Founding a company is both lonely and challenging – I know. Guarav Dhillon first went through this journey almost two decades ago when there were fewer support outlets. Now today as Dhillon is running Snaplogic, a company he started a couple of years ago, he is applying learnings from past experience – but also levering the infrastructure available to founders that did not exist before.
Dhillon founded Informatica in the mid-90s, first taking the company global then public. At the time there were only two books available about how to run a startup. To overcome this, he convened a trusted group of fellow founders for monthly dinners to discuss recruitment, how to manage their boards and funding.
Twenty years later, Dhillon is now the co-founder and CEO of Snaplogic, the cloud integration solution that helps enterprises connect data from the cloud, SaaS, and local applications into a single integrated platform.
Dhillon attributes the success of both Informatica and Snaplogic to timing. “Marketing timing is vital,” he said. Noticing a professional shift away from computer applications in HR, marketing and other data-based professions, Snaplogic has built a business that offers tools to accommodate the transition online.
It’s important that there be a change in the environment, and, as a result, a new set of technology is required.
During our conversation, Gaurav and I talked about starting a technology company before the web, how CEOs can learn from their mistakes, and the recent shift in enterprise software from applications to websites.
Editor’s Note: Michael Abbott is a general partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, previously Twitter’s VP of Engineering, and a founder himself. Mike also writes a blog called uncapitalized. You can follow him on Twitter @mabb0tt.
