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<p class="source"><span>Courtesy of Forager</span></p><p class="caption">Some of Forager's leadership team in the company's Chicago office. From left to right, COO Jessie Essman, CEO Matt Silver, and CFO Jordan Salins.</p><ul class="summary-list"><li><strong>Freight-matching startup Forager, founded in late 2018, specializes in cross-border freight matching.</strong></li><li><strong>Forager has a new president - Marc Kiven, who cofounded the ad tech company Signal in 2009, joined the company last month.</strong></li><li><strong>Matt Silver, the CEO and cofounder of Forager, says the logistics newbie will bring "tech entrepreneur experience" to the startup. </strong></li><li><strong><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/?hprecirc-bullet">Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories</a>.</strong></li></ul><p>Freight-matching startups have been snagging top tech talent left and right.</p><p>The New York-based Flexport hired <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/transfix-trucking-vp-engineering-etsy-2019-2">a longtime Etsy VP</a> and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/transfix-leaders-explain-why-digital-freight-isnt-uber-for-trucking-2019-8">a 19-year veteran of Intel</a> this year. Convoy, which raised $400 million in fresh funding <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/trucking-convoy-fund-raise-startup-founder-interview-2019-11">last month</a>, <a href="https://www.geekwire.com/2019/convoy-hires-vp-revenue-marketing-doubles-workforce-750-bid-transform-trucking/">snagged</a> the PayScale chief sales officer and a general marketing manager at Amazon Web Services. Convoy itself was founded by two former Amazon execs.</p><p>And just last week, Uber Freight appointed Yelp veteran Raj Subbiah as its head of product. </p><p>Now, the Chicago-based Forager has a new techie leading its team: Marc Kiven, most recently the cofounder and CEO of ad tech company Signal in 2009. Meeting the team at Forager this year while exploring advisory and board membership roles sparked his interest in the world of logistics. </p><p>"I was really very intrigued by what they were doing and what was going on in the logistics space," Kiven, who was in the ad tech space beginning in 1998, told Business Insider. "It quite honestly reminded me of the digital advertising space 20 years ago - a huge fragmented industry ripe for the implementation of advanced and sophisticated technologies."</p><p class="source"><span>Courtesy of Marc Kiven</span></p><p class="caption">Marc Kiven, president of Forager</p><p>Forager is in its early days, founded just over a year ago. It holds $4.8 million in seed funding raised in July 2019. The company sets itself apart from other freight-matching startups with a specialization in cross-border freight, allowing shippers to move goods between the US, Canada, and Mexico.</p><p>In October, Forager launched Scout - a platform that allows shippers to see pricing, instantly book, and then track those loads as they move across North America.</p><p>Hiring Kiven to Forager, despite his lack of logistics experience, solidifies the startup as a tech company, rather than just another brokerage, CEO and cofounder Matt Silver said. </p><p>"I think it provides the exact perfect balance between the tribal knowledge and a tech entrepreneur executive experience that Mark has really made an insanely strong leadership team as we assessed the vision for the next five years."</p><h2>Read more about Silver's vision for Forager here.</h2>            <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-cybertruck-compare-against-rivian-r1t-amazon-ford-electric-truck-2019-11">How Tesla's Cybertruck stacks up against the Amazon-backed Rivian R1T electric truck</a></h3>

Buzzy freight-matching startup Forager nabs Chicago serial ad tech entrepreneur as president

<br />
<em>The U</em><em>S is still stuck in a fiscal deadlock and no one is sure how it will end. However, <keyword id="2540" type="POSITION" weightage="100" keywordseo="President">President</keyword> <keyword id="16284" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Obama">Obama</keyword> and House Republicans are in talks, an initial step that may prepare the path to end the standoff. Meanwhile, we bring you the last interaction of the Quick Chat series that featured the views and insights of entrepreneurs and start-up specialists. Today’s chat is with <keyword id="104932" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Krishna-Kumar">Krishna Kumar</keyword>, the founder and CEO of <keyword id="1309724" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Simplilearn">Simplilearn</keyword>, an Indian start-up gone global.</em><br />
<br /> Here is one start-up that started as a blog, teaching people online for free. But in about 4 years, Bangalore-headquartered Simplilearn has become one of the biggest global players, offering 80-plus online certification courses across 11 categories and training 4,000 young professionals a month. The company was set up by former Infosys <keyword id="1899622" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="techie-and-serial-entrepreneur">techie and serial entrepreneur</keyword> Krishna Kumar (he had earlier co-founded <keyword id="1899623" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Tech-Unified">Tech Unified</keyword>, which was acquired by a public listed company) back in 2009 and within 1 year, it was earning $100,000 a month. Simplilearn has also raised $10 million in a recent Series B <keyword id="6357455" type="EVENT" weightage="80" keywordseo="Funding">funding</keyword> from <keyword id="309606" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Helion-Venture-Partners">Helion Venture Partners</keyword> and existing investor <keyword id="1397792" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Kalaari-Capital">Kalaari Capital</keyword> (former <keyword id="677853" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="IndoUS-Venture-Partners">IndoUS Venture Partners</keyword>).<br />
<br /> The US operations of this start-up happen to be huge – around 70% of its revenues come from the <keyword id="6356955" type="COUNTRY" weightage="100" keywordseo="united-states">United States</keyword>, with 15% from India and the remaining from Europe and Australia. So how does Kumar view the ongoing <keyword id="613228" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="US-shutdown">US shutdown</keyword> from the perspective of an Indian start-up?<br />
<br />
There’s no immediate threat, he feels, but it will definitely affect the business in case there is a spending cut on training. But the shutdown also proves that policy paralysis can happen anywhere in the world and there is a chance now that the home turf would get more VC traction if the impasse continues. Here are the excerpts from our chat.<br />
<br />
<strong>How will this current shutdown affect <keyword id="770060" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Indian-start-ups">Indian start-ups</keyword>?</strong><br />
 Currently, the situation seems temporary and for this reason, we have not seen any impact. However, if the situation escalates and the shutdown is prolonged, we will definitely see effects. Once a negative sentiment settles in, there can be massive consequences.<br />
<br />
<strong>Will it hit your specific niche?</strong><br />
We are an individual re-skilling business that provides certification training courses to professionals. Because it’s a consumer product focused on training, the shutdown has the potential to affect us if the country reduces its spending on training.<br />
<br />
<strong>Will this have a long-term impact on seed-stage or early-stage funding?</strong><br />
In my opinion, I can’t relate the shutdown to funding. Funding is a long-drawn process. Generally, cross-border funding takes places at the early stage of funding, not during the seed stage. So if there is any impact, it will be in the early stages.<br />
<br />
<strong>What about VC sentiment? Does the current situation mean investors will turn to emerging markets again?</strong><br />
Yes, I think this is possible. The shutdown is a true testament to the fact that policy paralysis not only happens in India, but in the US as well. The longer it goes on, the greater the chance of VCs looking to India and other emerging markets.<br />
<br />
<strong>Do you think Indian <keyword id="428085" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="start-ups">start-ups</keyword> would now think twice before entering the US market?</strong><br />
When you have a start-up, you do everything you can to survive. Frankly, as long as there are buyers in the US, start-ups will continue to focus their efforts on the US. Moreover, I think such factors impact larger organisations much more, rather than start-ups. In my opinion, private companies (start-ups) will not feel the heat as much.<br />

<b>Indian
Start-ups Won’t Stop Targeting U.S. Market: Simplilearn CEO Krishna Kumar </b>

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Kate Dutton/GBx</span></p><p class="caption">GBx members on a recent cycle ride. That's RocketSpace's Josif Grace, Emergent Technologies' James Cole, the British Consulate's Andrew Whittaker, Duncan logan (also from RocketSpace), Casual Films' Nick Francis, Social Standards' Mark Charkin, EQT Ventures' Alastair Mitchell, and AppWise's Julian Gay.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>GBx is an exclusive group of British entrepreneurs and investors in Silicon Valley.</strong></li><li><strong>Founded a little under two years ago by British expats and the UK Consulate, it's a way for British techies to meet up and talk about industry issues - and "salt and vinegar crisps."</strong></li><li><strong>Membership of the 250-member non-profit organisation starts at $150 a year, and is restricted to founders, investors, and senior executives.</strong></li><li><strong>It hosts private tech industry events and helps support British entrepreneurs moving to America - as well as more casual get-togethers like curry clubs and cycle rides.</strong></li></ul><p><br />SAN FRANCISCO - About two years ago, Pete Flint had some time on his hands.</p><p>The British entrepreneur and California Bay Area resident had led a merger between Trulia, an online real estate platform he had founded a decade before, and rival Zillow, in a deal that valued his business at $3.5 billion. "I was freed up from a big operational role, and I started to kind of think about different ecosystems within Silicon Valley," he said.</p><p>The American tech industry is dotted with groups catering towards expats of varying nationalities - the Canadians have C100, Israel has IEFF, and so on. And while Flint had been meeting up with other British entrepreneurs and founders to "talk about the trials and tribulations of being a startup founder" in a pseudo-support group as long as he'd been in the Bay Area, there was no dedicated organisation catering towards the needs of Brits living and working in the tech industry, he noticed.</p><p>Flint wasn't the only Brit in the Bay Area to feel that way. A group of British techies and the British Consulate in San Francisco subsequently determined to do something about this - and in June 2016, GBx was born.</p><h2>A 250-strong group of entrepreneurs, investors, and tech executives</h2><p>GBx, at its simplest, is an exclusive group of British entrepreneurs and tech workers living in Silicon Valley.</p><p>The group has three key roles: It's a community for Brits in the Bay Area, where they can get advice and support from their peers. It's an existing network for British entrepreneurs moving to America, so they don't have to start from scratch. And it's a space for discussing policy issues with the aim of informing British government policy.</p><p>Its growth in its first two years highlights how, even as the British tech scene flourishes domestically, its expatriate citizens are also becoming ever-more present in Silicon Valley. Business Insider spoke to key figures within the organisation to learn about its history, and what it's trying to achieve.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Evie Griffin/London &amp; Partners</span></p><p class="caption">Members of GBx's female founders group. Executive director Kate Dutton is in the centre, wearing the white shirt and black jacket.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Members of GBx range from entrepreneurs to investors to senior employees at big American tech giants. There's Flint, who serves as one of GBx's two co-chairs, is a managing partner of<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/pete-flint-trulia-nfx-vc-firm-150-million-early-stage-startup-fund-2017-11"> early stage venture capital firm NFX</a>. And there's Michael Birch, cofounder of defunct social networking site Bebo who now an angel investor and philanthropist - and founded popular San Francisco <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/take-a-look-inside-the-battery-2018-1">venture capital haunt The Battery.</a></p><p>Other members of the organisation's board include Julian Green, a product manager at Google-linked moonshot factory X; Jaclyn Mason, the British consulate's head of trade and investment; Janice Roberts, GBx's other co-chair and partner at Benhamou Global Ventures; Andy McLoughlin, a partner at SoftTech VC and cofounder of SaaS company Huddle; and Kate Dutton, GBx's executive director. </p><p>It's an experienced group, and kept exclusive by design - there are currently only 250 members, with membership largely limited to entrepreneurs, senior executives, and investors. You're not going to bump into many mid-level sales people or marketing managers at its events.</p><p>"When a community gets too big you don't re-encounter the same people again [at events]," Michael Birch said - making it it difficult to build relationships. "There is value is keeping it focused on people who have something in common."</p><p>Flint added: "We think it's just really important to be highly curated, high quality, and we're really designed for c-level executives or founders. Not to try and make it exclusive ... it's really just trying to solve this specific issue for Bay Area entrepreneurs and executives."</p><h2>The British connection</h2><p>In December 2017, GBx members and their families were treated to a private showing of "Star Wars: The Last Jedi" at the cinema at Lucasfilm's headquarters in San Francisco. (Business Insider attended and can confirm it was excellent, <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/12/18/16791844/star-wars-last-jedi-backlash-controversy">despite what the haters say</a>.)</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Rob Price/Business Insider</span></p><p class="caption">The Yoda fountain outside Lucasfilm's offices in San Francisco.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The organisation isn't just British techies sharing lessons about the venture capital ecosystem - there's a social aspect to it, its members held together by a shared cultural experience as they navigate a foreign land. It's "always fun for Brits to get together, talk about the Queen," Michael Birch joked.</p><p>Birch, along with his wife and serial cofounder Xochi Birch, have hosted brunch at their San Francisco home. Members have gone on a group bike ride. It's got a curry club. And there's a glitzy annual members' gala which debuted in 2017 -  "a real coming of age moment" for GBx, said British Consul General Andrew Whittaker.</p><p>Of course, there's the more serious business too. It throws member events, from panels on industry subjects like healthtech and  talent, to meetings with British government officials like London's chief digital officer.</p><p>What members get out of GBx - and what they put in - varies wildly from member to member. For a startup founder new to the US, it's an opportunity to learn from people who've done it all before. Birch, meanwhile, has lessons to share about growth marketing. Flint has direct experience of building billion-dollar companies on two continents. And for Whittaker, it's less about sharing lessons as it is about listening to members' inputs and using it to try and inform UK government policy. </p><p>It fulfills a similar function to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-london-tech-scene-retreat/">the "ICE list," an exclusive UK-based tech network of entrepreneurs and investors</a> that hosts events ranging from focused panels to ski trips in Europe (though GBx hasn't considered residential trips for its members just yet).</p><p>After kicking off in 2016, it formalised its activities in early 2017, with Kate Dutton coming on board as executive director in March, and then it incorporated as a non-profit organisation in April. <a href="https://gbxglobal.org/?page_id=362">Members' fees range from</a> $150 a year for the lowest tier to $1,000 to be an "inspire" member, with perks like unlimited event access, guest passes, and sponsorship opportunities.</p><p>So what's the appeal of having a British-focused group? Why not stick to existing, non-regional tech networks? "I think there are definitely elements of British culture ... recognising when you talk about, I don't know, salt and vinegar crisps, or the things people can relate to very quickly," Whittaker said. "There's also the bit about being a Brit in the US - it is a foreign country, and people sometimes miss that."</p><p>"We're not trying to be patriotic, or live a British lifestyle, quite the opposite," Flint said. "You become fast friends because you have a similar background, and Silicon Valley is inherently a place where people are very generous with their ideas and their time."</p>     <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/prevent-stop-robocallers-spam-calls-2018-5">How to stop robocallers</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

