VAN Summit 2009 and BuDuRu

Ok this week was VAN Summit 2009 here in Portland, OR and for those of you not into this type of thing VAN stands for "Value Added Network" and this week was a meeting of the minds that keep the industry ticking along. For those of you that know me I have managed my own boutique VAN service for the better part of the past 5 years and have consulted to the industry for over 10 years. So as you can imagine I really wanted to go, you know the opportunity of a lifetime to rub elbows with the who’s who of an industry I really have grown to love over the years. So as you can also imagine how upset I was when I found out it was over $150 per ticket and I was broke.

God bless webinars, as it happens I heard through the grape vine that Todd Gould (CEO, Loren Data) would be broadcasting the Summit on Webinar and anyone interested could connect up and listen in. So I sat at my desk, worked and listened to Todd and a few other presenters give a presentation about a VAN service for VAN services, or a central command and control structure that would allow just about any VAN to lookup on the fly almost any Receiver ID from a central database and see which VAN Service they are on and the route needed to get the data to them. The cool thing is that a lot of the stuff they were asking for sounded a lot like BuDuRu, my pet project over the past 3 years.

After hearing the entire webinar and hearing the presenters come out on stage asking people to start thinking of ways to correct the issues of the industry I decided I would at least tell them what I have created and see what they think about it. So I did a little research and came up with Todd’s email address and sent him a short note thanking him for the webinar and inviting him to coffee while he was still in Portland. Todd agreed to meet me at Powell’s World of Books on Wednesday afternoon. So on Wednesday I dug into my change cup and got enough money for the bus fare to Powell’s and jumped the bus.

In short I learned many years ago, getting your foot in the door is almost always about who you know, so never pass up an opportunity to meet with someone new and especially someone that has influence in your chosen industry. In short I wanted to hear what Todd had been developing and then fill him in about BuDuRu and see what he says. After giving Todd my BuDuRu spiel it seemed like Todd was about to fall out of his chair. The rest of our meeting was great, talk about a brain storming session of like minds. Todd would toss out ideas and issues and I’d through out potential ways of doing it in BuDuRu. The cool thing was at the end Todd asked if I was interested in taking on equity partners, if so how much would I need and when would we be ready.

At this point all I can say is I’m excited and a little apprehensive, basically I’m not sure what to think. Next week I’m to demo the product for Todd. It’s not the money; BuDuRu is going to go live in February anyway with or without it. For me it has more to do with the fact that a major player and a visionary to the industry has accepted my idea as valid and has taken an interest in seeing it progress. However the investor side I liken to a car. I have this car; it runs and barely will seat 2 people legally. I’m standing at the fuel pump and it’s about 80% full of fuel and we are about ready to go. Sure the car could use tires, tune-up, alignment, some working seatbelts and a really good cleaning; however, that doesn’t stop me from leaving on my trip. I’ve heard way to many horror stories about VC and Angle Investors just walking in an demanding the world. What I’m afraid of is someone just running in thinking they can just snatch up 80% of my company and product and then just coast their way across the finish line on our effort alone. I’m not a greedy guy and I have offered to share anything that comes of my idea with some 15 people over the years; however, I have one barrier for entry, you have to show up and you have to contribute and based on that alone the team consists of only three (David, Alex and I) people. There will be more to follow as next week progresses.