Danielle Newnham Podcast

Have you ever seen a picture of someone you've never met and wanted to know their story?I first saw a picture of Donna Auguste in Doug Menuez's great book –Fearless Genius: The Digital Revolution in Silicon Valley 1985 - 2000 …and I had to know more about her. A black woman leading an engineering team at Apple – her photo stood out – for all the right reasons, among a sea of pictures of Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, John Sculley et al.Two years later, and I got the exclusive chance to sit down with Donna who shares her inspiring story for this podcast – from being the first African-American (man or woman) to enter the PhD program at Carnegie Mellon researching AI, to managing the Newton engineering team at Apple to selling her software business for $147 million. It’s all the more amazing when you learn the obstacles she had to overcome.With a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Berkeley, Donna went on to research Artificial Intelligence at Carnegie Mellon where she spent the holidays interning at Xerox PARC in the early 80s before heading to IntelliCorp as a software engineer working on products which incorporated AI. She then went on to Apple before co-founding her own company - Freshwater Software.This episode is one of my favourites – Donna’s story is one of grit, faith, determination, ignoring the naysayers and ultimately, a story of success.As Donna says when discussing the VC’s reaction to her when fundraising, “They had a whole model of what they were looking for and I fit none of it.” Donna proved them wrong. And the lessons she shares shows that you can too, whoever…wherever you are.As this is the final episode in Series 2, I wanted to thank you dear listeners for coming on this journey with me. I have so enjoyed speaking to my incredible guests: Dan Bricklin, Rana el Kaliouby, Nolan Bushnell, David Byttow, Avery Wang, Megan Smith, Ed Smith and of course, Donna Auguste.I look forward to welcoming you back for Series 3.-----Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamDonna on Twitter / Auguste Research website-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng.  Mentioned in this episode: Fearless Genius: The Digital Revolution in Silicon Valley 1985 - 2000 by Doug Menuez 

Today’s guest is the incredible Ed Smith - one of only two known African American engineers who worked on the design of video games in the 1970s and the first African American to work in the design of a personal computer, and the only hybrid video game/personal computer ever released. In this episode, Ed talks me through his childhood, growing up in one of the toughest neighbourhoods in Brooklyn, New York and his desire to create a better life which he found through tech. A voracious reader and into electronics, Ed studied Computer Science before getting a job working on traffic control signals at Marbelite. Whilst there, Ed got the opportunity to go to Fairchild and learn early microprocessor-based circuit design which put his skills in high-demand. He soon landed at APF Electronics where he immediately starting work on the hardware design and built the prototypes, joystick and port design for the MP1000 video game – one of very few cartridge-based video game systems at the time. Two years later, Ed and the APF design team leveraged the processing power of the MP1000 and Ed’s hardware designs to create the Imagination Machine personal computer which was the first combined home video game console and personal computer.This episode is inspiring and uplifting with many lessons from Ed on how to strive, thrive and find your role in tech.-----Mentioned in this interview:Ed's book  Imagine That!: The story of one of the first African Americans to work in the design of video games and personal computers can be bought from Amazon UK here and Amazon US here.Benj Edwards Fast Company interview with Ed Ed Smith And The Imagination Machine: The Untold Story Of A Black Video Game Pioneer-----Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.-----Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamEd website / Twitter @slicer114-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng. 

Today’s guest is the incredible Megan Smith - award-winning entrepreneur, engineer, and tech evangelist. It would take me an hour to talk through Megan’s illustrious career but some of what we discuss in this episode includes working on multimedia products at Apple Japan, working on early smartphones at General Magic, 11 years at Google where she held a VP position, leading new business development including acquisitions of Google Earth, Maps, Picasa, she led Google.org, and later co-created Women Techmakers, and Solve for X before serving as the third U.S. Chief Technology Officer and Assistant to President Obama from 2014-2017, working on issues from AI, data science and open source, to inclusive economic growth, entrepreneurship, structural inequalities, government tech innovation capacity, STEM/STEAM engagement, workforce development, and criminal justice reform. Megan is currently founder and CEO of Shift7, a company working collaboratively on systemic social, environmental and economic problems -- finding opportunities to scout and scale promising solutions and solution makers and engage proven tech-forward, open, shareable practices to drive direct impact, together. Finally, Megan holds a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering from MIT where she is now a board member and Megan is also co-founder of the Malala Fund and UN Solutions Summit. She is also a board member of Vital Voices, LA Olympics 2028 and Think of Us, and is Algorithmic Justice League advisor and member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the National Academy of Engineering.I told you she was impressive! But before we learn more about Megan’s story – a couple of quick notes. Firstly, we recorded this episode during the pandemic and so there are a few background noises we couldn’t eliminate. Secondly, I wanted to talk to you about sponsorship - if you want to sponsor this podcast, please do reach out and you can have your ad read by me, each week, at this point of the podcast and have your message reach over 120,000 founders and business leaders.I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did.-----Mentioned in this Interview:Megan talks about her time at General Magic - worth watching this documentary on the now-famous companyListen here to my interview with General Magic co-founder Andy Hertzfeld Megan mentions Dr Sue Black and her work at Tech Mumsand Sherry Coutu and her work at Founders 4 SchoolsCoded Bias documentaryThe Hōkūleʻa story can be found here------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamMegan on Twitter  @smithmeganShift 7 website / Twitter @shift7 / Instagram @shift7-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng. Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.  