Her Majesty's Techies: Inside GBx, the exclusive Silicon Valley club full of British techies that have created billion dollar companies

Tech cofounders to me are people who are madly Techies and bravely <keyword id="53533" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="entrepreneurs">Entrepreneurs</keyword>. A scarce breed that we call <keyword id="1868938" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Technopreneurs">Technopreneurs</keyword>. My work as the CEO of Ambab/Pretr and over a decade in Consumer Internet is constantly revolving around such techies and helping such extraordinarily smart and creative people reach their full potential as creators, builders and engineers.<br />
<br />
While Knowledge, Skills, Technology, Process, Management, Communication, Planning<strong>, </strong>Hands-on Coding and Recruiting capabilities are given - there are 4 important things that I look in a techie before qualifying him/her as a tech cofounder.<br />
<br />
<strong>The <u>first thing</u> that I look for in a <keyword id="3390499" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="tech-co-founder">Tech co-founder</keyword> is his/her Hunger</strong><br />
<br />
It’s an awkward truth about a successful Technopreneurs — in the deepest levels of their psyche (often hidden to their self), they have a <strong>hunger</strong> that they can’t control. This hunger goes by many names — anxiety, learning, ambition, competitive drive, and the will to win. You can’t teach Technopreneurs to be hungry! No matter how brilliant a product team is, if Tech lead of that team doesn’t carry this hunger, the chances of success of that project can go from low to infinitesimal. Technopreneurs who learn to bank and control this hunger fire are among the most productive and effective Tech co-founders in the world.<br />
<br />
The <strong><u>second most important factor</u></strong> that I see in Technopreneurs is their <strong>Intellectual Agility.</strong><br />
<br />
Tech cofounders basically should be like sponge. You can’t be a good Tech Cofounder if you aren’t restlessly curious about business, ideas, people, technology and challenges— constantly remixing those ingredients in your head to find new and better ways of doing things.<br />
<br /> Because Technopreneurs are so intellectually agile, they can learn almost anything if exposed to the right vectors, whether its high-performing peers, experienced mentors, academic environment, direct trial-and-error or <keyword id="6355629" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Google">Google</keyword>! So next time when you hire a Techie, Hire him for his <strong>Intellectual Agility</strong> to do things and to do them better and faster every time.<br />
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<strong><u>The third</u></strong> and probably most important factor that I see in a tech co-founder is the <strong>ability to Integrate Fearlessly</strong>.<br />
<br />
He or She must boldly integrate with vision, with business and with teams. The tech co-founder needs to be a commanding officer of the troop and probably the only teammate who can tell you its possible every time you hit the impossibilities. Very commonly we hear this and probably true in Indian context where CEO says that we failed because of our technology or our ability to adopt technology was not good. But at the core of it is integration inertia that tech leads create. These inertias are created primarily when your tech co-founder starts keeping personal interest over company’s interest. Tech leads tend to take easy decisions. They tend to be followers over innovators. They want to use proven over experimental. The want to be defensive over aggressive. They fear to fail. They fear to be responsible. They paralyze businesses by limiting businesscgrowth to IT capabilities instead of building innovative capabilities to address business challenges. This is the breed, which is in abundance today! My advice to you is to beware of them. DO NOT- I repeat DO NOT hire someone as your Tech co-founder if they tend to play safe.<br />
<br />
Their ability to learn, invent, implement and reinvent fearlessly and fiercely is the key to a successful Products and Businesses.<br />
<br />
And the <strong><u>final quality</u></strong> and the must have one is their <strong>Ability to Sell</strong>.<br />
<br />
I am serious, their ability to Sell! While interviewing your Tech co-founder just ask him one question “Explain me one complex thing that you believe you don’t know” and if he starts explaining you some complex mathematical theorems that you have no interest in - Reject him! Ability of techie to simplify the most complex challenges so that it becomes seamless, interesting, and sellable is the most important thing. When you are running a Tech Startup, your Tech Lead is the most important selling factor both internally and externally. He is the face to you internal teams. He is the one who is driving, building, selling and simplifying your visions with your tech teams day in and day out. He is the one who is constantly facing the heat of your stake holders for manifesting your business into reality. If he can’t sell, he can’t simplify, if he can’t simplify, he can’t build.<br />
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Tech Cofounders are Rock Stars! They aren’t born but made; first by the hurt the world gives them and then by their lifelong fight to forge that hurt into something beautiful and strong.<br />
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If you are Techie out there just brace yourself to be one Heluva Technopreneur. Find one Cofounder, Identify real problem and be brave to build and build it big. If you are Entrepreneur out there building a dream team for your Tech Startup do not compromise on your Tech co-founder.He is, will be the only reason for your failure if not success.<br />
<br />
<em>(The article has been written by <strong>Mr. Bhavik Jhaveri, Founder- Ambab &amp; Pretr. </strong>He is a serial technopreneur and an emerging market observer. Bhavik has successfully founded and built some of the leading ventures in e-commerce, consumer internet and digital media space across India and global Markets. He is committed to build start up ecosystem in the country.)</em>

How to Find the Perfect Tech Co-Founder for your Tech-Start Up?

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="AP/Ed Ou" title_caption="Success is not raising money. Success is building a great company. " class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54f4bd65ecad04e06c7c881d-960/office-lunch-break.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>AP/Ed Ou</span></p><p class="caption">Success is not raising money. Success is building a great company. </p></div><p></p></div></div>These are the top ten mistakes that entrepreneurs make, compiled in one list to help you avoid as many as possible.</p><p>If nothing else, please try to make new mistakes.</p><h3><strong>1. Mistake: Multiply big numbers by 1%.</strong></h3><p>Entrepreneurs love to take an enormous potential market (such as the Internet-security market), calculate that even a 1% market share will be huge and easy to attain, and then imagine the revenues they'll achieve.</p><p><em>Fix: Calculate from the bottom up. Do a bottom-up calculation instead. You'll see how hard it is to attain even a 1% market share when you start from zero. Once you ship, you'll learn that your first-year results are closer to zero dollars than even 1% of the huge number.</em></p><h3><strong>2. Mistake: Scale too fast.</strong></h3><p>A consequence of multiplying a big number by 1% is concluding that you need to scale your infrastructure and head count for huge, inevitable, impending success.</p><p>So you increase your burn rate, which uses up your capital, which eventually gets you fired.</p><p><em>Fix: Eat what you kill. Take the risk of foregoing sales and jeopardizing your service reputation by not scaling until sales are in hand. I've never seen a company fail because it couldn't scale fast enough, and I've never seen a company ship on time. You may be the first, but the trend is not your friend.</em></p><h3><strong>3. Mistake: Form partnerships</strong></h3><p>Entrepreneurs love to use the P word-"partnership" especially when they can't use the S word-"sales." Unless a partnership enables you to alter your spreadsheet, it's bullshiitake. Most partnerships are a PR exercise and a waste of time.</p><p><em>Fix: Focus on sales. Instead of spinning your wheels with partnerships, focus on sales. Tattoo this on your forearm: "Sales fix everything." If a picture is worth a thousand words, a sale is worth a thousand partnerships. The longest you can stall using the P word is six to twelve months. Then you'll hear the F word: "fired."</em></p><h3><strong>4. Mistake: Focus on fund-raising.</strong></h3><p>Success is not raising money. Success is building a great company. Many entrepreneurs forget that fund-raising is a means to an end, not the end, so they spend weeks working on their pitch and business plan and getting in front of any investor with a heartbeat.</p><p><em>Fix: Focus on prototyping. Building a prototype is the most important goal in the early days of your startup. A prototype enables you to get real-world feedback and, heaven forbid, sales. Bootstrap, borrow, and crowdfund what you need to survive, and pour your energy into building a product.</em></p><h3><strong>5. Mistake: Use too many slides.</strong></h3><p>When you do have to pitch, don't use fifty to sixty slides. I know that you know in principle that less is more, but you will be tempted to think you are the exception to this rule. You are not. If you need fifty slides to pitch your idea, your idea is flawed.</p><p><em>Fix: Obey the 10/20/30 Rule. The optimal number of slides is ten. You should be able to give your presentation in twenty minutes. The ideal font size is thirty points. Even better, try to get away from slides and do a demo . . . which is another reason you need a prototype.</em></p><h3><strong>6. Mistake: Proceed serially.</strong></h3><p>Entrepreneurs try to do things in a serial manner: raise money, then hire people, then create a product, then close deals, then raise more money. They want to do one thing at a time and do it well. This is not how startups work.</p><p><em>Fix: Proceed in parallel. Life for entrepreneurs is a parallel existence. Get used to it, understand it, and live it. You need to do many things at once, and good enough is good enough. You don't have enough time to do things one at a time.</em></p><h3><strong>7. Mistake: Retain mathematical control.</strong></h3><p>Founders love to retain control, so they try to maximize valuation and sell as little stock as possible. They think that as long as they control at least 51% of the votes, they run the company.</p><p><em>Fix: Make a bigger pie. The way to make money is to increase the size of the pie, not to hold on to as much of the  pie as possible. It's better to own .01% of Google than 51% of a piece of Mediocre Technology, Inc. And control is an illusion-the moment you take outside money, you are working for the investors.</em></p><h3><strong>8. Mistake: Use patents for defensibility.</strong></h3><p>Entrepreneurs read stories about how patent infringers lose multimillion-dollar lawsuits, and they think that this means patents can protect their intellectual property. This is like reading that a burglar was arrested and therefore you don't need to lock your door.</p><p><em>Fix: Use success for defensibility. Patent protection is a game for big companies with lots of lawyers and money. Does that sound like your startup? The only thing that makes a startup defensible is that it's growing, succeeding, and sucking the oxygen out of the market. You won't have the time or money to out-litigate anyone who's worth suing.</em></p><h3><strong>9. Mistake: Hire in your image.</strong></h3><p>Many entrepreneurs hire employees who match the rest of the company. Engineers hire engineers. MBAs hire MBAs. Men hire men. Fitting in is one thing, but this is going too far when everyone is young or male or techie or anything, really.</p><p>Fix: hire to complement. A startup needs a variety of skills, perspectives, and backgrounds to succeed. Rather than hiring mirror images, you should hire people who complement one another. The two most important complementary skills are making and selling, so cover these two bases right away.</p><h3><strong>10. Mistake: Befriend your investors.</strong></h3><p>During the honeymoon period, which is the ninety-day period after your first missed ship date, you may have an insane desire to befriend your investors. This is because you and your investors are simpatico, and they will never fire you because they invested in the startup because of you. Hello, Tooth Fairy. . . .</p><p><em>Fix: Exceed expectations. If you want intimate relationships, use Tinder or eHarmony on the weekends. Your job is to raise money from investors, use it wisely, and then return ten times more than they invested. It doesn't matter if you end up hating one another as long as you meet your deadlines and exceed sales projections. </em></p><p><em>Excerpted from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1591847842/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=1591847842&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=RWTRX55BFYIGQ4K5">The Art of The Start 2.0: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything</a> by Guy Kawasaki, in agreement with Portfolio, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Copyright © Guy Kawasaki, 2004, 2015.</em></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/why-you-should-forget-setting-goals-2014-11">Forget Setting Goals - Focus On This Instead</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="c4b2x5cTr1Ry0mcI_1xnuHdY5MG0UcHh" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

