By Nicole Jordan, LA Correspondent
In my first post I tried to relay the development of the up and coming tech business community that’s beginning to truly formalize, en masse. Since then I’ve been to several other events, each time asking, what’s your sense of the current climate here? What I’ve discovered is that there are smart, connected and motivated people all over LA yearning for the same thing – more opportunities to learn and connect. At the beginning of October I was at the Rubicon Project’s monthly “Thursday in the Mix” (TitM) event. TiTM was created to be a fun informal venue to get to know each other better, build relationships, and strengthen So Cal’s inter-business community ties.
While there I got to talking with Brian Deagon from Investor’s Business Daily. He informed me that he wrote an article a few years ago about the sleeping giant that is LA. We agreed that we can sense something in the air. A buzz of activity, an impatience with there not being more options. Which is not surprising, given the many folks who live here who spent time in The Valley. You get used to a certain…selection…and when it’s not there you want to create it. That’s the driving motivation behind one of the first start-up focused conferences to happen down here in a long time, Start Up LA, happening next weekend on the 25th and 26th at UCLA.
At the TitM party I encouraged Brian to write an updated article, chronicling all that’s starting to pop up. The westside, by far, seems to offer the highest turnouts. Which isn’t surprising considering the high concentration of VCs, start-ups and established tech and media companies in the area. Hello, MTV? MySpace? Yahoo? Google? All of them. TitM was a bit of a who’s who of names in the local circuit. The entire Rubicon crew was in attendance. Frank Addante, CEO and Craig Roah, COO were in high demand, busy the entire night, moving from one conversation to another. Drinks were flowing, hands were shaking, cards exchanged. I heard from several people afterwards that they had a great time. Hey, who doesn’t like some free drinks, conversation with smart people and a little deal making to boot.
The events are held at The Parlor in Santa Monica. A fairly large sports bar with monitors all over, and plenty of room to move around. At the first one the crowd was more spread out. This time people were clustered around the bar. Hmmm…what does that say? Working hard people, working hard. Keep an eye out for the next one, likely in December.
One of the founders, and former L90/adMonitor crew member.
James and Eric of the Rubicon Project with guests.
To see additional photos… click here