Category: Community

The Venture Atlanta 2009 conference wrapped up today with two great keynote speakers and 22 companies presenting their six minute investor pitch. As conferences go, the event was extremely well done and the venue worked out great. Here are a few quick thoughts from the event:

• The companies were mostly early stage with revenues under a million for this calendar year, and naturally, huge growth projections
• Most companies were looking to raise an average of $2M – $3M in a Series A or Series B round
• The tabletop area for presenting companies to talk to investors was separated from the main area and didn’t get as much traffic as you would expect
• The event had a heavy number of service providers, all of whom were very nice

TAG, Atlanta CEO Council, and the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce did a great job putting on the event.

One of the things I love about the Atlanta technology community is that there are large events, almost quarterly, that bring entrepreneurs, technologists, and executives from around the region. We have events like Startup Riot, TAG’s Georgia Technology Summit, and Venture Atlanta. Today and tomorrow are Venture Atlanta 2009.

From the Venture Atlanta website:

Event Highlights:
– Venture Atlanta Showcase with 24 companies to open this year’s event
– 22 Presenters to give their pitches on stage on October 14th
– Two dynamic speakers: Pete Kight of Fiserv and Jeff Sprecher of IntercontinentalExchange (ICE)
– Networking with the entire Atlanta technology community
– Meet Venture Capitalists from Silicon Valley, Boston, Washington D.C, North Carolina, Texas, Florida and more

I recommend that you get involved with your technology community if you haven’t done so already.

As you might imagine in a city with a regional population of five million plus, Atlanta has a strong base of top-notch service providers. Yes, most will not defer fees until funding, like many do in Silicon Valley, but there are a handful that will (here’s one). Of course, the fees in Atlanta are also much lower than in other major cities, and that’s inline with our cost of living advantage.

Here are some of the major service providers for technology companies in Atlanta:

Legal

• Morris, Manning, and Martin
• DLA Piper
• Siavage Law Group
• Nelson Mullins

Accounting

• Habif, Arogeti, and Wynne
• Frazier & Deeter
• Bennet Thrasher

Human Resources

• HR Strategies & Solutions
• Angus McRae

Service providers are an advantage for Atlanta startup companies.

Note: Please let me know of other services, legal, accounting, or otherwise that you recommend.

The Atlanta startup community has really come into its own in the past three years. When I moved my company to Atlanta in the summer of 2002, I must admit that I was disappointed in the lack of activity in the metro area. There were a handful of events but it didn’t feel like a community. The advent of social media and passionate technology entrepreneurs really helped coalesce the community and make it a vibrant place.

We have so many events and organizations I’m bound to forget a few (please add them in the comments!), but here goes with a starting point:

• ATDC
• Shotput Ventures
• Technology Executive Roundtable
• Technology Association of Georgia
• CEO Council
• Atlanta Technology Angels
• Young Entrepreneurs Society
• StartupChicks
• Startup Riot
• Startup Drinks
• Open Coffee

For links to these and more organizations, please visit the ATLSE.com organizations page.

The technology community is an advantage for Atlanta startups.

When most people think of Atlanta they probably don’t think of the cost of living. More likely, people think of the ’96 Olympics, our airport, or a host of other attributes. Atlanta’s cost of living, especially housing costs, is a real advantage when compared to other major cities with a large technology community.

On the commercial real estate side, Atlanta is much more affordable than other population centers. In my class A building, we’re subleasing office space on the 34th floor for $14/ft while the direct rate on the space is $31/ft. Our office is one of the nicest in the city for a technology company. To get an idea of that cost, the same space would be twice as expensive in Boston and three times as expensive in New York.

On the residential real estate side, Atlanta has a glut of condos making it possible to get a new construction high rise one bedroom unit for $120k and a two bedroom unit for $200k. These are new condos in a brand new building. Single family homes can be purchased new in the suburbs for $200k while in-town homes can be purchased for $350k.

Apartments are also affordable in Atlanta. Two bedroom units are available for under $1,000/mo while renting condos or rooms from owners can easily be found for $500/mo. There’s a diverse range of housing options available, and many are available with flexible terms.

Cost of living is an advantage for startups in Atlanta.

As you might have heard, Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport is the busiest in the world, based on passenger traffic. While Delta is the largest carrier out of Atlanta, AirTran, based in Orlando, has Atlanta as their flight hub, and does a great of providing competition to keep flight costs in check. In addition, many of Delta’s flights, and all of AirTran’s flights, have WiFi on board for browsing the internet at 30,000 feet.

You might have also heard that you can’t go anywhere in the South without going through Hartsfield-Jackson. The benefit, for those living in Atlanta, is that you can go direct to most any place in the U.S., and many places around the world. Direct flights are a big benefit of living in Atlanta.

Another benefit of having such a major airport is the cost of flights. Due to the competition between Delta, AirTran, and others, many flights are affordable allowing startups to be more capital efficient. We routinely fly round trip to major cities for $200. It is hard to beat that.

The Hartsfield-Jackson Airport is an advantage for Atlanta startups.

Tip: Park in the North Terminal parking even if you’re flying Delta in the South Terminal, as it usually has more spots open that are closer to the terminal.

The Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC) in Atlanta is one of the oldest publicly funded incubators in the country. From their website, here are some of the services and programs they offer:

• Brown Bag
• CapVenture
• Office Space
• Startup Showcase
• Startup Resources
• Much more…

Just within the past few months, the ATDC has revamped their model to make it inclusive of all startups, and not just startups that were based on protected IP. The new ATDC is also branching out and holding office hours in several different suburbs of Atlanta. If you haven’t had the chance to get involved with the ATDC, I would highly recommend it as all of their employees are first class.

The ATDC is an Atlanta advantage for all startups in the area.

Arguably the number one reason why Atlanta is great for startups is the Georgia Institute of Technology. If you didn’t already know, Georgia Tech is a force nationally as it is ranked in the top five of engineering schools. I’ve hired many software engineers from Georgia Tech over the years and almost all of them have been excellent in their programming abilities.

In addition to the technical talent from Georgia Tech, the school also has a business school that has risen significantly in the rankings, and is now ranked in the top 25 nationally. Now, of course, rankings aren’t everything, but the rankings do help with recruiting. Georgia Tech has a surprisingly high number of out of state students, and thus acts as draw to bring smart people from all over the country to Atlanta. I can think of three developers alone that work for me that moved to Atlanta to attend Georgia Tech from out of state, and naturally they stayed after graduation.

Georgia Tech is a major advantage for startups in Atlanta.

Atlanta added more people than any other metro region since 2000. Naturally, a large percentage of this population growth is from young professionals, age 25 – 34, informally known as the “young and restless.” These young professionals are looking to advance their careers and are the perfect people for startups.

TAG, the largest technology group in the state, recently added a Young Professionals society to promote networking and learning among this fast growing demographic. Forbes, in 2007, ranked Atlanta as #3 best city in the country for young professionals. An article just last month in the AJC revealed that Forsyth County is among the top 10 counties in the country for young professionals that make over $100k/year.

What does this mean for startups? This means that there’s a highly educated workforce here, that’s early in their career, and ready to make an impact on the world. Young professionals are an advantage for Atlanta startups.