Wireless Moves: DotCom DotGone
Wireless Start-Up: Aereon Solutions
Another Wireless Startup: Tellshare
OUT Expansion: Sycamore Ventures
Corrections or additions?
This article was prepared for the January 23, 2002 edition of U.S.
1 Newspaper. All rights reserved.
Life in the Fast Lane
Top Of PageWireless Moves: DotCom DotGone
If Broadbeam is making record progress in the B-to-B
side of the wireless revolution, the consumer side of wireless is
coming along much more slowly. Another central New Jersey firm,
GeePs.com,
was going to be the next great thing for the wireless consumer. Using
the global positioning system, it was supposed to be a way to flash
neighborhood-specific information (and advertising) to people with
Palm Pilots.
Geeps.com had a total of $7 million in funding, mostly from Great
Britain and Europe, where wireless usage is much more pervasive than
it is here. But because consumer use of wireless in this country is
progressing much slower than predicted, the company has gone into
“hibernation mode,” says Aezaz Hussain.
He chose those words carefully. Hussain is CEO of Visionnet Systems,
which has a stake in Geeps. “The investors still own the
intellectual
property,” he says. “If the wireless revolution happens later,
maybe we will come back to it.”
“It will take two or three years, maybe even longer for those
kinds of technologies to mature in the U.S.,” says Arshad Masood,
former president of Geeps.com (See article below on Masood’s new
company, Aereon Solutions). Andy Goren, former CEO of Geeps.com, has
moved to San Francisco.
GeePS.com, 3 Cedar Brook Drive, Cranbury.Top Of PageWireless Start-Up: Aereon SolutionsArshad Masood left two companies — Visionet Systemsand a dotcom wireless marketing firm, Geeps.com — to head a newcompany in the wireless field. Aereon Solutions has offices atPrincetonForrestal Village in HQ and should not be confused with the aviationfirm, Aereon Corporation, at 20 Nassau Street.A new team of six employees are “self-funding” AereonSolutions,meaning that they are not getting paid until the money starts comingin. “We are aggressively looking for clients and working on thefirst software piece to be completed in the first quarter,” saysMasood. The other key partner here is COO/CFO Nigel Gardner, who isexperienced with start-ups.Aereon Solutions has a vertical market: to bring wireless automationto small and medium-sized contracting firms. Wireless devices caneliminate telephone calls and double entry paperwork. “They canaccess the customer history, do the work, leave the bill, and moveright on to the next stop,” says Masood.”We are doing something tangible for the customer, versusmarketingwhich is not really necessary,” says Masood, explaining why hisnew firm has a brighter future than GeePS.com “If you can’t servea customer today with some tangible ROI (return on investment), itis impossible to survive.””Only three or four companies are in our vertical market,”says Masood. Several of these companies are in start-up mode and amajor competitor on the west coast is FieldCentrix. “We arebuildingour IP to show our future clients and then we will go out and partnerwith larger firms,” he says.Masood has the patience to build a company from scratch. He earnedan undergraduate degree in engineering in Pakistan, has a MS incomputerscience from the University of Guelph in Canada, and an MBA fromBaruchCollege in New York. He worked at IBM as a sales manager for severalyears before starting Visionet Systems in 1989. It took him six orseven years to grow Visionet from a one-person self-funded company,into a viable business, and he moved out of a home office in 1996(U.S. 1, November 29, 2000).Now Visionet Systems, an IT consulting company for the apparel andmortgage industries, has 30 people at Cedar Brook Drive. Its clientsinclude Liz Claiborn, Maidenform, Timberland, and Countrywide HomeLoan (www.visionetsystems.com).Initially Masood’s new company, Aereon, will target HVAC companieswith about 15 trucks. “Bigger companies can automate bythemselves,but we are packaging the solution for the smaller ones and makingit painless for them. We believe we can make a 20 to 30 percentsavings.”Aereon Solutions, 116 Village Boulevard, Suite201, Princeton Forrestal Village, Princeton 08540. Arshad Masood.609-524-4030; fax, 609-524-4031.Top Of PageAnother Wireless Startup: TellshareText messaging that’s fast, fun, and free — that’sthe business model of Tellshare, a wireless messaging provider thatwants to tap the youth market. Despite the uneven record of wirelessadvertising firms such as Geeps.com (see previous story), Tellsharethinks it can create an audience for opt-in, permission-basedpromotionalmaterials, and it pins its hopes on a market of 15 millionundergraduatestudents.”Teenagers and college students register with us for free,”says Jay H. Paszamant, the president of the five-person firm thatrecently moved from 1,400 square feet in North Brunswick to a similarspace in Research Park. “They enter their cell phone number andcarrier and get the newest gizmos. No matter what carrier they haveor what device they use, if they have messaging capability they canuse our service for free.”Marketers and advertisers catering to this youth market will offerdeals, promotions, coupons, contests, and sweepstakes, all”permission-based,”meaning that the users don’t receive anything if they don’t want to.”It is another way for us to create a value added service,”says Paszamant.What kind of deals might these be? Time-sensitive offers areespeciallypotent. Say you are producing a concert or a sporting event in Trentonand, two days before the event, you have bales of unsold tickets.You could “paper the house,” the insider’s lingo for callingup charities and offering the tickets for free. Or you could beamyour ad for half-priced seats to Tellshare users in Central Jersey.”We are trying to help those venues fill the seats and generateadditional revenue,” says Paszamant. An in-house copywriter anddesigner can help produce the ads. “We offer value added service.We are approaching the advertising industry to use our services asan additional channel for their clients.”Tellshare’s goal is to be a complete solution provider for wirelesstechnology, such as www.upoc.com and www.planethopper.com”We want to be the wireless portal to take us to the generationY market,” he says, “the third generation networking to theUnited States. We want to be involved in multimedia messaging andgaming, to be on the ground floor when the third generation comesout.”Paszamant aims to avoid the pitfalls experienced by Geeps.com becausehis is a regional service that targets college campuses. “We arein a pilot test in all the four-year colleges in New Jersey. We havea marketing campaign with postering throughout the campuses. It seemsto be the most effective way.”Those with cell phones or pagers sign up for the service and thenget all the messages, whether they want to or not. They respond bycalling a toll-free number to talk to the application directly, orthey can use wireless application protocol (WAP). Those with web-basedPalm Pilots can choose to get a particular message. So can thoserespondingfrom their laptop or desktop PCs.Paszamant is particularly enthusiastic about the market for wintertourism. “Skiers can sign up to get snow reports. Sometimes theyare traveling and don’t have their computers with them. Now they don’thave to dial a number and pay minutes. We are talking about agenerationthat doesn’t want to spend money.”A resident of Skillman, Paszamant and his wife, a professionalfundraiser,have two school-aged children. His Hungarian grandfather founded MonteCarlo Wines in New Brunswick, and the successor was the Monarch WineCompany. Paszamant went to the University of Miami, Class of 1984,and worked in the financial markets before joining the familybusiness,doing marketing. “I stayed with them until I started my ownbusiness.”Tellshare started out as a web application development firm, DigiTechnologies. It bolsters its cash flow by providing messagingservicesto other companies’ websites, so potential customers can sign up toget “alerts.” The firm’s accountant is Carl Gensib of NorthBrunswick, and it is looking for angel investors. “We are notin the VC stage yet,” says Paszamant. If Tellshare’s idea is sogood, why isn’t everyone doing it? “It is too new,” is thefamiliar refrain. “Everybody is sitting back waiting for othersto start.”Tellshare, 22 Wall Street, Princeton 08540. JayH. Paszamant, president. 609-924-4224; fax, 609-924-4465. Homepage: www.tellshare.com— Barbara FoxTop Of PageHardware For WirelessLamina Ceramics, a Sarnoff company that works on highperformance ceramic printed circuit boards for optical and wirelesspackaging, has landed $12 million in venture capital financing fromMorgenthaler Venture Partners. Actually, this money came through lastAugust, but the company waited to make the official announcement ofthis funding until last week.Its contact at the Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm is GregE. Blonder, a former Bell Labs inventor who is also the VC contactfor Princeton Lightwave, a Sarnoff spinoff that moved to Route 130.Bob Pavet is also a Morgenthaler partner who is on the Lamina board.Lamina Ceramics was founded in April, 2001, and plans to move fromSarnoff’s building soon, says Taylor Adair, president and CEO (U.S.1, October 10, 2001).”The name of the technology we are commercializing is lowtemperatureco-fired ceramic on metal,” says Adair. “The advantage tometal, is that it constrains the shrinkage of the ceramic when itis fired, provides a thermal heat sink, and increases the flexuralstrength of the ceramic.” Such strength helps to eliminatebreakagewhen manufacturing large packages or boards.Potential clients are manufacturers that need a high speed backplane(a circuit board that links other circuit boards). “Nobody weare aware of has commercialized this technology,” says Adair.Lamina Ceramics, 201 Washington Road, Princeton08540. Taylor Adair, CEO. 609-720-4949. Www.laminaceramics.comTop Of PageCrosstown MovesBCA & Associates Inc., 103 Carnegie Center, Suite309, Princeton 08540. Joyce Morrison, controller. 609-452-0889; fax,609-243-9602.Tom Colitsas, an accountant and financial planner who emphasizesfranchising,has six restaurants of his own, and the company that runs them (BCA& Associates) will be moving into the suite next door to Colitsasin the fall. In the meantime, the two firms have temporarilyconsolidatedand are working out of the same space.One of the six restaurants is Steak Escape in Quakerbridge Mall.deSaules Placements, 100 Overlook Center, SecondFloor, Princeton 08540. Pat deSaules, owner. 609-520-0700; fax,609-520-0866.Pat deSaules has moved from Alexander Park, at 791 Alexander Road,to 100 Overlook. Similarly, she has moved her firm’s focus frompersonnelplacement to executive search and consulting.Top Of PageDeathsJames P. Harrah, 76, on January 17. He founded Harrahand Associates on Nottingham Way, and his son, Scott, is now presidentof the business insurance agency.Top Of PageLeaving TownFuturestep, 103 Carnegie Center, Suite 307,Princeton08540. Alan George. 609-716-7616; fax, 609-716-7206. Home page:www.futurestep.comThis office of the executive recruiting firm, a project of Korn/FerryInternational and the Wall Street Journal, has closed. The businessplucks recruits off the Web. It targets only middle-market managementand doesn’t rigorously assess each candidate, as is the standard atKorn/Ferry.A company representative at headquarters in Sherman Oaks, California,says the nearest office is now in New York City.cktk Lisa is his daughter in law.Top Of PageOUT Expansion: Sycamore VenturesSycamore Ventures, 845 Alexander Road, U.S. TrustBuilding, Princeton 08540. Peter Gerry, managing director.609-759-8888;fax, 609-759-8900. Home page: www.sycamorevc.comA five-year-old venture capital firm, Sycamore Ventures, just acquireda Princeton address. The 13-person office moved from 4,700 squarefeet at 989 Lenox Drive to 5,700 feet on the first floor of the U.S.Trust Building at 845 Alexander Road on Friday, January 11 and hasa new phone and fax.Among the firm’s three founding partners is a man with impeccablepolitical connections, John Whitman, husband of the former governor,Christine Todd Whitman. Peter Gerry and Kilin To are also managingpartners. They have have invested in more than 100 companies and havetaken 20 companies public. They have sold or merged 40 companies,and they have offices in San Francisco and Asia.Sycamore Ventures, the only tenant of U.S. Trust, has a five yearlease with a renewal option. Bob Sobel of the Acclaim Grouprepresentedthe tenant and Buzz Woodworth of Keller Dodds & Woodworth thelandlord.Architect Joel David Zieden designed the interior to have 14 perimeteroffices, a large interior conference room, and a large file room,and two secretarial areas. Michael Riesz and Co. of Fords, New Jersey,was the general contractor.Except for the new office’s proximity to the train station, Princetonnot a particularly convenient location for the Whitmans who live inNorth Jersey. “We looked for an office further north, but therereally are not a lot of class A buildings along the 206 corridor thatwould be convenient for everyone,” says David Lichtenstein, thechief financial officer who planned the move.With $450 million under management, the firm focuses on second stagethrough IPO companies in the areas of information technology andbiotechnology.Its active funds are Sycamore Venture Capital, an SBIC fund startedin November 1999 that has $51 million in private capital. As a SmallBusiness Investment Corporation, it gets federal funds matched twofor one, so the fund can be $153 million. The Asia Star IT fund,startedin May, 2000, has $165 million. Earlier funds are fully invested andare in “harvest mode.”An Edison-based consumer products company with brands such as”CarpetFresh”, “X-14,” and “2000 Flushes,” was acquiredby WD-40 Company last April.One of Sycamore’s first computer investments was Taiwan-based AcerGroup, now the sixth largest PC manufacturer in the world. Othercomputercompanies are ASUSTeK Computer, the largest global PC system boardmanufacturer; ACM Research Corporation (a semiconductor equipmentmanufacturing company for polishing and plating in copperinterconnect,headquartered in northern California), and three more Taiwan-basedcompanies.In the telecommunications and networking industries, Sycamore hasinvested in companies based in Texas, Florida, California, India,Tokyo, and Jedai Broadband Networks in Red Bank.Among Sycamore’s other companies in New Jersey are two dotcoms.Edison-basedEasylink (www.easylink.com) provides business messaging services andwent public in June, 1999. RxHope.com, in Hackettstown, is a websitewhere doctors can request free medication for their indigent patients.In 1998 these VCs invested in Juno Online Services, helped it gopublic,and sold its position. Juno recently agreed to merge with NetZero,and the resulting firm (United Online) may be the second largestInternetaccess provider in the US. Other dotcom companies are in Canada andShanghai.Software, healthcare and biotechnology, media and broadcasting, andfinancial services are among the other investment areas.Whitman went to Yale, Class of 1966, and has a Harvard Business SchoolMBA. He has had several positions at Citicorp and was an advisor tosuch firms as the Ford Motor Company, AT&T Venture Corp., theHungarian-AmericanEnterprise Fund, British and Commonwealth Holdings PLC, Coopers &Lybrand, the United States Agency for International Development(U.S.A.I.D.),and Prudential Securities Inc. From 1987 to 1990 he was CEO ofPrudential-BacheInterfunding Inc., a merchant banking fund.Gerry graduated from Harvard in 1968 and received his MBA from theHarvard Business School. He has been president of two Citicorp equityinvestment subsidiaries, president of the New York Venture CapitalForum, and has served two terms as the governor of the NationalAssociationof Small Business Investment Companies.To earned his master’s degree in electrical engineering from PrincetonUniversity in 1969 and an MBA from the Wharton School in 1979. Heworked at Philips Electronics, RCA Corporation, AT&T Corporation andDigital Equipment Corporation, was president of Citicorp InvestmentsInc., and vice president at Citicorp Venture Capital Ltd. To divideshis time between the United States and the four Asian offices —in Hong Kong, Taipei, Singapore and Shanghai — which total 10people. The VCs are hiring for the Asian offices.Corrections or additions?This page is published by PrincetonInfo.com— the web site for U.S. 1 Newspaper in Princeton, New Jersey.
