The Top

Rob Frohwein is the co-founder and CEO of Kabbage. In 2008, Rob Frohwein recognized that companies like eBay offered automated access to small business transaction data via APIs. Rob realized small businesses could simply share this data to allow underwriters to make better, faster credit decisions and provide a great user experience. He co-founded Kabbage in Atlanta, Georgia, to leverage the power of real-time data automation through technology. Before founding Kabbage, Rob advised, established and/or led several successful businesses, including LAVA Group, U.S. Micro Corporation (acquired by Arrow Electronics) and Surgical Biologics (acquired by MiMedx). Additionally, he led business development and legal for ZapMedia and Security First Network Bank (SFNB), the first online bank.

Markus Linder is the chief executive officer and co-founder of SMARTASSISTANT, the leading global technology provider for Digital Advice and Guided Selling technologies for online retailers, manufacturers and service providers. Over the last 11 years under Markus guidance, SMARTASSISTANT has grown internationally, with offices at several locations in three continents.

Niklas is co-founder of the SaaS company Filestage. Filestage is a solution web application that makes it easy to share, comment on (+draw) and approve videos, designs and documents, allowing customers and colleagues to mark change requests directly online in the file. This helps to avoid long feedback rounds via email. Before Niklas founded Filestage he used to work in different companies in marketing, advertising and e-commerce. In this time he experienced how time consuming and painful the content review process could be. Especially when done via email. So he started Filestage - his first SaaS startup.

CEO and Co-Owner of Z2 Systems, Inc. After making a few mistakes growing up and turning my life around, I decided to focus my life on helping nonprofits. I consider myself one of the luckiest people in the world to own and run a software company that helps nonprofits work towards achieving their missions. We started the company with just two people and some friends and family money, and are now surpassing the largest competitors in the industry.

Chris Vandersluis – a veteran North American project management authority, public speaker and author – is CEO of HMS Software, publisher of world-leading TimeControl® web-based corporate timesheet software.

Dr. Yampolskiy is a recognized expert in the security field. He is CEO of SecurityScorecard, the leader in security ratings, used by hundreds of customers like GE, McDonalds, Pepsi, AllState, AIG, Bank of NY Mellon, and others. Before founding Security Scorecard, he was the CISO at Gilt Groupe, and has held lead technologist and security roles at Goldman Sachs, Oracle, Cinchcast, and Microsoft. Yampolskiy is a published author and active speaker in the security and software development communities. He has a Ph.D. in Cryptography from Yale University.

Simone Vincenzi, known as The Experts Strategist, is the co-founder of GTeX, Forbes, Entrepreneur Magazine and Huffington Post contributor, TEDx speaker, Host of the podcast Explode Your Expert Business, author of 3 life-changing books. Simone is passionate about turning experts into authorities using his signature EXPLODE YOUR EXPERT BIZ programs. Every year he speaks in front of more than 5,000 business leaders, which included sharing the stage with Les Brown, Dr John DeMartini, Simone Sinek, John C. Maxwell and many more. He has also organised over 600 events, including Gary Vee speaking from York Hall boxing ring, and he is currently speaking in more than 200 stages every year. Following his passion for making an impact on the younger generation, he also partners with the largest youth organisations in the UK, helping them deliver more effective courses and training. Simone cannot live without 3 things: Speaking, basketball and playing his Didgeridoo.

Vladimir launched his first SaaS-startup in 2014. Created his first customer academy for that startup and when he saw that a lot of people wanted to have the same academy, he decided to pivot his startup and in 2016 founded an academy builder for SaaS-companies.

Gleb Budman is co-founder and CEO of Backblaze, which he and his team grew to $20m in revenue and profitability, while building one of the largest and most cost-efficient cloud storage systems on the planet. Previously, Gleb led two product teams from pre-funding through acquisition, and founded three companies.

As Chief Strategy Officer Eugene helped SEMrush to more than triple it’s revenue in less than 2 years and raised over $40m from Tier 1 VC firms. Before joining SEMrush Eugene was a partner at Target Global, pan-european growth stage venture fund that invests in consumer Internet space. There Eugene was in charge of US pipeline and invested in number of notable companies including Blue Apron(IPO), Lyft and Juno(acquired by Gett) Eugene started his VC career as Senior Associate and then Partner at Foresight Ventures. Foresight Ventures was focused on early stage US technology companies. Fund generated number of profitable exits over three years and was ranked top 10 Russian VC firm by Forbes in 2013.

I'm the CEO at Siftrock. I joined as ex-post-facto co-founder in Oct 2016. I'm passionate about all things related to SaaS marketing and sales. Previously founder and CEO at Simply Measured in the social analytics space. Also a BOD member at Bizible - leader in b2b marketing attribution.

Max Armbruster is the founder and CEO of Talkpush, the leading messaging recruitment platform. Max is a serial entrepreneur, and has sold his last three companies, most recently a recruitment SaaS company. Max has 17 years of international experience in the US, Europe and Asia, and has held strategic roles at SAP, CNET Networks and AT Kearney.

CEO of ProcurementExpress

43yo engineer, married, 3 children, living on a farm in North Denmark. Built up a top App agency from 2008 with 15 employees and produced over 120 apps for top danish companies. Sold the company and co-founded PRE.DO to help companies to capture, create overview and progress on ideas from their employees.

JP Fatta is the Founder of StreaMe with a mission to leverage technology to create new entertainment experiences. He has personally funded and operated multiple startups including a production company creating non-scripted TV shows. He is talented in the creation and deployment of cross-functional teams to launch concepts to market.

Aaron is the co-founder & CEO of CloudCheckr, the cloud management company. A serial entrepreneur, he has founded and sold three successful startups. An acclaimed speaker and author on technology topics 'Enterprise 2.0 and the Oracle Security Handbook' Aaron has been awarded multiple patents in database security and social media.

Marc Zionts has successfully led companies since 1987 and is the CEO of Automated Insights, a Vista Equity Partners owned company. Zionts is an Independent Board Director for Pivot 3, TEOCO, and Friends of the Earth. Besides enjoying time with family, Zionts is an avid outdoorsman and accomplished bicycle racer.

Florian is CEO of Usersnap which helps digital businesses to get feedback, track issues, and create successful products. Companies like Google, Facebook, Dow Jones, and Microsoft trust Usersnap to get actionable insights. Florian is an enthusiastic entrepreneur and founded several companies. He has over a decade hands-on experience building SaaS businesses and delivers on rapid organizational expansion. Most recently, he has been participating in the Salesforce Incubator to launch Usersnap globally.

John James is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Engine: a cloud-based eCommerce platform focused on creating the best experience for both merchants and consumers.A serial eCommerce entrepreneur, John started his first eCommerce business in his college dorm room in 1994 and financed his medical school education with the proceeds. Since then, he has built and sold multiple businesses including Acumen Brands: a company that raised $100 million in venture capital as it grew to dominate the country wear market in the late 2000's.

Hoala Greevy is the Founder CEO of Paubox, a B2B SaaS startup that focuses on being the easiest way to send and receive HIPAA compliant email. The company is located in San Francisco and has over 1,000 customers in all 50 states. Hoala likes to go kayak fishing on his spare time.

Dave Nevogt is the co-founder of Hubstaff.com which helps teams communicate better through automatic time tracking and activity tracking. He’s been running online businesses since he was 23, and now manages a team of 40 remote employees. Dave has been honored as one of Indianapolis’s top 40 under 40 entrepreneurs, and focuses on teaching others to manage remote teams.

Sid Sijbrandij is the CEO and co-founder of GitLab, a software company that supports the entire DevOps lifecycle in a single application. Originally a computer programmer for a personal submarine company, Sid was first introduced to GitLab while working as a (self-taught) Ruby programming developer. Under Sid's leadership, GitLab has grown from 49 to 267 employees, closed $20 million in Series B funding and delivered on promises to solve the complete developer lifecycle.

Marc Kirshbaum is a business leader, strategic advisor and board member to companies in healthcare, software and information technology. Marc is retained by investors, founders and CEOs to build, grow and turn around businesses that will deliver sustainable and measurable results for investors, employees and customers. Marc has been serving as the CEO of Sococo since August 2017.

Alan Trefler is a visionary leader, a technology change-agent, an innovative philanthropist, a chess master, and a trusted advisor to business executives around the world. He founded Pegasystems to change the way the world builds software. Today, the company employees nearly 4,500 people around the world and has a market cap of almost $5B.

Nadav Kidron is the CEO & Director of Oramed Pharmaceuticals, which he co-founded in 2006 to bring oral insulin to the millions of people with diabetes. Kidron holds a bachelor’s degree in law and an international MBA. He’s a member of the Israeli Advanced Technology Industries, and an international lecturer on Israel’s entrepreneurial and innovative culture.

As the CEO of Assembla, Paul Lynch is responsible for driving the strategic direction of the company. Prior to Assembla, Paul held multiple executive roles within cloud businesses where he drove revenue growth and international expansion. Paul has a Marketing degree from Dublin City University and is fluent in Spanish.

A tech entrepreneur who is always up to something. Studied at IIT Kharagpur (India) and started the career as a software engineer at Cisco. Moved into product management role there and then joined a small startup Calm.io. Calm.io got acquired by Nutanix. Has witnessed the Nutanix IPO and has a software patent filed in his name. Currently, he is working on his new venture Clappia that bridges the business apps innovation gap.

Reena, a serial entrepreneur and philanthropist, interestingly dove into entrepreneurship when most women take a career break, after her first child was born. She began with a staffing company, Avankia, then moved on to TargetRecruit, the most innovative talent management platform built on the Salesforce platform, that modernizes the recruiting cycle at organizations, from front to back office. Reena was featured as CRN's 2016 Women of the Channel, in Entrepreneur Magazine, Power 50 Solution Providers and much more. From supporting girls education to providing job opportunities to stay-at-home mom's at her firm, Reena always strives to do her part to support women. In this pursuit, she has embarked on the journey of Mom Relaunch- an initiative to bring women on a career break back into the workforce. Mom Relaunch is a one-stop solution for moms to have a fulfilling and sustainable career in the HR and IT industry.

Ron Miller, CEO of StartEngine,who was in Episode 40 of The Top and Chad Newell, CEO and founder of Snapwire. Listen as Ron and Chad explain how the new rule of SEC in equity crowdfunding helped their companies.  Famous Five: Favorite Book? – Ron: The E-Myth  What CEO do you follow? –  Chad: Sean Malarkey Favorite online tool? — Ron:  Internal Email / Chad: Google Sheet Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— Ron: No If you could let your 20-year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “It’s all about confidence.” – Ron Miller   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:40 – Nathan introduces Ron and Chad to the show 02:30 – StartEngine is the nation’s leading platform that allows entrepreneurs to directly connect with potential investors to raise capital 02:45 – The new law opened up the possibility for everyone to become an investor 03:11 – It allows companies to advertise broadly 03:24 – StartEngine was launched in June 2015 03:30 – Total amount invested is $20 million 03:42 – 60,000 unique users have joined their community 04:00 – StartEngine charged 5% of the total capital from the proceeds raised 04:20 – Entrepreneur can raise up to $50 million a year in the online public offering and StartEngine charges $50 per investor 05:10 – “We are currently focusing on the US market and there’s no SaaS in there” 05:30 – What made Chad decide to use StartEngine 06:40 – Why StartEngine is ground-breaking 07:00 – The congress’ limitation on investing in a company 07:31 – “Real wealth is made by being an early investor” 07:54 – The new law is a radical shift 08:51 – Nathan believes that the best investors are customers 09:10 – Snapwire has 300,000 photographers in the platform 09:22 – Buyer ratio is much smaller than the photographers 09:45 – Snapwire has pay-as-you-go and a SaaS model 10:08 – Snapwire’s revenue is 50% from pay-as-you-go and 50% from SaaS 10:20 – 9,000 images have been bought in Snapwire since their launch 10:30 – Snapwire was founded in 2014 10:34 – Snapwire has raised $2.8 million 11:15 – Snapwire raising in StartEngine opened up a lot of opportunities 11:45 – Can you use StartEngine after a price round? 11:52 – The main advantage is that companies can set their terms 12:03 – Some companies have to essentially create a second priced or non-priced round 12:58 – The good thing about equity crowdfunding is you have to disclose everything 13:08 – Disclosure statement is clear 13:41 – Lawsuits and CAP table 14:10 – There’s a disclosure and subscription agreement that investors sign 14:30 – “I think there’s an immersion of risk” 16:14 – There are limits to investments and to returns 16:28 – During crowdfunding, there’s also a limit on the amount of investment that a company will accept 17:00 – “As far as information rights, you can be very clear in the disclosure” 18:00 – It is not allowed to give out public information even if it is unintentional 18:15 – Upon investing, you will get a shareholder report that is in compliance with security exchange commission requirements 18:40 – “Competition can’t reverse engineer your strategy in execution” 19:06 – StartEngine has 12,000 – 14,000 investors 19:20 – Total of 15-18 companies have raised in StartEngine 19:30 – 14 team size in StartEngine 19:36 – StartEngine raised capital through seed round and Series A 19:47 – Total of $7.7 million raised 19:54  - Ron didn’t use their platform to raise 20:25 – Average value of an investment is $1400 20:40 – StartEngine’s biggest competitors are Seed Invest, Next Seed, WeFunder and Flash Funder 21:11 – What should people look for in the marketplace? 21:23 – If certain companies are establishing themselves in a specific niche area 21:43 – Success rate of the companies 21:57 – Support the companies can provide to entrepreneurs 22:13 – Connect with Ron through his email 22:34 – Contact Chad at Chad@Snapwi.re 24:53 – The Famous Five   3 Key Points: Real wealth is made by being an early investor. The good thing about equity crowdfunding is the disclosure. Be confident in yourself.   Resources Mentioned: Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal  for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal  developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages  – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. Assistant.to – The site Nathan uses to book meetings with one email. Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel. Ron@StartEngine.com – Ron’s email address Chad@Snapwi.re – Chad’s email address Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives