Mark Swanson On Helping Build A Company To $2+ Billion Valuation And Now Building The World’s First Virtual Studio Network

In the world of startups, where every decision can lead to success or failure, the stories of resilience, innovation, and purpose often stand out the most. Mark Swanson, an entrepreneur with a journey spanning several decades, exemplifies these qualities.

Mark’s latest venture, Vu Technologies, has attracted funding from top-tier investors like Accenture (NYSE: ACN), Lane Five Ventures, Topmark Partners, Jacques Fu, and ADX Labs.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Entrepreneurship can be born from unexpected experiences, like Mark Swanson’s journey from military leadership to startup culture.
• Being ahead of the curve in technology, as seen with Swanson’s ventures in the early days of the internet and cloud, can be both a blessing and a challenge.
• Resilience and adaptability are crucial in entrepreneurship, especially when facing unexpected setbacks like losing a major investor or surviving the dot-com crash.
• Building a successful startup often requires creativity and resourcefulness, as illustrated by Swanson’s early fundraising and strategic hiring tactics.
• As Swanson did with Telovations in healthcare, targeting a specific niche market can lead to rapid growth and market leadership.
• Transitioning from a technical to a business role can be rewarding, especially when viewing business operations as a form of engineering.
• Helping others succeed can become a fulfilling purpose after years of entrepreneurial success, as Swanson discovered through mentoring and startup coaching.

 

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About Mark Swanson:

Mark Swanson has an extensive work history in various leadership roles and is currently the Chairman and CTO at Vū Technologies. In 2001, he co-founded and became the Managing Director of Lane Five Ventures, a technology consulting and angel investment firm.

Mark has also been the owner, co-founder, and CEO of Bacchetta Bicycles, a leading recumbent cycle manufacturing company, which he sold after 20 years. Mark served as the CEO of Spheriance from 2020 to 2022 and was the Chairman of Diamond View in 2021.

Additionally, Mark has held positions such as Lead Consultant at Jabil and USSOCOM, where he led technology innovation projects. He also served as the Vice President at Bright House Networks, responsible for strategic initiatives and managing voice services.

Furthermore, Mark was the Co-founder, Chairman, and CEO of Telovations, a Cloud Telephony Company. He invested in and turned around a marketing firm, Boost Branding, where they served as Chairman.

Mark has a track record of creating transformational business initiatives, building new service lines, and driving revenue growth. He has also been involved in projects involving Israeli Fintech startups, blockchain applications for real estate, and broadband infrastructure solutions.

Mark Swanson earned a Master of Business Administration (MBA) and a Master of Science degree from the Georgia Institute of Technology, specializing in Management of Technology (MOT). He completed this program in 1994.

Prior to that, Mark attended the United States Military Academy at West Point, where he obtained a Bachelor of Science (BS) degree in Computer Engineering.

Connect with Mark Swanson:

• LinkedIn
• TheOrg
• Crunchbase
• RocketReach

Read the Full Transcription of the Interview:

Alejandro Cremades: All righty. Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Dealmaker show. So today we have a founder that has done it so many times that they you know it’s a it’s kind of dizzy. And just to think about all the startup stories, the startup war stories, we’re going to be talking about building, scaling, financing, taking companies public.

Alejandro Cremades: you name it. So again, prepare yourself for a really powerful session today. We’re going to be talking about finding your purpose. We’re going to talk about you know also how to get ah out of like crazy deals where things you know happen last minute. you know We see that a lot when it comes to fundraising as well, why he was for a few years without starting a company after having done a few before that. And again, a lot of the good stuff that we like to hear. So without further ado, let’s welcome our guest today, Mark Swanso. nWelcome to the show.

Mark Swanson: I’m great to be here, Alejandro.

Alejandro Cremades: So originally born in New York, and also you know to a family full of teachers. So give us a walk through memory lane. How was life growing up for you?

Mark Swanson: Well, it was great. I had very um attentive parents who really focused on education. and So both of them were, my mom was an elementary school teacher. My dad was a high school teacher. And so learning was very important to me. um Fortunately, they moved from New York when I was ah just four years old. So I didn’t have to shovel snow growing up. And I ended up growing up down in the Tampa Bay area of Florida.

Mark Swanson: and ah really had a good good childhood there and played sports and did all the things that young young boys do ah growing up.

Alejandro Cremades: Now in your case, you ended up in the military and today that’s actually where you ended up learning entrepreneurship.

Mark Swanson: Yes, I did.

Alejandro Cremades: I mean, it’s quite the place to be learning on entrepreneurship. so why So how did this happen?

Mark Swanson: Well, in high school, I was trying to figure out where I was going to, you know what I was going to do and where I was going to go to college. My parents encouraged me to apply to college, but we didn’t have a lot of money. So I applied the military academy, which you can get us everyone gets a scholarship in, and I was lucky enough to get accepted. And it’s a great education, and it was a great experience in leadership, which I think I took that with me into my entrepreneurial career.

Mark Swanson: But upon graduating, well, first of all, I was there studying computer science, which wasn’t called that way back then. um But I ended up um graduating with a degree of engineering and and focused on math, which I ah really enjoyed math more than writing, but I’ve since learned to write a lot better and no recognize the importance of that. So I went in the military as an aviation officer. I was lucky enough to to command two aviation units, including

Mark Swanson: the first one, which was the the first activating troop of Apache helicopters. And so unlike most military units where you join and everybody had been there, I was the first person to show up to the unit and ah they assigned to me all these different pilots and maintenance people and stuff. So I had the first opportunity to really shape a culture of an organization ah from the ground up without having to inherit something.

Mark Swanson: And that experience was tremendous for me. I mean, it felt really like a startup in the military. So because we were inventing manuals, we were inventing tactics, we were trying to figure out what works in terms of gunnery. And being the first and trying to start up that unit, it was a formative experience in my life and I wanted to have it again. And I remember my commander, when I i left command, he said,

Mark Swanson: You know, you did a great job, Mark, but you’ll never have this experience again of of forming a unit. And I’m like, why not? And so that led my inquiry into entrepreneurship. And I decided I later became a test pilot. I really didn’t like that that much. So I decided to get out of the military and pursue an entrepreneurial career. I wanted to be an entrepreneur of the day I got out of the military.

Alejandro Cremades: So that’s what happened. You went to Georgia Tech you know to polish the business skills and also the computer skills. But right out of that, you started Swann Interactive.

Mark Swanson: yeah

Alejandro Cremades: And you know out of all things, you know you started doing your fundraising rodeo there, and something really, really crazy happened. So I guess first and foremost, what were you doing at Swann? And then what happened during that fundraising journey?

Mark Swanson: Well, i learned I got lucky at Georgia Tech and learned a lot about 3D graphics and especially the internet. I didn’t know that. And that was in the 92, 93 time frame, which the internet was only there. so But it really wasn’t a there was no business opportunity that early on. But what I ended up doing was I i started doing some multimedia projects ah while in school. I did some freelance programming, but um I was able to recruit a couple people there. and Initially, it wasn’t even a company, but and through that work and through the team I started building, it was we incorporated in early 94.

Mark Swanson: and and then and started that business. and it was ah I didn’t really have much money, so I had to ah really be very creative on the ways that I was able to to start growing that company. So a good example of mike of the creativity was I had a guy I really wanted to employ. He was my first business development guy, but he was moving to to Atlanta, and that’s where I started. it And he could not ah Ford, the salary, I wanted to pay him. I was paying him two grand a month, but I gave him a deal where I said, you could live in my basement and for free, and I’ll pay all the the expenses there if you come. and and He really wanted some entrepreneurial experience, and and he joined the team.

Mark Swanson: Well, that company started growing, and and I needed some money. So my sister-in-law introduced me to the guy that invented super glue, which is a company called Loctite, a guy named Dr. Robert Krebel. So I went out and pitched to him on my yacht, on his yacht. I didn’t have a yacht then.

Mark Swanson: And he wrote me a letter back and said, hey, I’m really interested and I want to put together a group of my friends or he has a group of his friends that invested. So I went up there and pitched all them. And you know this was a six month process and I was still growing. I’m pretty much out of money. But we fortunately signed the deal.

Mark Swanson: And then what ended up happening was we came back and we had a closing dinner on Friday night. This was in the spring of, ah I think 97 or winter of 97. And that weekend he had a heart attack and passed away. So I had a really odd situation where I had already, you know, the, the, the, these deals come together very long. So I’m already a hiring ahead of time. I’ve got people that I couldn’t make payroll in in at the end of the month. And yet this money that I thought for sure was coming in was held up and and would go into probate. So I ended up having to figure out a way to do that. And I knew ah but of a guy that

Mark Swanson: in He had sold his ah television stations and was looking for companies to merge with. He had ah recently purchased a company that did video production and and also graphic design and really needed some engineers.

Mark Swanson: i um basically went there and explained my situation to him. I had lunch with him and and come to tell, you know, I found out he had the exact same experiences. His co-founder dropped dead. So he and I um struck up a partnership. We merged our companies together and I was able to go and take the CTO role on that as he was um putting these companies together to go after the internet. So um

Alejandro Cremades: Well, I mean, that was quite the shift because say the company ended up going public. you know I’m sure that it was saying crazy times during that dot-com craze.

Mark Swanson: and Yeah, it was very crazy. i mean we In when I was still at Swan Media, I had been preaching about the internet and the great things. And a lot of people, if you can imagine this, in 1995 and 1996, a lot of people thought it was a fad a technology fad.

Mark Swanson: um But all that business I had been developing for a year or two came back in 96 and i couldn’t you know that I had way more business that I could possibly do. So everybody was interested in it then and then it only blew up from there from 96 to 99. It was an incredible run.

Mark Swanson: And we we grew that business ah from $7 million dollars the first year up to $150 million dollars within within four years. So it was you you know just unbelievable.

Alejandro Cremades: Wow. What was the valuation? At the peak of the company, what was the valuation?

Mark Swanson: ah Over $2 billion.

