Entrepreneurship in the DC Area

I had been planning on writing my thoughts on this for a while, but spurred on by the announcement of a local tech incubator launching in the coming months, I felt it was time to write something.

Tech entrepreneurs, who dedicate so much of their lives to connecting people regardless of geographic location, still rely on real-world networking and face to face interaction. Online companies still need real world offices (with some exceptions). VCs and angels still want face to face presentations. And so on and so on. For things like this, the more local resources there are, the better chance of success. It’s long been said by seasoned tech entrepreneurs that the only place
to start a company is in Silicon Valley. I remember talking to the
founder of a now very popular company, and for him, the one thing that he felt he needed to make his company successful was pack up shop and move out West. He did that, and now they are huge.

It’s become crystal clear in my mind in recent months that my main focus is to launch my own startup. I’ve spent considerable amounts of time considering what’s necessary to accomplish that goal, and what resources are available to me. Persuaded by others, and backed up by reading article after article, I became convinced that what I really needed to do, before doing anything else, was move to Silicon Valley. But I like it here. Here is where I call home. Not to say I won’t ever move back out to California, but I refuse to think that I can’t accomplish anything here, solely because of where I am. If I were in Texaco, New Mexico, it would be one thing, but this is Washington DC, our nations capital.

Here is what DC has.

Talent – Step into the labs of any government agency, defense contractor, or consulting firm, and you’ll meet some of the smartest people around. Experts in their respective fields, they often remain unknown outside the confines of the entity they work for. I know this because I work around them. In this area, the way of life is working for a large firm or agency, as opposed to a startup.

Job Security – The government and contractors are always hiring talent. Coming out here with a solid technical background (citizenship a plus), you are guaranteed a job at any of these places. Depending on market forces, startups and established companies may thrive or whither away, but the government always runs, and will always need people. We’ll never see a mass exodus of talent away from this area, even if every startup dies up.

Education – I’m pretty biased here. I graduated from Maryland. I know the caliber of the students entering and graduating from Maryland. Fine, Maryland is no Stanford/MIT, but it’s already highly ranked, and climbing. I’ve seen what students like me can and have produced. Why have we not seen more come out of Maryland/GWU/American/etc… technology grads? Because the dominant recruiters at universities have been government and contractors. Most graduates never thought of anything else, other than choosing which branch of government to go for, or which firm to join. I can only think of one startup that I saw at a career fair in my four years there. None of my colleagues have gone to work for a startup, nor thought of it. As the DC tech community starts to focus away from government and more towards startups and the like, this will change. I’ve spoken with a recruiter for local startups about this a bit.

Access to Resources – New York, Philadelphia, Richmond, Delaware, all within a few hours drive. Boston a little bit further. All of these, in addition to those right here in DC, have significant capital, large companies to partner with, and people. People, people, people.

The one big thing we are missing? Experience. Yes, we have AOL (for now) and a handful of other dot-coms, but not an established ecosystem. Experience brings knowledge of how to launch and run a startup. Experience helps break away from the perception that it can’t be done out here. Experience shows kids like me and younger that something else can be done other than rising through the pre-defined ranks of a big company or branch of government. I know that some of the experience is out there, but it just needs to come out. Talk.

It’s an exciting time to be in the DC area.