakfast: Stuart Jamieson, Slipstream January 9, 2009

Speaker: Stuart Jamieson, Slipstream

Startups: Choosing to build the company of your dreams…

Getting started as an entrepreneur - You made a New Year's resolution to finally start a business but are hitting roadblocks. How do you find the right service providers? How do you negotiate with them? When does it make sense to have them work for equity or deferred comp?

What You Will Learn: Companies start off as a reflection of the founder’s dreams. Whether they are audacious ventures with plans to change the world with ground breaking technology, or simpler lifestyle business’ with no boss but you, the drive to start down the entrepreneurial path is very personal. From day one, you will be faced with a myriad of options; from forming the founding team and raising seed money, to choosing attorneys and finding an office. As your company evolves you will face much bigger challenges that will test your resolve to the limit. How can you, as a founder, stay true to your dream and choose to follow a path to success as defined by you?

There is no ‘one size fits all’ approach for starting ventures. During this session we’ll discuss some of the key choices a startup CEO will face, and weigh the pros and cons of each. Ultimately your decisions will affect significant issues such as control, speed of growth, market success, level of risk and personal contentment.

About Stuart Jamieson, CEO Slipstream Design, CEO Cirrus BioSystems, CEO AquaStasis
Stuart Jamieson is CEO of three very different companies, all at very different stages of development, and all started with very different purposes. Stuart cut his teeth in the startup world as co-founder and CEO of AquaStasis. Within a two year period he learnt the harsh realities of raising angel money, discovered the unequal challenges that startups face when selling products, and found ultimate success by selling the company's award-winning continuous test strip technology to Virbac Corporation. Today his long term focus is as CEO of Slipstream Design, a product development firm, and new venture incubator. Here he actively seeks out new product ideas that Slipstream Design can help to launch as new ventures. Cirrus BioSystems is the result of one such opportunity. A joint venture started in 2007 between Preston Van Hooser (UW inventor), UW tech transfer and Slipstream Design, Cirrus BioSystems is an example of how a virtual company can make real products.

Official Website: http://www.nwen.org