10 mistakes every entrepreneur needs to stop making

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><ul><li><strong>There's a vending machine at San Francisco's airport that dispenses vests.</strong></li><li><strong>The practical outerwear is favored among Bay Area venture capital investors.</strong></li><li><strong>A spokesperson for San Francisco International Airport told Business Insider that the vest vending machine averages $10,000 in sales a month.</strong></li></ul><p>&#xa0;</p><p>San Francisco's airport has a <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/san-francisco-airport-vest-vending-machine-2018-7">vending machine that dispenses vests</a> - the unofficial uniform for venture capital investors - and Twitter has been poking fun all week.</p><p>But a spokesperson for the airport tells us that the machine's sales figures are no joke.</p><p>The Uniqlo-branded vending machine earns $10,000 a month on average, according to Doug Yakel, a public information officer for San Francisco International Airport.</p><p>At nearly $50 a pop, that means the vending machine sells about 200 vests per month.</p><p>It's one of the highest-earning vending machines that its leasing tenant - a third-party company that also sells electronics and other consumer goods out of vending machines - operates at the airport, according to Yakel. It's unclear what cut SFO and Uniqlo take.</p><p><span>"This is the first time we've had clothing available for sale from a vending machine, which we thought was very unique," Yakel told Business Insider.</span></p><p>Japanese retailer<span> </span><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uniqlo-adds-vending-machines-airports-malls-2017-8">Uniqlo started selling clothes out of vending machines<span> </span></a>in airports and malls across the US last year. At the time, these so-called "Uniqlo To Go" machines stocked two of the most popular items from the brand's "LifeWear" collection: a thermal heat-tech T-shirt ($14.90) and a lightweight down jacket ($69.90) in an array of colors.</p><p>It appears Uniqlo added down vests for the tech set at San Francisco's airport. The<span> </span><a href="https://www.uniqlo.com/us/en/men-ultra-light-down-vest-400502COL33SMA002000.html?s=shopping&amp;gclid=CjwKCAjw4uXaBRAcEiwAuAUz8A2CVS7nNyQpi6hnTgq0wLAoaDlsxj_vHrrXAO_jN181RwKeEJ-JmxoCzbcQAvD_BwE">Men's Ultra Light Down Vest<span> </span></a>typically retails for $49.90 online and in the vending machine.</p><p>"SFO has a down vest vending machine for visiting VCs," said <a href="https://twitter.com/frankba">Frank Barbieri,</a> a serial entrepreneur, in a now-viral tweet that included a photo of the vending machine.</p><div id="embed-445559" class="twitter" data-type="embed" data-embed-type="twitter" data-postload="        &lt;blockquote class=&quot;twitter-tweet blockquote&quot; data-lang=&quot;en&quot; data-cards=&quot;&quot; data-conversation=&quot;&quot;>                    -Frank Barbieri  (@frankba) &lt;a href=&quot;https://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1020687562317258752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&quot;>July 21, 2018&lt;/a>&lt;/blockquote>&lt;script async src=&quot;//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js&quot; charset=&quot;utf-8&quot;>&lt;/script>    " data-e2e-name="embed-container" data-media-container="embed" style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 20px 0px;"><div data-twitter-event-id="0"><div data-click-to-open-target="https://twitter.com/frankba/status/1020687562317258752" data-iframe-title="Twitter Tweet" data-dt-full="%{hours12}:%{minutes} %{amPm} - %{day} %{month} %{year}" data-dt-explicit-timestamp="8:10 AM - Jul 21, 2018" data-dt-months="JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec" data-dt-am="AM" data-dt-pm="PM" data-dt-now="now" data-dt-s="s" data-dt-m="m" data-dt-h="h" data-dt-second="second" data-dt-seconds="seconds" data-dt-minute="minute" data-dt-minutes="minutes" data-dt-hour="hour" data-dt-hours="hours" data-dt-abbr="%{number}%{symbol}" data-dt-short="%{day} %{month}" data-dt-long="%{day} %{month} %{year}" data-scribe="page:tweet" data-tweet-id="1020687562317258752" id="twitter-widget-0" lang="en" data-twitter-event-id="1"><article dir="ltr" data-scribe="component:card"><div data-style="max-width: 1200px"><div data-style="padding-bottom: 75.0000%"><div></div></div></div></article></div></div></div><p><span>Venture capitalists can be seen sporting the practical outerwear wherever techies gather, from Blue Bottle Coffee shops to the Battery to the VC offices on Sand Hill Road.</span></p><p><span>San Francisco has chilly summers, with temperatures hovering between the mid-50s and high-60s.&#xa0;As investors travel across the Bay Area, meeting with entrepreneurs, sitting in on board meetings, and negotiating deals in eternal-spring weather, it helps to zip up.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/sneakers-worn-top-silicon-valley-tech-ceo-lanvin-nike-tim-cook-mark-zuckerberg-2017-5">Silicon Valley's ultimate status symbol is the sneaker - here are the rare, expensive, and goofy sneakers worn by the top tech CEOs</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div></hr>

The vest vending machine at San Francisco's airport is getting mocked, but it rings up $10,000 in sales every month

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><ul><li><strong>The vest is the most quintessentially-VC item in a tech investor's wardrobe.</strong></li><li><strong>San Francisco International Airport is showing it's on trend with a Uniqlo vending machine that dispenses down vests, possibly for "visiting VCs."</strong></li><li><strong>We rounded up the best tweets about the vest vending machine at SFO.</strong></li></ul><p>&#xa0;</p><p>San Francisco has reached peak San Francisco with the addition of a vending machine that dispenses down vests at the city's airport, and Twitter is having a field day.</p><p>"SFO has a down vest vending machine for visiting VCs," <a href="https://twitter.com/frankba">Frank Barbieri</a>, a serial entrepreneur, said in a tweet that included a photo of the now infamous machine.</p><p>The vest has become the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-investors-love-fleece-vests-2016-10">unofficial uniform for Silicon Valley investors</a>. Venture capitalists can be seen sporting the practical outerwear wherever techies gather, from Blue Bottle Coffee shops to the Battery to the VC offices on Sand Hill Road.</p><p>Japanese retailer <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/uniqlo-adds-vending-machines-airports-malls-2017-8">Uniqlo started selling clothes out of vending machines</a> in airports and malls across the US last year. At the time, these so-called "Uniqlo To Go" machines stocked two of the most popular items from the brand's "LifeWear" collection: a thermal heat-tech T-shirt ($14.90) and a lightweight down jacket ($69.90) in an array of colors.</p><p>It appears Uniqlo has added down vests for the tech set at San Francisco International Airport. The <a href="https://www.uniqlo.com/us/en/men-ultra-light-down-vest-400502COL33SMA002000.html?s=shopping&amp;gclid=CjwKCAjw4uXaBRAcEiwAuAUz8A2CVS7nNyQpi6hnTgq0wLAoaDlsxj_vHrrXAO_jN181RwKeEJ-JmxoCzbcQAvD_BwE">Men's Ultra Light Down Vest</a>&#xa0;typically retails for $49.90 online.</p><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>Twitter has been roasting San Francisco all week long, and it's brutally funny.</p><h2>Here are the best reactions:</h2><p>We asked San Francisco International Airport and Uniqlo how sales at this particular machine have been, but they did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</p><div></div><div></div><div></div><div></div><div></div><div></div><div></div>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-model-x-america-electric-car-road-trip-elon-musk-2017-6">We drove a brand-new Tesla Model X from San Francisco to New York - here's what happened</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div></hr>

Twitter is roasting San Francisco for having a down vest vending machine at its airport, and it's brutally funny

