Arvind Rajan

Some great thoughts from my friend Neal Bloom🎩 about the critical importance of Founders in the starting and building of companies, and a startup ecosystem in a community. Sometimes we lose sight of this important fact. Service providers, non-profits, Angel investor, and venture capitalists are here to service the startup companies, and they are anchored by founders. He references a great book written by Brad Feld, “Startup Communities”. For those that don’t know, Brad is an entrepreneur, author, blogger, and venture capitalist at Foundry Group in Boulder, Colorado, a firm he started with partners Seth Levine, Ryan McIntyre, and Jason Mendelson. #sandiego #startups #venturecapital

5

1 Comment

If you’re building a health tech startup, here’s a useful perspective from the accelerator side. At ViVE, I spoke with Keith Camhi, Managing Director of the Techstars Healthcare Accelerator powered by Permanente Medicine Mid-Atlantic States. The program invests in early-stage startups and helps founders run pilots with physicians in the Kaiser Permanente ecosystem. Some interesting takeaways: • Techstars still prioritizes “Team, team, team” above everything else; • Founders in the program are interviewed by physicians before acceptance; • The goal isn’t just mentorship — it’s getting real pilots with providers; • AI startups dominate applications, but the focus remains on real clinical problems. Applications for the next cohort open soon, so founders may want to keep an eye on it. Short interview from #ViVE 👇 🎥 Watch here: https://lnkd.in/gNN_5628 #Vive2026 #digitalhealthinsideout #health2tech #digitalhealth

41

1 Comment

At HOMY Robotics , we’re building caregiving robots to help seniors age in place safely and independently in the comfort of their homes for as long as possible, while giving families support and peace of mind. We’re currently deploying in senior living communities across the Bay Area. If you have aging loved ones or are connected to senior living communities, please reach out at homyrobotics.ai. 🤖💙 Thank you, Adewale Yusuf , for featuring HOMY Robotics!

23

2 Comments

Random Sunday Thoughts #197: CEO edition 1. This week, I spoke with a Founder/CEO friend who runs one of the fastest growing companies in tech. We met when I oversaw the acquisition of his company's exact match .com domain. While I represented the seller, I worked with both sides to get to an outcome everyone was excited about. On our call, he emphatically said, "we were a very successful, profitable company before we acquired the domain, but within days of doing so, it became apparent to me that it is the arguably the most important strategic decision I have made since I founded the company over 4 years ago". He went on to recite the many reasons why, and most of all, he said his investors (tier 1 VCs) have applauded the decision (a mid 7 figure asset investment) more than anyone. It got me thinking... 2. Every scaling company eventually has the same conversation, usually in a board meeting, often later than they expected. It starts with a domain. Early on, nobody worries about it. There’s a workaround. A hyphen, an extra word like “join” or “hello" or "the", or god forbid a secondary TLD that seems serviceable as a compromise , at least for now.  At the start it works, as growth hides a lot of inefficiency. Then the company scales, and there’s real spending behind the brand. There are real enterprise decisions, customers, and investor conversations. This is when small things creep up and start getting expensive; traffic leaking to search and the exact match domain, branded keywords getting bid up, URLs that need explanation, and emails that go to the wrong place. Case studies show the costs massively exceed the cost of the exact match domain name asset. Users don’t remember modifiers, hyphens, and alternate extensions. They remember the brand, and they default to .com, which has been ingrained as part of the brand every single day across all mediums. A domain isn’t just a website. It is your brand, your signature, your email address. It’s spoken out loud. Every time someone asks “is there a dash in that"?, or "is that .io or .co", when they intuitively assume you mean and only hear .com”, creates friction, and friction compounds ,especially at scale. As Jeff Bezos says, "people default to .com because it's what they trust” and USV's Fred Wilson has noted, "every time you have to explain your domain, you're creating friction". 3. Last Saturday was the moving memorial service for Bobby Weir in SF. It was sad, inspirational, and touching. Highlights were Bob's daughter Chloe saying, "In 30 years, I hope a 60 year old says to a 20 year old, I saw them with Bobby",and John Mayer leading the crowd and family in a moving Ripple. John’s deference & appreciation for being chosen for Dead and Co is evident https://lnkd.in/eiSkxdxg 4. I had a blast on this week's Domain Sherpa. It was a pod worth watching, https://lnkd.in/ebTe6QGx 5. For all the category and exact match brand domains we own or rep, www.ATMHoldings.com Until Next Week #domainames

