Code Story: Insights from Startup Tech Leaders

Erik Fogg attended MIT, but failed his intro to computer science classes. It was at that point, that he punted over to mechanical engineering. So as you could guess, Erik is not the tech guy - but, he does know enough to be dangerous. He loves to work with his hands, and has a professional history in solving old problems in new ways.Speaking of working with his hands, he likes to create comic con gear (at the time of the recording he had a captain America shield made out of an old satellite in his office). He's also a huge comic book and sports card collector, and he actually mentors several startups involved in pricing & liquidity around collectibles. Outside of that, he hosts a podcast around the topic of politics, polarization, and tribalism.Early 2018, Erik's co-founder started working through the traditional problems of QA testing. After getting fed up with it, he decided that he just needed to build his own solution, and needed someone to help him turn it into a business. Erik joined the team, and has been changing the QA testing landscape ever since.This is the creation story of ProdPerfect.Sponsors.Acton Children's Business FairLinksWebsite: https://prodperfect.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikfogg/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Lior Sion has been doing tech for 30 years, since he was in High School. He is married with 2 amazing and a dog (a Vizsla to be specific), and is in his mid 40s. He is passionate about ultra running, which is anything larger than a marathon... which can equate to 5-6 hours of running. Yep, you heard that right. He loves the contrast between being outdoors and computers, and typically runs the trails and rivers around where he lives.Around 8 or 9 years ago, Amazon was a losing company - as in, they are losing money. At the time, Lior was CTO of a ride hailing company in Europe, where he gained great understanding around logistics in this industry. He realized that though companies like Amazon and Uber could create connected and seamless service for their customers, the rest of the world would have difficult building platforms around logistics, customer ownership, and visibility. Lior and his co-founders decided to create an operating system, enabling these types of players to achieve this out of the box.This is the creation story of Bringg.SponsorsActon Children's Business FairProdPerfectKitcasterLinksWebsite: https://www.bringg.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/liorsion/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Justin Mitchell started off wanting to be an actor, dreaming of going off to work for Disney or doing movies. He loved being on the stage, playing sports, and overall, being the center of attention. He loves video games, reading, and generally - he loves making things.He is married with 2 foster boys, and is expecting a new addition soon. And, a lot of the stuff he is building on the side centers around his family. For example, he's creating a solution to incentivize his kids to be human beings - put on deodorant, clean their room, etc - by rewarding them with redeemable tokens, allowing them to cash them in for toys, screen time, or other things.To top it off, the solution he is building is such that it's designed to be a kit - for parents and kids to build the system as a bonding exercise. As a Dad - I think this is absolutely brilliant.He noticed over the years of working remote that the accepted culture of getting stuff done was to have meetings all day. He and his team started thinking about how to increase the amount of communication that happened during the day, without increasing the number of meetings.This is the creation story of Yac.SponsorsProdPerfectActon Children's Business FairLinksWebsite: https://www.yac.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/itsthisjustin/https://www.butterbehavior.com/https://www.ohtipi.com/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Matt DeBergalis has been into tech since he was a boy, playing games like Flight Simulator on his Commodore 64 and reviewing the schematics in the handbook. To Matt, computers are tools to make things possible... and enable people to do it quickly. He loves community building, with his background in politics, and he loves the open source world. He finds that it's a powerful force for organizing people to create what wasn't possible before.He lives in San Francisco, with his wife and 6 year old. And he's a private pilot, owning his own plane. When asked how he balances all he has going on, he quickly replies that anything worth doing is going to require hard work. For him, this is his family, flights and code adventures.Previously, Matt co-wrote an open source product called Meteor, attempting to make it simpler and faster to write JS applications. At the core of the tool, there was a capability to write a query to move data around, instead of writing the code. They took that capability, and formed what they are focused on today.This is the creation story of Apollo GraphQL.SponsorsMorgan Page Game DevProdPerfectArt of ManlinessLinksWebsite: https://www.apollographql.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/debergalis/https://www.meteor.com/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

As an interesting turn to the guests I have on the podcast, Dave MacLeod is not a technologist by trade. He is a serial entrepreneur, and an old school face to face facilitator, who cares a lot about what people have to say and feel. He came out of college having taken every course under the sun, and getting zero degrees.. which prepared him perfectly to be a consultant.He lives in a small ski town called Rossland, in British Columbia. And it's important to him to be a good Dad, a good Son, and a good member of his community.Along the way, he got to do some interesting and complex work, where he heard voices representing many different viewpoints. In doing this, he picked up some facilitation techniques to figure out what was important within the diverse groups of people he was working with. He got hooked up with some people building software to solve a similar problem.This is the creation story of ThoughtExchange.SponsorsProdPerfect LinksWebsite: https://www.thoughtexchange.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-macleod-te/https://www.amazon.com/Scaling-Conversations-Leaders-Access-Potential/dp/1119764459https://www.diversityinc.com/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