My guest today is Avery Wang – co-founder and Chief Scientist at music recognition app Shazam and now Principal Research Scientist at Apple.Almost ten years ago, I conducted my very first interview for my first book and it was with the Shazam founders. The story of Shazam is one of pure innovation, foresight, and friendship. In 1999,  Chris Barton dreamed of a seemingly impossible solution to ambient music recognition and created the team — including friend Dhiraj Mukherjee, classmate Philip Inghelbrecht and engineer Avery Wang — to make it a reality. Even after 20 years post launch, Shazam currently has over 200 MILLION monthly active users and was acquired by Apple in 2018.For regular listeners of this show, you will know that I spoke to fellow co-founder Dhiraj Mukherjee back In Series 1 but in today’s episode, Avery Wang talks me through the invention process – going all the way back to how as a child, he fell in love with science and maths and how his parents encouraged him to experiment, up to how he managed to invent the Shazam algorithm which every "expert" had said was impossible.I am so over the moon to share this interview with Avery – a first of its kind because Avery doesn’t do interviews. Everyone who knows him refers to him as a genius and it’s easy to see why. He holds over 150 US and international patents, has a Bachelor of Science degree and a Masters in Mathematics and a Masters and PhD in Electrical Engineering, all from Stanford. He also went to Germany as a Fulbright Scholar and studied Computational Neuroscience.I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.-----Let me know what you think of this episode by rating, reviewing and sharing - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnham-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng.  

Today’s guest is David Byttow – a self-described engineer by trade and, very much an artist at heart. David is most famous for his role as co-founder of mobile app Secret which allowed people to share messages anonymously.Whilst there was a lot of hype around Secret when it officially launched in 2014 - lauded by the press and tech industry, and with the company raising millions of dollars within just a few months – the company abruptly closed down a little over a year later. Some of the very public criticism David faced at the time was around the three million dollars that he and his co-founder each took off the table as part of their Series B deal. And, of course, there was the red Ferrari that David bought and which got a lot of column inches when things didn’t work out.In this episode, we dig deep into the rise and fall of Secret and some of what David went through during that time from the exciting high - post launch - to the crushing low he felt in having to close the company down. We also discuss how he dealt with the backlash that came with Secret’s closure and how his pre and post Secret career has seen him work at many of the top tech companies from Google to Medium, Square and Snap.I really appreciate David’s candour in this interview, he opens up about a lot of things which many founders would prefer to keep out of public conversation. And, in doing so, I believe David will enable others to do the same – to talk about the hard times which come with entrepreneurship. It also gives an insight into David – who he is as a person, not just a founder, and that’s exactly why I do these interviews. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.-----Mentioned in this Interview:David talks about Andy Hertzfeld who appears in Series 1 - listen here.David's ABC: Always be Coding article can be found here. Jim McKelvey interview can be found here.Tweet about creator economy can be found here.Philip Rosedale interview can be found here.-----Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamDavid on Twitter @davaidbyttow / YouTube  David Byttow-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng.       

Today’s guest is the legendary Nolan Bushnell – serial entrepreneur, co-founder of Atari and a pioneer of the video games industry.After an early interest in Engineering, Nolan went on to study Electrical Engineering before setting up Atari with Ted Dabney and Al Alcorn (I interviewed in Series 1, EP 8 - listen here). Atari experienced huge success with Pong which was one of the first computer games ever created but whilst it was hugely popular, Atari was born at a time when venture capital didn’t really exist, IP could not be protected and so the journey to keeping the company going was much tougher than it is today and by the time Warner Communications made an offer for the company, Nolan was ready to sell.In this interview, where we look back at gaming history, Nolan talks me through the highs and lows of building Atari, the traits he looks for when hiring, and why one of his biggest regrets was turning down an offer from Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak to own a third of Apple.Enjoy!-----Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamNolan Bushnell on Twitter @nolanbushnell-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng.  

Today’s guest is Rana el Kaliouby a pioneer in Emotion AI and, before I go any further, I wanted to say that this is one of the most honest, and authentic interviews I have ever conducted with a startup founder.Rana is co-founder and CEO of Affectiva - a software company that builds artificial intelligence that understands human emotions, and cognitive states and activities by analyzing facial and vocal expressions. The company was spun out of the MIT Media Lab with Rana and Professor Rosalind Picard as co-founders.A self-described nerd at heart who felt like a misfit growing up, Egyptian-born Rana also authored Girl Decoded: A Scientist’s Quest to Reclaim Our Humanity by Bringing Emotional Intelligence to Technology. As I touch on in the interview, this book is very much Rana’s inspiring life story - from her middle-eastern upbringing to her startup journey, why it’s critical for your company to have core values and the toll her chosen path took on her personal life.------If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a review? It doesn't take long and would mean the world to me. It also helps others to find the podcast too. Thank you.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamRana el Kaliouby on Twitter @kaliouby and Instagram @ranaelkaliouby Affectiva website -----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng.  

Welcome back to Series 2 of the Danielle Newnham Podcast. I am your host – Danielle Newnham and each week, I interview tech founders and innovators to learn the inspiring, human, stories behind the game-changing tech we use every day.Today, I am thrilled to kick off Series 2 with Dan Bricklin – the man behind the very first electronic spreadsheet.Dan received a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering and computer science from the MIT before coming up with the idea for VisiCalc whilst studying Business at Harvard Business School. Not only did VisiCalc form the basis of what we all know to be the spreadsheet today but at the time, Steve Jobs credited VisiCalc with helping drive Apple II’s success. In this episode, we explore Dan’s background, what got him excited about engineering as a kid and what it was like studying at MIT at the dawn of such an exciting age.We also discuss the motivation behind creating VisiCalc and what it felt like to have someone so close to him essentially copy it – you’ll be surprised to hear there were no hard feelings!Dan’s work has been critical to the innovation which followed and I am grateful that he shared his story with me.I hope you enjoy it too.------Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamDan Bricklin on Twitter @danb / website / buy his book here.-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng. 

And we're back! Great to have you here for more interviews with the tech founders and innovators behind the game-changing tech we use every day.Listen in to hear who we have coming up on this Series as well as why the telling of these stories is so important.This Series is hosted by Danielle Newnham and produced by Jolin Cheng.If you would like to sponsor this or another Series, please get in touch with Danielle Newnham via Twitter or LinkedIn.

In this episode, I speak to Al Alcorn – electrical engineer, Apple Fellow and the man who created Pong – one of the earliest arcade video games and one of the first video games to be commercially successful. Pong very much put Atari at the forefront of what became the gaming industry in the early 70s.Al is a great storyteller and we dive into the early days of Atari from hiring an 18 year-old intern called Steve Jobs and watching him and Woz start Apple - to getting Pong into the hands of hundreds of thousands which launching an industry that is now worth billions. We also talk about the financial struggles Atari experienced, the copycats they had to deal with and what it meant for the company when Atari got sold and the suits came in to run it. We also talk about life post Atari for Al, as he continued to pioneer in the tech field, becoming an Apple Fellow.It is rare that one gets to talk to someone who was at the dawn of an industry so I am grateful to Al for his time and hope you enjoy our conversation, as much as I did.-----Let us know what you think of this episode and please rate, review and share - it means the world to me and helps others to find it too.------Danielle on Twitter @daniellenewnham and  Instagram @daniellenewnhamAl Alcorn on Twitter / LinkedIn-----This episode was hosted by me - Danielle Newnham, a recovering founder, author and writer who has been interviewing tech founders and innovators for ten years - and produced by Jolin Cheng. Series 1 of this podcast is sponsored by Sensate – the device which can help to reduce stress and anxiety in less than ten minutes a day. To get an exclusive, limited offer, $25 off your first purchase, simply head to Sensate and insert my discount code POD.