38

2 Comments

💰That thought that all funding is smashed and gone in these times? Read about LabStart's program and squash that misinformation. Funding, positivity, and progress are here- be part of it-jump in, cuz the water is warm (and needs conservation, but that's a different convo 💧😉 ) TL;DR: SNAPSHOT: LabStart empowers entrepreneurs—including first-time founders—to commercialize breakthrough climate technologies with: 💲 Up to $100K in funding for entrepreneurs 🚀 Access to frontier climate technologies 🔬 Expert mentorship and guidance 🌎 A community of climate innovators Applications close July 7, 2025. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/gSAg-KkU Tova Lobatz Kristy Drutman Jennifer Hanke Felix Antonio Padra Emily Alvarez Emily Chu Carolina Larrahona ImpactPHL Sustain SoCal Chloe Rowsell Rebecca Shirey Green Standards Waste Not Consulting Ashlee Baker, TRUE Advisor Tova Lobatz SOCAP Global The Ecology Center Jonathan Zaidman Eliza Baron Kriss Kokoefer Amit Sharma AQUATRAX USGBC California #ClimateInnovation #ClimateEntrepreneurship

3

1 Comment

Owning your narrative is leadership. Last week in San Francisco, we gathered with AAF SF Bay Area to talk about positioning in competitive markets. Three themes emerged: Be memorable. Be clear. Be consistent. The market doesn’t reward talent. It rewards clarity. Grateful to everyone who showed up thoughtfully. #personalbrand #careergrowth #leadership

13

I’m thrilled to officially announce our $3M seed investment in Propel People, a company we built inside the 1848 Ventures studio to tackle one of the biggest challenges facing the #construction industry today: the skilled #labor shortage. For small and medium-sized contractors, hiring isn't just a challenge. It's the number one threat to their growth, profitability, and safety. With 94% of contractors struggling to find qualified workers, it’s clear that traditional hiring methods aren't built for the trades. That’s why we built Propel People. It’s a mobile-first, AI-powered hiring platform designed for how construction actually works: in the field. By leveraging smart candidate ranking, instant #SMS-based screening, and a fully #bilingual interface, Propel helps contractors build great crews faster and more efficiently. I’m also thrilled to formally announce that industry veteran Dexter Bachelder is at the helm as CEO. Having worked with Dexter and the team over the last few months, we've already seen the impact of his leadership. His 25 years of experience scaling construction tech companies will be instrumental as Propel People enters this initial stage of growth. This investment reinforces our core thesis at 1848 Ventures: building AI-native companies that solve fundamental pain points for the #SMBs that form the backbone of our economy. A huge congratulations to Dexter and the entire Propel People team on this milestone. We are incredibly proud to partner with you to support the people who build our world. Read the full announcement below. #constructiontech #venturecapital #seedfunding #ai #skilledtrades #smb

144

14 Comments

Project Vend reads less like a capability story and more like a governability story. Phase two improved because institutional scaffolding (tools, procedures, role separation) reduced predictable judgment failures—persuasion, compliance blind spots, boundary confusion, values drift. The board-level question isn’t “can an agent run a business?” but “what governance primitives must exist before we delegate authority.” Until incentives, escalation rights, and refusal boundaries are structurally enforced—not merely prompted—agents remain high-performing managers, not autonomous executives.

6

1 Comment

Mid-sized teams can lead in partner innovation. One of the standout sessions for me at Catalyst Seattle 25 came from Rachael Travis and Mike Blumenstein. She shared how they built a points-based partner program that ties performance, capabilities, and commitment into one scalable system. What stood out was that Smartsheet isn’t a tech giant, yet they’ve rolled out a program that’s bold, structured, and revenue-driving. A real proof point that mid-sized companies can lead the way in partner innovation. This connects directly to one of the content pillars we’re highlighting at Catalyst Europe 25: Programs & Enablement. Kathie Osborne will also be speaking in London about her own approach to points-based programs. Expect more sessions like this, field-tested and built to scale. 23 October 2025 | Convene 133 Houndsditch, London, UK To register: link in comments

33

3 Comments