startup

Video retrospective of GlobalNiche, my remote skills edtech startup 2011-2013 and beyond...

Her groundbreaking concept of building an online professional presence as a way to advance business objectives for growth and sustainability… came long before companies understood the marketing potential of online social media, and began to hire social media managers in large numbers. And long before people understood why and how to use existing tools for effective remote work.
— Tanya Monsef

I founded GlobalNiche in Istanbul with Tara Agacayak after evolving my 2006 cultural book to a 2010 global citizen blog to an online skill building business, and Tanya Monsef joined us when I moved to San Francisco. Here’s what Tanya, the Dean's Executive Professor of Management in the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University for the past decade, says about GlobalNiche in 2024.

Watch a quick retrospective, excuse any missing media.



"Anastasia’s groundbreaking concept of building an online professional presence as a way to advance business objectives for growth and sustainability… came long before companies understood the marketing potential of online social media, and began to hire social media managers in large numbers. And long before people understood why and how to use existing tools for effective remote work.

Tanya recalls how I took my knowledge and prior success using book publishing’s “author platform” concept to reach the public with content marketing, branding and community outreach (that’s Expat Harem!), and combined it with the heavily-online techniques a serial expat like me has relied on during my overseas experiences, and then how I created a way to teach it to others, and then to scale it.

"GlobalNiche was a forward-thinking leader in digital solutions and thought leader to a global cohort of founders and business women, as well as organizations serving female innovators.”

This reminds me that Tanya and I continued to deliver talks and workshops well into 2014 and later, working with the Women’s Startup Lab in Mountain View, Turkish Women’s International Network in Menlo Park, and a women executives group at Cisco in San Jose, and I’ve guest lectured to her business students at Santa Clara University for several years.

“Ten years before Zoom became mainstream, GlobalNiche were already conducting live web video group meetings (using chat, recordings, etc) showcasing an ability to foresee trends and implement innovative solutions to increase opportunity.
— Tanya Monsef

"Ten years before Zoom became mainstream, GlobalNiche were already conducting live web video group meetings (using chat, recordings, etc) showcasing her ability to foresee trends and implement innovative solutions to increase opportunity,” she says.

"GlobalNiche was awarded Top Instructor by Udemy in 2013 as the most enrolled course.” You’ll see in the quick video above that Udemy noted we enrolled students from 17 nations in 2013.

Tanya recalls our 2013 win of an innovation challenge to connect 5 million women by national and international gender equality foundations, global health nonprofits, and academic leadership centers.

The multi-year strategic change initiative of San Jose State University, Public Health Institute (PHI), World Pulse, the Global Women's Leadership Network, Monterey Institute of International Studies, and the Global Fund for Women recognized GlobalNiche's pragmatic, resourceful plan to use free web technology and collaboration tools for connecting and transforming communities world-wide.

In 2013 GlobalNiche won an innovation challenge to connect 5 million women, recognition of a pragmatic, resourceful plan to use free web technology and collaboration tools.
— Tanya Monsef

ON CONTRIBUTING TO THE FUTURE OF WORK MOVEMENT

In 2014, I looked back on the workforce pioneering I’d done during GlobalNiche, and noted how awareness and adoption was coming for people who hadn’t yet felt the need for this online survival method:

“I’m proud to have added definition to, contributed to & participated in the movement toward every-day entrepreneurial thinking and acting and creative entrepreneurship as a solution for everyone, the incorporation of location independence and lifestyle design in populations beyond expats, travelers and life hackers, a new seriousness around digital identity, personal branding, digital footprints and online social networking in general for personal and professional development, reinvisioning the future of work with online collaboration and cocreation, the adoption of global communication best practices, the absolute tidal wave of online content marketing, the rise of the transformational consumer.”

UC Berkeley is #1 in the world for creating venture-funded startups

This week it was announced by Pitchbook 2023 University Rankings that University of California, Berkeley is #1 in the world for creating venture-funded startups.

In PitchBook's overall rankings in 2023, Berkeley is the top public university for producing startup founders for the sixth straight year.

I’ve loved being an entrepreneurship mentor to university students at both these institutions - the European Innovation Academy, the world’s largest extreme accelerator, and UC Berkeley’s School of Engineering Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology - and their entrepreneur programs!

