Entrepreneur helps build on idea

NEWSMAKERS Q&A

Veteran entrepreneur advises how to build on idea

ONN-TV

Rich Langdale founder and  managing partner of NCT Ventures

“It takes one to know one.”

That six-word pronouncement, a time-honored retort on playgrounds across America, tops the list of guiding principles on the website of NCT Ventures, a Columbus-based venture-capital firm.

If the sentiment’s true, then Rich Langdale, NCT’s founder and managing partner, has the perfect credentials to spot — and cultivate — aspiring entrepreneurs with moneymaking ideas. There’s no disputing, after all, that he is one.

Langdale was in his early 20s, studying physics at Ohio State University, when he started his first company, Digital Storage. That was in 1986.

Since then, he has founded eight other companies and, through NCT, launched or acquired dozens more. Along the way, he has raised and invested hundreds of millions of dollars.    Among the companies he has helped shape: GotCast, a matchmaker for Hollywood executives and “undiscovered stars”; Phoenix Bat Co., a manufacturer of custom wooden baseball and softball bats; and Embrace Pet Insurance, an online insurance agency specializing in health-care policies for cats and dogs.

Ten years ago, just weeks after being dubbed “Golden Boy” on the cover of Smart Business magazine, Langdale and several NCT colleagues established OSU’s Center for Entrepreneurship. The academic unit quickly earned a tier-1 ranking from Entrepreneur magazine.

Langdale himself is a four-time finalist for Inc. magazine’s “Entrepreneur of the Year” designation.    Now, Langdale, who turns 47 this week, is looking to find, well, the next Rich Langdale.

He’s heavily involved — as a mentor and prospective investor — in “10-xelerator,” or “10x,” an 11-week competition featuring 10 teams of budding entrepreneurs. (The program was detailed in last week’s Newsmakers Q&A.)

The inaugural round of the program, sponsored by OSU’s Fisher College of Business and the state’s Third Frontier research-and-development initiative, is scheduled to conclude on Sept. 1.    NCT has committed $200,000 in follow-up funding to the winning team.    Langdale discussed his successes, philosophies and goals with Mike Kallmeyer, host of ONN-TV’s Ohio Means Business program. An edited excerpt:

Q: You’ve been called an “entrepreneurial guru.” Fair?
A: Well, I think that might be an overstatement, but I do enjoy entrepreneurship.

Q: I heard you sold your car for $5,000 to invest in your first company. Is that true?
A: That’s correct — my Honda Prelude. I loved that car, but I decided to start a business and needed some capital. It’s a lot more motivating when you don’t have a car to (get to) work.    So it worked out very well for me.

Q: There are a lot of great ideas out there. How do you bring something from the idea stage to reality?
A: When we talk about it in the venture world, we often say, “Ideas are worth nothing.” It’s all about execution, and execution is really (about) getting in front of the customers and understanding their true needs.

Q: When it comes to fostering entrepreneurs, what’s the biggest challenge in getting past the idea stage?
A: We have a lot of discussions around the academic halls about “Can you teach entrepreneurship?”    I think a lot of it’s a little inherent in your personality, but that biggest leap forward is really the comfort or the confidence of reaching out to customers, explaining what you’re going to do, and trying to get really valid feedback on: “Is this worth what I think it is to you?”    And (you need) the intellectual honesty to say: “Maybe it isn’t as good as I thought it was. What do I need to retool about this to make it truly valuable to my potential customers?”

Q: How satisfying is it for you, now, to give back and help young entrepreneurs?
A: It’s so much fun. It’s actually a lot more fun than building a business, because, (in) building a business, you have so many more stressful moments.    It’s a lot more fun to go in and say, “Hey, you should try this,” and then step back and let them actually try it.

Q: How’s the 10x competition gone so far?
A: I think it’s been amazing — better than I think we could have imagined. … There are a lot of quality people and a lot of quality ideas, and the way they’re approaching it has been very exciting to see.

Q: College kids aren’t the only aspiring entrepreneurs out there. There are a lot of older people out there trying to do startups. What’s your best advice to them?
A: Follow something you’re passionate about, to start with. Find something you’re passionate about that you can translate into a business vision, and then, from a business vision, move to a mission, which is “How do I apply this to an industry?” And then drill it down to a strategic plan and finally a financial plan.    Build all that out in advance, with feedback from your customers, and test it and bootstrap it, which is the concept of trying to have the partners of your business finance it as opposed to just trying to find capital and hoping your idea was a good one.    That’s a big answer — but there are a lot of pieces to it.