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/candiedwomanire/7670784052/in/photolist-cFQLRs-51BueX-51BF1x-41HUR-iwXLzR-2dj4MY-4tUKD-2deuig-42Lphu-2dj8d9-42G9hp-2dj1pj-41JhX-vi38V-5g3P2N-2SwvL-5g3RHy-jKtQHa-5jBvC-jKbEjY-5g3M2G-jKxftb-saDbf-f21fCD-fDXLbA-fDXJRN-fDF9jt-eV6ZHx-fDJRpV-nfn9N8-pwpxXX-oRMVRG-41Hne-42JAdD-EMWXnp-jDZ2bx-jG5Tbi-5xouJ-pwcmcB-2SyCy-jKqDsQ-49pUJF-5AFFKi-2Sxkd-41DQM-pwfkXo-jKvjqU-fDXKL7-fDF8E8-nfmArq">Dawn Endico/Flickr</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>Andrew Ng is one of the world's most respected artificial intelligence researchers and executives.</strong></li><li><strong>He has a new $175 million fund backed by Silicon Valley's biggest names to invest in AI businesses. </strong></li><li><strong>He calls AI the "new electricity."</strong></li></ul><p>Andrew Ng may not be a household name like other tech entrepreneurs, but he's very in-demand among techies both in Silicon Valley and in China. </p><p>Ng is one of the top experts in machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies in the world - he's taught at Stanford, worked at Google, and most recently was the chief scientist at Chinese tech giant Baidu. People legitimately call him a genius.</p><p>Now he's got a huge pile of money to invest in companies working in AI, which he calls the "new electricity."</p><p>His fund, "AI Fund," announced on Monday that it's raised $175 million from some of Silicon Valley's biggest investors, including Sequoia, Greylock Partners, Softbank Group, and NEA. Ng will be the fund's general partner.</p><p>What he's going to do with that money is found and build new artificial intelligence businesses in-house. In a blog post, Ng wrote that his fund is already "pursuing three new AI-powered directions," and part of his plan seems to make funds available to researchers so they can keep what they're working on secret for longer. </p><p>"As such projects mature and turn into businesses, the AI Fund will provide additional capital to these teams and thereby give them the ability to move quickly, and not be distracted by months of fundraising," Ng wrote. "It also allows them to publicize their work only when they are ready."</p><p>The first public investment Ng's fund has made is Landing.AI, a nascent company founded by Ng that uses machine learning algorithms to improve manufacturing quality. </p><p>In addition to spending money on AI companies, Ng also says that he will "invest heavily" in global training programs, and he calls it a "urgent societal problem" that lots of people could lose their jobs because of the rise of automated technologies.</p><p>"I want to make sure every person can gain the skills needed to thrive in the AI economy, and every person has a shot at meaningful work," he wrote. </p><h2 style="padding-left: 30px;">Read the entire blog post below: </h2><p style="padding-left: 30px;">Dear friends,</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">I am excited to announce the formation of the AI Fund. We have raised $175 million, and will be sequentially initiating new businesses that use AI to improve human life. As we grow these businesses, we also hope to help many of you enter the field of AI, and do the important work of building an AI-powered society.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">We are grateful to our investors, including NEA, Sequoia, Greylock Partners, and the SoftBank<br />Group, for supporting us.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">In the early days of electricity, much of the innovation centered around slightly different improvements of lighting. While this was an important debate, the really transformative applications, in which electric power spurred massive redesigns in multiple industries, took longer to be grasped. AI is the new electricity, and is at a similar inflection point.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">When I was leading Baidu's AI Group, part of my job was serially building teams to explore new directions, and then systematically assessing their potential and deciding whether to go forward with specific AI businesses. In addition to being a lot of fun, it hammered home to me something that I'd felt since the early days of Google Brain: that we can develop systematic and repeatable processes to initiate and pursue new AI opportunities.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">We are starting to see how AI will transform almost every industry. AI Fund teams are currently pursuing three new AI-powered directions, some of which we hope to announce at a later date. As such projects mature and turn into businesses, the AI Fund will provide additional capital to these teams and thereby give them the ability to move quickly, and not be distracted by months of fundraising. It also allows them to publicize their work only when they are ready.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">I had announced Landing.AI last month, which is focusing on using AI to transform manufacturing. The AI Fund is providing funding to Landing.AI, which will accelerate its growth.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">As with any societal transformation, the transition toward AI will be jarring for some. It is an urgent societal problem to address the impact of AI and automation on jobs. My team is continuing to invest heavily in global training programs. I want to make sure every person can gain the skills needed to thrive in the AI economy, and every person has a shot at meaningful work.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">I will be leading the AI Fund as its General Partner. Eva Wang will be Partner and COO, and Steven Syverud will also serve as Partner. Eva was formerly a partner at Fenwick &amp; West, and will bring considerable operational and legal expertise to the fund, Steven had led the development of Coursera's Specializations product and was formerly CEO of Sycamore, and will bring considerable product as well as business development expertise.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">If you work in AI, you have important work ahead. Just as the work of Thomas Edison had helped build an electric-powered society, it is now time to build an AI-powered society. The AI Fund will be working hard to accelerate this important global transformation.</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">Andrew Ng</p>      <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/most-complex-watches-uk-skeleton-garrick-england-michael-michlmayr-s1-2018-1">We went to a luxury watchmaker to see how some of the rarest and most complex watches in the UK are made</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

This in-demand AI genius just got $175 million from Silicon Valley's biggest investors

