Chargify handles every aspect of recurring billing for your Web 2.0 or SaaS company so there’s no need to build a custom billing application. In addition to processing one-time and recurring transactions, Chargify handles free trial periods, one-time fees, promotions, refunds, email receipts and even dunning (reminders for failed credit card payments). Powerful reporting tools provide information to help you make sound decisions about your company’s future. Level 1 PCI compliance ensures your customers’ billing information is always secure.

Cloud Foundry, a VMware-led project is the world’s first open Platform as a Service (PaaS) offering. Cloud Foundry provides a platform for building, deploying, and running cloud apps using Spring for Java developers, Rails and Sinatra for Ruby developers, Node.js and other JVM frameworks including Grails.

There's a big difference between being self-employed and being a business owner.

Being self-employed feels like freedom until you realize that if you take time off, your business crumbles.

To be a true business owner, make sure you could leave for a year, and when you came back, your business would be doing better than when you left.

The past four years have been a wild ride for us: growing something from nothing to substantial scale, providing a simple service that people love because it simplifies their lives. We’ve learned tons along the way, often by making big mistakes. We’re really sorry that this last lesson means that you’ll have to find an alternative to Xmarks, but the alternatives exist and you’ll have no problem finding them.

The other stand is different. The lemonade is free, but there's a big tip jar. When you pull up, the owner of the stand beams as only a proud eleven year old girl can beam. She takes her time and reaches into a pail filled with ice and lemons. She pulls out a lemon. Slices it. Then she squeezes it with a clever little hand juicer.

The whole time that's she's squeezing, she's also talking to you, sharing her insights (and yes, her joy) about the power of lemonade to change your day. It's a beautiful day and she's in no real hurry. Lemonade doesn't hurry, she says. It gets made the right way or not at all. Then she urges you to take a bit less sugar, because it tastes better that way.

...

Finally, once she's done, you put $5 in the jar, because your free lemonade was worth at least twice that. Well, maybe the lemonade itself was worth $3, but you'd happily pay again for the transaction. It touched you. In fact, it changed you.

So, how do you quadruple the size of your engineering team in one month and still keep everyone productive?

Om du står inför en företagsstart, eller redan har ett företag, ger inkubatorprogrammet dig möjlighet att utveckla och förädla din affärsidé.

Inom programmet erbjuds du ett flertal aktiviteter som bidrar till att ditt företaget växer och utvecklas utifrån behov och förutsättningar.

What does the "Media Business Model" mean?

Fred Wilson says:

Most web apps will be monetized with some kind of media model. Don't think banner ads when I say that. Think of all the various ways that an audience that is paying attention to your service can be paid for by companies and people who want some of that attention.

Since I've started my new career as a venture capitalist I have become keenly aware of some of the classic mistakes that geeks make when trying to raise money for a new business. Instead of writing the same comments over and over again I thought I'd try to summarize some of the mistakes that people -- especially smart people -- make when they decide to try to turn their bright ideas into money. Here then is my top-ten list of geek business myths:

Through the following tips, tricks, and examples, we will discuss the methods that worked and those that didn't. We will show you how to slip into a rapid prototyping state of mind, how to set up an effective team, and where to start if you've thought abo