Special shout out to Berkeley Method of Entrepreneurship program director Gigi Wang for bringing me to Cal as a mentor and a venture judge.

I’ve been consistently impressed with the problems UCB student entrepreneurs have chosen to address, and the fast work they achieve in these accelerated entrepreneurship environments. You can read about student ventures I worked with here and here and here and here.

Berkeley Method gets students thinking like entrepreneurs, click the image to read a 2018 article about it

Congrats to all!

The September Issue: Drop is "the future of delivery"

What does it look like when a pre-Series A startup is on newsstands in three national industry magazines at the same time?
— Like this!

Congrats to the young diverse team at Drop Delivery which Marijuana Venture calls in its cover story "The future of delivery".

Marijuana Venture writes: “After revolutionizing delivery tech in 2020, Drop Delivery is empowering businesses with even more customizable features to improve efficiency and increase sales.”

Women & Weed calls CEO Vanessa Gabriel “the delivery diva”.

Cannabis & Tech Today says Drop’s on a mission to help retailers optimize their day-to-day operations and delivery services with cutting-edge technology for a monthly subscription fee. That’s the SaaS model.

Why am I writing about Drop?

If you missed it, I’ve been pleased to be bringing my experience to Drop as their chief operating officer since last November!

The tech + cannabis industry space is having a particular moment, as legalization spreads to more states and during the pandemic “cannabis has become an essential household item.” California, which began adult-use sales in 2018, saw consumers rise to 45% of all adults in the first half of 2021 according to BDSA’s business intelligence and market share tracking. Consumption is on the rise across the nation.

Cannabis has become an essential household item. Consumerism has exploded. Delivery is the future.

…and the news does not stop.

Yesterday, Drop won the Poseidon Asset Management Green Shoots Pitch Forum, a special event that connects top-performing cannabis companies across all verticals (licensed and ancillary), with accredited investors. It’s organized by Poseidon, a first mover in the cannabis investment space named Top Hedge Fund Q3 2020 by Barclay Hedge. Winning sends Vanessa to pitch to investors on stage during MJUnpacked in Las Vegas in October, an industry conference for brands, retail executives, and investors.


Welcoming a babytech unicorn to the family

Mine is a household of entrepreneurs. My husband Burc and I have both been working in the tech venture and startup world for decades. We’ve done startups together too!

Today the Silicon Slopes Series-B IOT company he joined last year — Owlet Baby Care, which makes a smart sock to measure blood oxygen levels in infants, among other connected nursery products — announced their merger with a special acquisition corporation at a Wall Street valuation of more than $1 billion. That’s a unicorn in Silicon Valley parlance.

Among the new partners Owlet is gaining are some fashion world luminaries like Tommy Hilfiger and the chairman of Tom Ford, Domenico De Sole, who are sure to take Owlet from Utah to the world.

Congrats to everyone who made Owlet a success!

Our advisor Craig Kornblau advises Google Ventures on the future of film in a streaming world

It's been wonderful for the past year and a half having Craig Kornblau advise our entertainment tech startup 10 BLOCK  — and Google Ventures’ GV — on the intersection of the entertainment industry and the tech world. "The reason I decided to work with early-stage and growth companies is, having lived in big corporate America and big entertainment companies, it's really hard to find massive innovation in large companies. I think real innovation is going to come from small companies," he says in this interview about the future of film in a streaming world.

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Come see 10 BLOCK on Product Hunt today & let us know what you think

SXSW 2019 named us a top-10 cutting edge company this spring. Now come see our direct-to-consumer mobile streaming platform like no other at the early adopter emporium Product Hunt today, watch our movies for free, and tell us what you think.

Selected! Top 10 Company To Release Cutting-Edge Product On Stage At SXSW

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10 Block (formerly known as Second Screen) is on the 2019 SXSW homepage today.

We're top 10 finalists to release a new product on stage opening day at the premier interactive conference in Austin, Texas.

Congrats to our fellow finalists & good luck in March! See a full list below.

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Ampl
Santa Monica, CA

Ampl is an article discovery & article sharing platform that enables users to easily create conversations within shared articles on mobile. You can highlight text & add comments within articles, so a focused conversation is waiting for whoever you share the article with. It makes article sharing fun & easy.