<p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div>Gurbaksh Chahal built his dream and sold it to&#xa0;millions, appearing everywhere from Oprah to Men's Health magazine. Inside the tech world, his advertising tech companies like Blue Lithium sold for millions to match.<p>He published a memoir, "<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Dream-Learned-Rewards-Entrepreneurship-Millions/dp/0230618952">The Dream: How I Learned the Risks and Rewards of Entrepreneurship and Made Millions</a>" at 25.&#xa0;</p><p>Then, the dream unraveled.&#xa0;</p><p>On Friday, Chahal was <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/gurbaksh-chahal-sentencing-2016-8">sentenced to a year in jail</a> after facing a judge for violating his probation. His sentence was suspended pending appeal, but he has already been forced to surrender his passports and has transferred ownership of his latest company to his sister.</p><p>Chahal was serving probation after pleading guilty to misdemeanor charges for hitting a girlfriend&#xa0;in 2013. He faces other lawsuits from former employees alleging wrongful termination and discriminatory hiring. Those cases are still working their way through the courts.&#xa0;</p><p>We culled news articles, public records, court records, Chahal's memoir, and his public appearances to learn more about the man who had it all, and how it all went wrong.</p><h2>From nothing to millions</h2><p>Every telling of Chahal's story begins the same way: Chahal was born in India, but moved to the slums of San Jose with his family when he was one month shy of four.&#xa0;</p><p>A Sikh, Chahal wore a turban growing up, and was bullied in school as a result. At one point, he claims, kids threatened him with a knife on the playground.&#xa0;</p><p>While his parents struggled to make ends meet, Chahal didn't care about school and found his own way to do business. He was turned away from a McDonalds job.&#xa0;He started buying and reselling printers on eBay.&#xa0;</p><p><div></div></p><p>Then, at 16, Chahal decided to start his own business. DoubleClick was "the big Kahuna" of internet businesses, Chahal says in his memoir, but he knew he could build a different business that tracked the number of clicks on an ad. He contracted with a programmer in London to build an ad-clicking program for him. To help get the gig, he created a fictitious&#xa0;name, Gary Singh, and said he was much older, according to his memoir.</p><p>He promised his London partner&#xa0;the money in 90 days once he had a chance to test the program,&#xa0;despite having no money to pay him. But Chahal landed a client, the bare bones program worked, and soon he was making hundreds of thousands of dollars a month.&#xa0;He lost the turban and cut his hair.</p><p>Twenty-one months after he started Click Agents, <a href="http://adage.com/article/news/valueclick-acquires-click-agents/10457/">ValueClick bought the startup</a> in an all-stock deal valued at nearly $40 million.&#xa0;</p><p>The 18-year-old bought a Lexus and paid off his parents' mortgage.&#xa0;His rags to riches story had happened in a blink of an eye.&#xa0;</p><h2>Planet Bollywood</h2><p>Without a college or high school degree, Chahal started what would become a career as&#xa0;a serial entrepreneur.&#xa0;His next venture, though, is often left out of the Chahal narrative.&#xa0;</p><p>"G," as he's been called since he was little (it's a sound-alike of "Ji," not an abbreviation for "Gurbaksh") and his older brother Taj created the Planet Bollywood restaurant: A place where Chahal wanted the Indian movie&#xa0;stars flying in and out of California to stop and eat.&#xa0;</p><p>"Bollywood promises to be a place 'where everyone feels like a star.' But obviously some get to be more of a star than others," wrote India Abroad in a 2002 review of the restaurant. "Every Thursday night, a lucky lady is selected to ride around downtown Milipitas in the owner's Lamborghini."</p><p>That brief career as a restaurateur ended in literal flames when Planet Bollywood burned down.</p><p>"That's when we started hearing the rumors," Chahal explains in his memoir.</p><p>Some people in the&#xa0;Indian community thought&#xa0;Chahal&#xa0;had burned&#xa0;it down for insurance money, he describes.&#xa0;In one scene from his memoir, a girl confronts Chahal about burning down his restaurant. He explains how he responded:&#xa0;</p><p>To Chahal, this was a turning point, as he writes in his memoir: "I had been trying to do something for the community, and clearly that had been a big mistake. It taught me another lesson: Forget noble motivations. Pursue your own interests and focus on making yourself happy."</p><h2>Flashy habits, solidified</h2><p>In&#xa0;2003, after Donald Trump rejected his application for "The Apprentice," Chahal returned to the ad tech business. The 21-year-old cofounded internet advertising company Blue Lithium with Krishna Subramanian.</p><p>The launch party in 2004 was seen as a symbol of the rebirth of tech, right after the dot-com crash. In a write-up of the party in the San Jose Mercury News, the paper described Blue Lithium's launch as the "era of extravagance" having briefly returned.</p><p>"Rotating go-go dancers graced two corners of the dance floor, while SF DJ Donovan spun techno and groove. The company hired two Cirque du Soleil performers to do a trapeze act in front of a very blue screen, as well as two stilt walkers/dancers," the paper said, noting that Blue Lithium hadn't sprung for an open bar.&#xa0;</p><p>The company specialized in display advertising and soon took off as Chahal's second ad tech triumph. The company was featured in the 2006 Business 2.0 cover story on "<a href="http://money.cnn.com/2006/09/15/technology/disruptors_bluelithium.biz2/index.htm">The Disruptors: 11 Important Innovations</a>."</p><p>Chahal, meanwhile, used the success to explore other areas. MySpace was hot back in 2007, and Chahal wanted to launch his own social network called MingleNow, designed for club-goers and party people. Even this had Chahal's Midas touch. MingleNow landed a partnership deal with Anheuser-Busch.</p><p>Within three years, Yahoo bought BlueLithium&#xa0;for $300 million. Chahal's personal stake was valued at around $100 million. MingleNow shut down after the acquisition, but Chahal was just getting started.</p><h2>Fame and fortune</h2><p>Chahal used his newfound riches to create a flamboyant and extravagant lifestyle, according to reports.</p><p>A 2008 profile in the Mercury News painted the picture:</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">"You'll find the world of G at the top of a 37-story elevator ride up to a fabulous San Francisco penthouse with a stunning view of Treasure Island and the bay. It would be hard to miss, actually. There's the letter G emblazoned on the entryway rug and the entryway mirror and the headboard of the penthouse's occupant. And then there's G himself, a Silicon Valley high-tech high-flyer who embodies everything we love and hate about celebrities."</p><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>That year was pivotal. He&#xa0;landed a book deal to detail "The Dream" - his story from a starting a company in his bedroom to selling his second company to Yahoo for $300 million.</p><p>In October, Chahal appeared on Oprah Winfrey's TV&#xa0;show - "He's single!" she gushed twice - addressing the bullies of his past and the opulence of his present. They had a&#xa0;detailed conversation about his Lamborghini doors, only to swivel back to the subject of him crying when he got home from school. (That "family-style" dinner his family is seen eating in his penthouse apartment was secretly catered by local restaurant Amber India, <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/When-you-need-an-elbow-wrench-hellip-3189754.php">according to the San Francisco Chronicle</a>.)</p><p><div></div></p><p>Weeks later, Chahal was featured&#xa0;on Fox's "Secret Millionaire." The multimillionaire lived in a hotel in the Tenderloin neighborhood for a week, volunteering for neighborhood charities, including a battered women's shelter. By the end, he had donated more than $100,000 to charity.</p><p>He was also&#xa0;written up in "Men's Health" as #7 on the list of the World's Fittest and Richest Men&#xa0;- one of the other techies on the list was&#xa0;PayPal co-founder Max Levchin - followed by an appearance on "Extra" as one of the Most Eligible Bachelors.&#xa0;In his memoir, Chahal reveals the one show he promised not to do&#xa0;was "Dancing With the Stars."</p><p>That didn't stop Chahal from seeking attention everywhere else.&#xa0;Chahal appeared on talk show after talk show, expounding on the world economic situation while talking&#xa0;about his fortune.</p><p>All of the interviews seem to go over the same Oprah narrative.&#xa0;When talk show host Seamus O'Regan asked him about his Lamborghini, he quickly corrected him: "A Bentley."&#xa0;</p><p>"You did buy a Lamborghini at one point?" he responded.</p><p>"Yeah, I did that when I waas 16."</p><h2>Things fall apart</h2><p>Chahal's memoir, "The Dream," ends in 2008, before he appears on Oprah and eight years after he sold his first company.