Electric vehicles are making some real noise. Irvine-based Rivian just raised $2.5B more in funding from Ford Motors and Amazon, amongst other investors. Also in Irvine, Cox Automotive has invested previously, and parent company Cox Enterprises has invested over $1B in cleantech and sustainability...

Summertime is seeing a steady flow of fundings, especially in the consumer space! B2C is even hotter now that hybrid life has become the norm, especially for anything for the outdoors and have a technical connection to your phone or subscription/recurring business model. OC is poised to do well...

I’ve spent the last few years learning and sharing in tech communities. I’ve looked for other local leaders to share notes and to answer questions like “How do we grow our local talent pools?” Or “How do we find more local capital to invest in local companies?” By looking at how...

Summer is here, and it couldn’t come at a better time now that we are returning to some normalcy. While the economy continues to rebound, the housing market has been crazy, with tech companies like Zillow, Houzz, and Better.com increasing their presence in OC. OC is also home to Corelogic’s...

Happy June! In another strong signal of our local software ecosystem, public analytics software maker Alteryx is launching a $50M venture fund. The deep analytics roots and talent in OC is producing a number of early stage startups and now local capital will help fund them. This is a great win for...

The headlines have been full of ransomware hitting major companies, hospitals, and infrastructure. Due to today’s cyber climate, we have become numb to it unfortunately. Yet Southern California has been the epicenter of great cybersecurity technology and therefore is on the front lines of...

As we drive into May, I’m pretty pumped to see the auto scene alive, well and innovating in OC. While HAAS Motors of Lake Forest is building SUVs, the automaker is still working on a US manufacturing site. This adds to Hyundai, besides the local electric vehicle makers we’ve mentioned in...

Well the cat is out of the bag and I can finally announce that I have launched an angel investment syndicate to support our local companies. My partner Al Bsharah and I have been quietly recruiting local entrepreneurs and operators to combine small checks together to invest in companies. We were...

“What are you working on, Neal?” I actually get this question multiple times per day. Read my blog post here to learn about my recent journey and where I’m focusing my time between companies, investing, and community building. Here’s some stories I’ve been watching: Newport-based...

The Orange County tech scene has serial entrepreneur Richard Sudek’s fingerprints all over it. From taking initiative at the multiple local universities to catalyzing a de facto startup headquarters at The Cove, and coalescing local investors is just the tip of the iceberg of Rich’s successes...