Dorsum
Portland, OR

Dorsum is a company solving the problem of back pain caused by spinal misalignment during repetitive motion activities. Our supportive spinal device inserts into apparel as part of an interchangeable back support system. Dorsum is committed to creating purposeful and dependable products that adapt to motion and the user’s needs.

Leaf Tyme
Chicago, IL

The Leaf Tyme mobile app is a directory for the cannabis industry that connects consumers and patients to licensed dispensaries, brands, and clinics in their area. The platform allows users to find cannabis laws and regulations by state and learn how cannabis can help with common health conditions.

Lumous Helmet
Los Angeles, CA

Lumos is a next generation bicycle helmet that features integrated lights, brake, and turn signals. Lumos started as a Kickstarter campaign, and has gone on to be featured as one of Oprah’s Favorite Things and TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2018. Lumos is also the first and only bike helmet to be sold in over 300 Apple Stores worldwide.

Nori Health
Nieuwegein, Utrecht

AI-driven chatbot coach for chronic disease patients. Nori helps them through regular conversations to discover and change lifestyle factors that make symptoms worse. To find an optimal quality of life with positive relationships.

Reviver Auto-mWebb
Foster City, CA

Reviver Auto created the Rplate, the world’s first and only digital license plate, transforming the 125 year-old metal license plate into a multi-functional, bi-stable high definition digital display, and customizable, connected vehicle platform. It enables virtually any legacy vehicle to transform itself into a connected smart vehicle taking advantage of today’s and tomorrow’s technology including smart cities, AI, autonomous and semi-autonomous systems, various vehicle ownership business models and much more.

Riteband
Stockholm, CA

Riteband is a stock exchange for music that empowers artists by bringing them cash when they need it; from fans and other investors who buy their future music copyright revenues. Backers can make a profit through secondary trading, just like on the stock exchange. Find the hit. Make money.

10 Block
Venice, CA

10 Block transforms high quality feature films & TV series into an experience the mobile generation loves by making great stories into bite-size blocks you can discover, binge and share on your phone. Their platform helps content owners reach today’s mobile viewers in an addictive social community.

The Labz
Atlanta, GA

The Labz’ is a music collaboration platform that frees music creators from the complex burden of song ownership data collection, ownership splits and song registration. We do this by integrating into the music creator’s current music sharing and songwriting digital workflow, collect data while creators collaborate, take that data to instantly register their ownership on a Blockchain database platform, and auto-generate simple forms such as a copyright and a split-sheets.

Thisten
Winnipeg, Canada

Thisten is an audio to text platform that transcribes the world’s information – in real time. Backed by Google Creative Lab, Thisten was founded by Liz Jackson and members of SkipTheDishes’ startup team – Rui Melo, Ben Grynol and Sudeep Sidhu.



Second Screen featured in Europe's leading magazine for media & entertainment industry

In January I took a cofounder & COO role in Second Screen, a mobile startup in LA's Silicon Beach that aims to become the Netflix of bite-size series. Europe's magazine for the media & entertainment industry interviewed us for their May issue when they took a look at the adoption of second screen technology and other rapidly growing areas of mobile content.

Today they made the Second Screen app their cover star. Thanks to TVB editor Jenny Priestley for the interview of Second Screen's founder & CEO Estella Gabriel.

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"Wouldn't the clever idea be to create an app where viewers can watch content but also comment about it?" asks TVB Europe's editor in her note prefacing the magazine.

Estella talks about social discovery: "Instead of an algorithm like Netflix has, we use a referral system. You can see what your friends are watching."

You can read the whole issue here.

Chief Mentor At The European Innovation Academy

Honored to be a Chief Mentor at the European Innovation Academy this summer in Nice, France. (That's like Tim Gunn's role on Project Runway, for up to 7 groups of entrepreneurs.)

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500 college student entrepreneurs will take an idea to a tech startup in 15 days in this program that brings together faculty from 75 nations, and education programs developed with universities and organizations like UC Berkeley, Stanford, Google, IBM and Amadeus.

Thanks to Ajda Mustafova for making this connection.

 

 

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