Intel Capital invests $20mm in Telligent
Tuesday, September 23 2008 - Business
This post is much of the reason why I have done a poor job at blogging (will correct that soon enough)
Today is the day - we can finally shout it from the rooftops...
Official Announcement: http://telligent.com/news-and-events/news/intel-capital-to-acquire-20-million-stake-in-telligent/
SANTA CLARA, Calif., Sept. 23, 2008 – Intel Capital, Intel’s global investment organization, today announced an agreement to acquire a $20 million stake in Telligent Systems, makers of social computing solutions and business intelligence tools. Based in Dallas, Telligent will utilize the funds to expand its sales teams and territories, including growth in international markets, as well as increase its marketing and advertising initiatives and product development plans.
In September of 2004, Rob Howard reached out and asked me to chat about joining newly-formed Telligent. While jumping around like a kid in a candy store, I was also terrified at the thought of being grilled technically by Rob Howard & Jason Alexander. (I think I ate 2 bites of lunch and threw up afterwards :p). However, instead of an in-depth technical interview, our discussion was around a larger vision. With Scott Watermasysk, Rob & Jason talked about their plans to build a Telligent as a solutions company - focusing around our Products and Service offerings. Back in 2004, Rob & Jason talked about their vision of a product called Community Server, which would serve as the online collaboration platform of the future - bringing blogs, forums, galleries together in one platform to better facilitate collaboration. With our second child on the way, I was a little nervous going to a start-up company. However, my strong belief in their vision, commitment to the business, and demonstrated leadership qualities - along with my strong desire to build a world-class Professional Services organization, I accepted the position and became Telligent Employee #5. I am proud of our company - and have our team members to thank.
4 years later, here we are talking about an investment. This is a huge day for Telligent. We're extremely excited for the possibilities and the next steps for our company. We've been hard at work planning this investment for quite a while now, and it is exciting to be able to blog about it. We're going to aggressively expand many of our our teams (including our Professional Services team - who is set to almost double in the next year alone). Our leadership team is laser focused on continuous improvement of our business and better servicing our customers.
To our customers, thank you for your trust and partnership with Telligent. To our team members, THANK YOU for your hard work and dedication.
As Jason said, "hold on to your hats", it's going to be a fun ride.