The tech career of Meetesh Karia started early, as his father was an electrical engineer bringing home a TRS80 with a tape drive. Computers just clicked, as he dialed into BBS systems, built computers installed with Slackware & Linux. Early on, he also dabbled in AI (is that even a thing?), building neural networks to predict weather patterns.He has played competitive sports for years - in fact, he has won a national championship in the masters division of ultimate frisbee (and met his wife playing the sport as well). He bases a lot of his leadership philosophy in tech around what he has learned from sports. Self proclaimed - he's one of those people that can't just sit still.In January 2013, he was approached to create and own the technology and team around a product that allowed people to compare insurance providers - from scratch. Meetesh made the decision to onboard and started the journey to build the Zebra.SponsorsMorgan Page Game DevInMoatLinksWebsite: https://www.thezebra.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tesh11/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRS-80Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Jason Riedel was drawn to technology as a 9 year old. He knew what he wanted to do with his life, falling into the tech world - and as such, he didn't attend college.Music was his first love (or second, he debates which came first), though he is not a musician. He has produced music in the past, creating beats for artists. Interesting fact about Jason - he ran a hip hop label for 8 years on the side. The way he puts it, he used to make money through IT and spend money through building a hip hop label. He's married with 2 kids, and is into nutrition - though that tends to fall to the wayside, cause kids will only eat what they are going to eat.Starting as a nights and weekends side project, he and his co-founder created a way for driven individuals to transform their future through learning and opportunity.This is the creation story of AspireShip.SponsorsInMoatLinksWebsite: https://aspireship.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonariedel/https://twitter.com/kelseyhightowerhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway%27s_lawLeave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Beerud Sheth grew up in Mumbai, India, and attended undergrad in Bombay. For graduate school, he came to the states to study at MIT, and then did a short stint in Wall Street before moving into the entrepreneurial world.He lives in the Bay Area, and enjoys hiking, working out and spending time with his family. He loves the Bay Area for these things, but also because of the community of ideation. The way he puts it, someone is always doing something interesting, and he really enjoys that. Besides business books, he leans towards reading biographies and books about the history of tech and business.Previously, he founded Elance, which is now Upwork, pioneering online freelancing. Twelve or so years ago, he noticed a key insight, in that the mobile revolution was happening all around. Within this, the lowest common denominator was text messages, in that not everyone had a smart phone. This got him asking the question - how interesting can these experiences be?This is the creation story of Gupshup.SponsorsGrindologyMorgan Page Game DevLinksWebsite: https://www.gupshup.io/developer/homeLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/beerud/https://www.upwork.com/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Greg Schier grew up in a small town, without a lot of opportunity. He rode BMX bikes and skate boards, and spent a lot of time building ramps and jumps for them both. At that time... he had no idea what programming entailed. He went to university and it was at that point that he learned about programming, after spending some time in mechanical engineering and then moving over to coding.He recently moved outside of Montreal, into a house with chickens... and he now finds himself getting into homesteading, gardening, and wood working - creating many improvements around his place to increase the quality of life. The way he describes it, he is midway to a life change towards analog hobbies away from the digital world and the city.While he was working for a company making a transactional email API, he realized that they didn't have a good way to interact with said API. There needed to be an easy way to interact with the solution as a customer, as a developer, etc. His tool, which ended up taking off, was born out of trying to solve this problem.This is the creation story of Insomnia.SponsorsWildbitLinksWebsite: https://insomnia.rest/Twitter: https://twitter.com/GregorySchierhttps://schier.co/ Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Bryon Jacob is a family man with 4 kids, from ages 11 down. With a young startup and family, his hobbies has suffered some, but during the pandemic, he was able to pick back up music, specifically playing the keyboard. He's an avid reader, mostly sci-fi and loves to play strategy board games. His family and he tend to play games like Puerto Rico and Ticket to Ride, which is simple enough for his 6 year old to compete.He and his co-founders have created a massive, open community for data. Users can sign up for free, bring their data catalogue, and analyze any data outside of that. In doing so, they have seen traction of nearly a million users in the eco-system, along with enterprise users with a private, internal data eco-system - all based in the cloud, and fully integrated.This is the creation story of data.world.SponsorsGrindologyMorgan Page Game DevWildbitKIMOLinksWebsite: https://data.world/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bryon/Leave us a review on Apple PodcastsAmazing tools we use:This podcast is hosted on RedCircle, a FREE platform for podcasts and brands to scale their message. Want to record your remote interviews with class? Then, you need to use Squadcast.Code Story uses the 1-click product ClipGain, sign up now to get 3hrs of podcast processing time FREEIf you want an amazing publishing platform for your podcast, with amazing support & people – use Transistor.fmCredits: Code Story is hosted and produced by Noah Labhart. Be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, Breaker, Youtube, or the podcasting app of your choice.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/code-story-insights-from-startup-tech-leaders/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy