Bettina Hein - "Fearless Founder"

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Bettina Hein is the founder of Pixability, one of the fastest-growing companies in Massachusetts. She was also co-founder of SVOX, a profitable Swiss startup sold to Nuance Communications for $125MM. This record may make her success seem easier to achieve than it was. Bettina Hein overcame numerous obstacles to justify the sobriquet “Fearless Founder”. Learn from her as I did. She is an exemplar of resilience, grace under fire and plain common sense. She also has much to teach us about how a startup might best raise money. Whenever I ask angel investors about a remarkable pivot by a founder, there’s a good chance Bettina’s name will come up. Don’t miss this charming and instructive conversation with a star founder.

Here are topics and quotes from the interview:

• Bettina Hein Bio
• How Bettina Hein Found Her Entrepreneurial Path in Life
• Bettina Hein Used to Write Computer Programs in Fourth Grade but Did Not Learn to Code in College; Why?
• Professors Discouraged Bettina Hein from Pursuing a Career in the Sciences
• “If I had to go back, I would probably get an undergraduate degree in either electrical engineering or computer science.”
• “I think I wanted to be an entrepreneur very early on. There's just that example that was set in my family. There's no one in my family that has had a nine to five job ever, except my brother…”
• Bettina Hein Founds an Entrepreneurship Initiative for Students at her University Called Start, that Leads her to Brains-to-Venture, Which Connects Her with Her co-founders in SVOX
• SVOX Has a $125 MM Exit to Nuance Communications
• Bettina Hein Starts Pixability – Looked for Co-founders But Could Not Find Any Willing Takers – How She made Being a Solo Founder Work
• Pixability’s Storied Pivots
• “We help large brands and their agencies place their video advertising and optimize it on YouTube, and we've expanded to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.”
• How Pixability’s Platform Impacts the Viewing Public
• “Consumers like it better, and brands get more out of it.”
• Sal Daher Reads an iTunes Review from HealthTech617 – Asks You to Leave a Review on iTunes
• Bettina Hein’s Advice on Fundraising for a Startup
• Bettina Hein on How Things Change Once a Startup Gets Venture Funding
• Bettina Hein Thinks Founders Are Scared of Having a Board So They Miss out on a Lot
• “Many beginning entrepreneurs are scared of having a board. They fear the meddling in their business. They fear that people will force decisions on them, on the board. I have not seen that ever happen.”
• “For me, often times the exercise of preparing for a board meeting is almost more important than the board meeting itself because it allows me to really think through the narrative of the company.”
• Bettina Hein’s Way of Balancing Work & Family
• Bettina Hein on Fundraising While Pregnant
• Bettina Hein on Marketing Technology’s Crowded Landscape

Topics: discovering entrepreneurship, pivot, venture funding, boards, co-founders, raising money