Rudyard Partners LLC

Your Location

Rudyard Partners — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 00:55:30 +0000

Location-based services are becoming all the rage. Context is still missing on many of them. Although the ‘buddy-finder’ is not a new concept, the advent of real-time Web 2.0 publishing tools and presence-based networking is creating a much better visual experience. Also, nice to see a page without ads!

If we can tag geese and seals, we might as well tag people……feedback on this would be great!

Rudyard Sightings

Rudyard Partners — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 00:38:51 +0000

Inaugural Broad MBA Business Plan Competition - Saturday, March 24, 2012, East Lansing, MI- The Center for Venture Capital Private Equity and Entrepreneurial Finance is organizing the Inaugural Broad MBA Business Plan Competition in collaboration with the Institute of Entrepreneurship and the Broad MBA Program. Matthew will be a guest speaker sharing his challenges and experiences as an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, and discussing global opportunities for both entrepreneurs and venture capitalist. He will also be a guest on the final round of judging for the competition.

Who Are Your ‘Peeps’?

RudyardPartners — Tue, 08 May 2007 16:49:56 +0000

Selling ‘many’ of something to ‘many’ people is a winning strategy if you are Walmart. However, companies like Motorola have quickly learned that selling a different color RAZR to everyone is not much of a winning economic model with its mass market consumers. One model is to specialize to a particular demographic as Russell Simmons did with Phat Pharm or Apple did with U2 iPOD. What consumer groups have big bucks, big interests, and big pain points? This will definitely assist in determining who needs WIFI, Bluetooth, or mobile video. Which groups are early adopters and/or fast followers?

The Advent of Location-based Services?

RudyardPartners — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 17:33:01 +0000

Wanted: Compelling applications and usage models for accelerating LBS into the marketplace!!!! As more IP-based technologies pave the networking world (MAN, CORE, etc), we should begin to see ‘presence-based’ applications offer local advertising, extended user search, virtual buddy-finders, GPS-based accessories, and hundreds of other features spring to existence. I don’t mean mapping lost dogs or sleeping plow drivers, but really qualitative functions like sharing music store offers with listeners in physical proximity. Let me know if it’s still too early or we’re missing something cool!

AirPrint gets new funding, customers

RudyardPartners — Wed, 18 Apr 2007 00:34:51 +0000

Since its $1.45 million first round of funding last spring, Framingham’s AirPrint Networks Inc., a maker of cell-phone printing devices, has added new board members, established a distribution program and added additional capital to its first round.

With much of that internal infrastructure in place, the company has also begun working to get its cell phone printer into the hands of paying partners, and over the past month it has signed two such deals — with Florida’s Movie Tickets.com Inc. and California’s Coupons.com Inc.

While officials would not discuss the financial details of the deals, both are exclusive deals and allow consumers to print coupons or movie tickets from a cell phone.

AirPrint Networks founder and CEO Mark Thirman said that since the launch of the company last year he has seen interest in the ability to print small documents from a cell phone coming from more industries than he expected.

“Everybody says they are working to get rid of paper but, in the end, people like paper documentation. Grocers, movie theaters, sporting events. They all still use paper,” he said.

Others share Thirman’s opinion, including one of two new AirPrint board members added last fall, Matthew Growney, General Partner at Rudyard Partners, and a co-founder of Motorola Ventures in Lexington.

“The future will never completely trade atoms for bits,” said Growney. “The advantage of having a paper copy for transactions is its ability to physically audit, document, locate and monetize without too much additional technology.”

Read the full release at Mass High Tech

Welcome to the New World!

RudyardPartners — Tue, 30 Nov 1999 00:00:00 +0000

Welcome to Rudyard Partners. We look forward to learning about your ideas and co-developing exciting new companies and products. Stay tuned as we fine tune our new business! Or contact us with any questions.