</p><p>By 2008,&#xa0;Chahal was working&#xa0;on a new company, GWallet. The idea was to become a&#xa0;type of virtual currency for the Facebook games that were becoming so popular (that Farmville craze). Chahal eventually turned the company into RadiumOne, another ad tech company, in 2009.</p><p>RadiumOne&#xa0;was focused on taking data from social media companies and using it to target ads. Once again, Chahal was <a href="http://techcrunch.com/2011/05/20/radiumone-about-to-corner-the-market-on-social-data-before-competitors-even-know-whats-happening/">right on the nose of&#xa0;the next trend in advertising</a>&#xa0;and raised more than $85 million, valuing the company at half a billion,&#xa0;by 2012.</p><p>The company kept climbing, and he was named one of the 2013 Entrepreneurs of the Year <a href="http://www.ey.com/US/en/Newsroom/News-releases/2013-24-June-EY-announces-Entrepreneur-Of-The-Year-2013-Award-winners-in-Northern-California">by Ernst and Young</a>. RadiumOne was rumored to be on track to an IPO - the first company Chahal was to take public. On Twitter and on his blog, Chahal published&#xa0;inspirational sayings. He started the Be Proud Foundation (later <a href="http://chahalfoundation.org/">renamed the Chahal Foundation</a>) after the 2012 attack on a Sikh temple in Wisconsin.&#xa0;&#xa0;</p><p>At the same time, he&#xa0;followed the path of MingleNow and&#xa0;experimented with&#xa0;more new social networks like <a href="https://pingme.net/index.html">PingMe</a>, a messaging platform, and&#xa0;<a href="http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20120301005500/en/RadiumOne-Labs-Launches-Via.Me-iPhone-Desktop">Via.Me</a>, a Instagram/Pinterest hybrid that applied filters to share favorite photos to social networks.&#xa0;</p><p><div></div></p><p>Still, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/gurbaksh-chahal-radiumone-2011-6">rumors started to percolate</a> that Chahal had overhyped his companies and that RadiumOne wasn't his original idea. When <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/gurbaksh-chahal-radiumone-2011-6">Business Insider contacted industry experts</a> in 2011, the&#xa0;most charitable opinion of him was&#xa0;"a great marketer."</p><p>In 2013, Chahal sued his driver and personal assistant for embezzling money. In emails that came to light as evidence, his personal assistant complained to a board member that Chahal was making him do illegal things and that he had a drug problem. Chahal claimed the emails were defamatory, and the lawsuit was later dismissed.</p><p>The next time Chahal would surface in media reports&#xa0;it was for a very different reason. In August 2013, the <a href="https://www.scribd.com/doc/219900669/Gurbaksh-Chahal">San Francisco District Attorney's office filed 45 felony charges</a> and two misdemeanors of battery and domestic violence against the RadiumOne CEO.</p><p>A video of the attack was recovered by police from the scene and reportedly showed Chahal hitting his girlfriend 117&#xa0;times in an hour, but a judge ruled that the video was inadmissible because police officers had seized it illegally. In September 2015, the <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/radiumone-worked-to-save-ipo-amid-scandal-1441837667?alg=y">Wall Street Journal reported</a> that Chahal had sought help from ex-Mayor Willie Brown to get the video tossed, paying him a $250,000 retainer for the job.</p><p>By April 2014, Chahal ended up pleading guilty to the two misdemeanors and started serving three years on probation.</p><p>But Chahal maintained his innocence, blaming his fame as a magnet for trouble.</p><p></p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"></div><p></p></div></div><p>"Celebrities in sports, entertainment and business, and high net worth individuals in general are all potential targets. It was only a matter of time when I would fall prey," he wrote in a blog post after his plea deal. (The post has since been taken down.)</p><p>"What is the American Dream? That you can come from nothing and make something of yourself not once, not twice but three times, only to have all of it come crashing down from misinformation, that is spun wildly out of control into the world of make believe and then goes viral into the blogosphere. We need to hold on to the American Dream, and reject those who would rather make it a nightmare," he added.</p><p>A month later, in May 2014, Chahal resigned from the board&#xa0;and&#xa0;slammed the RadiumOne leadership for backing him in private only to use him publicly.</p><p>"I sincerely hope you wake up from this greed, betrayal, and dishonesty," <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/radiumone-letter-to-the-board-2014-5">Chahal wrote</a>&#xa0;in an open letter he posted on his blog.</p><p>Two months later, Chahal moved on&#xa0;and started&#xa0;another ad company called Gravity4.</p><h2>Arrested again</h2><p>In October 2014, Chahal was taken into custody&#xa0;for&#xa0;kicking another woman&#xa0;multiple times, as first reported by <a href="http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/techflash/2015/05/gurbaksh-chahal-attack-probation-gravity4.html">the San Francisco Business Times</a>. Since Chahal was on probation, the District Attorney's office did not create a new case, but instead filed a motion to revoke his probation and set Chahal free after he posted bail.&#xa0;</p><p>News of the incident didn't come out until May, but the police report <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/gurbaksh-chahal-arrest-report-2015-5">painted a picture of a CEO out of control.&#xa0;</a></p><p>The woman told the police that she and Chahal drank three to five shots of tequila and two to three beers after work. "Additionally he would take 10 to 13 pills, antidepressants and sleeping pills one to two hours before bed," the police chronology said. "He would also drink alcohol while under the influence of the pills. Usually he is very mellow and becomes almost unconscious at times." The police chronology also said Chahal's security guard would record him yelling at his dog at night and show it to him when he woke up.</p><p>There were other legal troubles as well.</p><p>In 2015, two&#xa0;ex-Gravity4 employees filed new&#xa0;lawsuits against Chahal.</p><p>One employee alleges a workplace of sexual harassment and gender discrimination. Chahal and <a href="http://gravity4.com/a-open-letter-from-our-chief-of-staff-head-of-global-recruiting-and-chairman-ceo/">several Gravity4 employees publicly denied it</a>.</p><p>"As Chairman and CEO of Gravity4, I am shocked at these allegations, as they're simply baseless, false, and can not be supported by facts. We are very clear on knowing what the motives were on having this case filed, and look forward to defending it and clearing the name of Gravity4 based on actual facts," Chahal wrote.&#xa0;</p><p>A second lawsuit alleges Chahal never paid an employee before wrongfully terminating him. In response, <a href="https://twitter.com/gchahal/status/643587795819343872">Chahal tweeted about the lawyer involved in both cases</a>&#xa0;as his statement. These are still working their way through the courts.</p><h2>The end of the dream</h2><p>The once-famous entrepreneur is now seen as a villain by some in the tech industry, as&#xa0;<a href="https://twitter.com/Jason/status/764230072941150208">venture capitalist Jason Calacanis cheered for his jail time</a>.</p><p>Over the last six months, Chahal's life has gradually fallen apart. His cofounder left the company, and he had to sign over Gravity4&#xa0;to his sister. A judge found him guilty of violating his probation for attacking the second woman. He had to surrender his passports.&#xa0;</p><p>A report from&#xa0;<a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-08-12/silicon-valley-s-most-self-destructive-founder">Bloomberg revealed</a>&#xa0;increasingly erratic behavior. For instance, he reportedly created a pseudonym "Christian Grey," the character from "50 Shades of Grey," and was using it to attract clients and test salespeople. He also used a company holiday party as a release party for&#xa0;a hip-hop record he produced, called "The Legacy," the report says.</p><p>During the hearings, his lawyer told the court that Chahal had been recently diagnosed with a neurological problem similar to Parkinson's and that jail time would exacerbate it.</p><p>On Friday,&#xa0;judge Tracie Brown sentenced Chahal to 12 months in prison for violating his probation, but granted a stay in the sentencing so his lawyer can appeal. His lawyer, James Lassart, issued a statement saying "Mr. Chahal's sentencing was stayed today. The court is allowing the appellate court plenty of time and opportunity to 'get it right' to honor Mr. Chahal's full constitutional rights."</p><p>Chahal walked out of the courtroom with his family - and a 30-day window to fight to stay out of jail.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/launching-startup-changed-drastically-stewart-butterfield-slack-flickr-2015-6">Why new companies have it way easier now than a decade ago</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="1sd3FndTqSDbFP-3eYupLmnL535dH0Et" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

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