Hi, After nearly 15 years of software design, development, deployment, support and deconstruction for some of the worlds largest corporations, Minno's founder and CEO, Nick Mayall, decided that the time was right to head out into the wild blue yonder and turn his hand to what he believed to be a much more rewarding and technologically innovative pursuit. Namely, the development of cross-platform, fully functional, bespoke mobile applications. Nick's major experience in the software field has been with Microsoft technologies; being instrumental in the implementation of enterprise class VB6 and .NET applications for blue chip clients. His expertise also extends to the back-end with significant time spent developing in SQL on Microsoft, Sybase and Oracle platforms.
So - that's me and my lil' startup..... I currently blog for AppVee.com (one of the 'Big 3' iPhone app review sites), and am a Microsoft profiled developer and blogger. I am looking for ways to keep the momentum going with my venture whilst still retaining control over my little baby. Nick On Jul 24, 7:44 am, Geoff McQueen - Hiive Systems <[email protected]> wrote: > Brendan, > > Awesome intro mate: great to have you on the list. > > Geoff > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] > [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Brendan Quinn > Sent: Friday, 24 July 2009 3:20 AM > To: Elias Bizannes > > Cc: [email protected] > Subject: [SiliconBeach] Re: Introductions > > Okay as I promised, here's my introduction. > > I'm Brendan Quinn, a 35 year old geek sort of trying to become a > business guy. I spent my first 28 years or so in Australia and have > been living in London since 2002. I hope that doesn't immediately > disqualify me from Silicon Beach membership... > > Going way back as people seem to do in these intros, I started in tech > with the obligatory Vic 20 / C64 / Amiga route, from the age of 8 or > so I was writing BASIC programs on the Vic 20 as there wasn't much > else you could do at the time! My interest in computers really > blossomed when I started at high school (Mazenod College in Mulgrave, > Vic) where we had a network of BBC Micros. You could write assembly > code on them really easily, and do fun things like send chunks of > random data to another machine's sound buffer, which kind of surprised > the kid doing his word processing assignment a few machines down in > the lab. Our teacher let us come in at lunchtimes, after school etc so > I built up a good background in programming/hacking and some good > friends -- for example I built a little electronic mail program on our > network in 1988. It wasn't until I read about the "10,000 hours > theory" in Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers" that i realised the value of > this experience! > > I was very lucky to go to uni at an amazing time -- I was doing a Comp > Sci honours degree at Monash (taught by some greats like Damian > Conway, now a legend in the Perl scene) when the web came out, so i > already had an understanding of the protocols behind FTP, TCP, NNTP > etc before HTTP was invented. And having access to Sun and SGI > machines we were able to use the very first browsers in 1993 and 1994. > So I knew that the web was the place to be. > > After part-time jobs at an ISP I worked for Sofcom Internet Publishers > as a developer from 1996 to 1998. But I missed out on the crazy days > of their ASX listing because I went to work at Fairfax, becoming their > "Online Editorial Technology Manager", ie the boss of the webmasters > for the Age, SMH and AFR. We implemented a new content management > system, grew the editorial tech team to 12 people, built the first WAP > news site in Australia and created some of the first RSS feeds, and > ended up running the tech side of the award-winning > olympics.smh.com.au, which was the only site to stay up throughout the > Sydney 2000 games (the official olympics.org and the news.com.au site > both fell over on day one and ours stayed up... I'm pretty proud of > that ;-) I worked with some amazing people and built up my frequent > flyer points, having a team split between Sydney and Melbourne. > > After that I set up a one-man consultancy, Clueful Consulting Pty Ltd > (www.clueful.com.au) doing specialist work around web content > management systems, syndication and metadata, which was fun for a year > but in early 2002 when I got a call from a Fairfax colleague who had > gone to work for the BBC, the lure proved too great and within two > months I was living and working in London. > > I'm still at the BBC (after more than seven years!!) but I've moved > around a bit, doing metadata, content management, digital > infrastructure and large-scale web architecture for what is one of the > world's biggest web sites. I've worked with people like Tim Berners- > Lee and the W3C, the Apache crew, most of the big tech companies you > can think of, and spoken at conferences all over the world. Fun times. > > In the meantime I've just completed an Executive (ie part-time) MBA at > London Business School through which I got a taste for startups, > entrepreneurship and innovation. I was lucky enough to go on exchange > for a term to UC Berkeley, living the dream in Silicon Valley for the > last half of 2008. > > I'm just about to start a new role at the Beeb looking at > commercialising the technology coming out of our Research & > Development unit, which will give me a great taste for how the venture > capital industry works, how to get new businesses started and build a > network of contacts in London and hopefully around the world. > > On the side I've been looking into some startup ideas, and my current > plaything iswww.mycharitypie.com, a new way of donating to charities > through direct debit. It works in prototype form but I haven't formed > a company, worked out the payment side of things etc. I started the > project throughwww.launch48.com, started by fellow Aussie expat Ian > Broom with his friend Adil Mohammed, nice blokes. > > Eventually I suppose I'll end up back in Australia so I want to keep > in touch with the startup scene, hence why I've been lurking on this > list. Hopefully I can provide a bridge between the Australian and > European startup community, and help make connections where I can. > > Phew! That's a big intro, sorry to bore you all :-) Looking forward to > some interesting discussions! > > Brendan.- Hide quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach Australia mailing list. Guidelines on discussion: http://tr.im/ujKF No lurkers! 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