Alejandro Cremades: That’s unbelievable.

Mark Swanson: Yeah.

Alejandro Cremades: That is unbelievable. So obviously, in this case, you know you had the the success experience, right? I mean, in quite a remarkable journey. ah But then the the next time around, you guys say did the same rodeo with Abgenesis, but you did it in this in Silicon Valley.

Alejandro Cremades: You raised about $70 million. bucks You were competing with the likes of Marc Andreessen with Netscape. But they obviously, you know, the

Mark Swanson: Well, no, it wasn’t with Netscape, it was with LoudCloud.

Alejandro Cremades: With lab cloud, but but that was the time of the dot com bubble, you know, ah bursting.

Mark Swanson: his

Alejandro Cremades: So how was how was going through that?

Mark Swanson: Well, you know, you’re at You’re at a point, it’s kind of like now, I feel like, where we have the AI bubble and you feel like it’s never going to end. um But I think you know it’s inevitable that the expectations exceed reality. um But we you know it’s it’s kind of hard to see it when you have you know customers asking for your product and services like that.

Mark Swanson: and ah And also, the the the sums of money you know that are being invested in these things are so big, they give you a lot of runway. um But it’s it’s one of those things where you you you’re not getting much sleep you know two or three hours a night, it seemed like, and you’re just trying to take a mo advantage of a moment in time. But unfortunately, with AppGenesis, we raised all that money in late 99, 2000 timeframe.

Mark Swanson: And you know the the bubble was just starting to to peak right around then. And so the biggest problem we had, you know it I felt like it reflected at the board level, the board didn’t understand why were our revenues going down, but our business, which was an infrastructure as a service, was very appealing to startups.

Mark Swanson: and ah And when all these startups started running out of funding, it wasn’t that our customers were leaving us, they were going out of business. So we had probably 60 to 70% of our customers in six months went out of business. And so it became, and and when they do that, they leave you with a long trail of of unpaid bills and you know invoices that they won’t ah respond to. And so it becomes becomes a very difficult situation in a very short amount of time.

Alejandro Cremades: So then in this case, I mean, you end up a turning page with a company. You move to Florida ah to take care of your mom. And also about three years, I believe, go by until you end up being going at it again you know with another company. You were involved with a bunch of stuff, with your brother-in-law, with your neighbor. But three years without starting a company, that’s ah a long time.

Mark Swanson: Well, I didn’t, i I felt a little, you know, ah burned out to be honest with you when, when I threw the app chance to experience. So that had been about a 10 year stretch of just really going at it hard. um But I really felt like I, the skills I gained really were applicable to helping other people.

Mark Swanson: um so I tried to do a couple of startups then, and I helped out too. My brother-in-law, he was a passionate biker and he was a bike designer. He did this in his garage. so I helped him start a business and we grew that to the largest recumbent bike manufacturer in the world.

Mark Swanson: And then I was helping a neighbor who his business because of a regulatory change had dramatically plummeted. And so I helped him execute a pivot. And that was an enjoyable reason. I became the chairman of that company. I brought in a new CEO and was able to to turn that company around. We sold that to Halo.

Mark Swanson: and you know and but i still really and By then, I kind of missed it. um And then I wanted to get back into it. And i in the bike company, I was noticing how expensive phone systems were. We were we were a very small business. And I started getting really interested in voice over IP. So i I spent about a year playing around with messing with soft switches and trying to figure that out. and And then I ran into somebody with a telecom industry, and I said, hey, let’s start a business doing this.

Alejandro Cremades: So, at the end of the day, you know, you ended up doing a company called Telovations, if I get that right.

Mark Swanson: Yes, televations.

Alejandro Cremades: Telovations, Telovations, oh.

Mark Swanson: Yeah, televations.

Alejandro Cremades: so So talk to us about televisions, because now you know it was a few years have gone by you know before you actually were operational.

Mark Swanson: and wait

Alejandro Cremades: So how did you go about you know looking at things differently? Because before televisions, you had success. You had you know more unfoldings that were not expected, but you were able to learn a lot.

Alejandro Cremades: So what do you think you did differently with televisions from other experiences?

Mark Swanson: Well, I think um the good thing about televisions was that I spent about a year incubating the business in in my head and also with my hands, you know experimenting with different technologies, specifically Asterix.

Mark Swanson: And so the key lesson that I’ve learned in in the past was that I had tended to be ahead of the curve in terms of the business opportunity. So when the internet came around, I mean, I thought everybody was going to see what I saw, and they didn’t. I thought everybody was going to see the advantage of cloud service, cloud infrastructure, and ah big companies just weren’t buying it. you know And so just that experience, and I think one of the big takeaways I take away from this conversation is an entrepreneur often overestimates the response of a market um because they have a unique perspective. And I would say probably they underestimate the the size of impact and the opportunity. I mean, I had no idea that the internet would be this big, no idea that cloud would be this big.

Mark Swanson: um And so, but it’s just that you don’t want to jump the gun on there, which is what what I did. So incubating that and realizing that voice did not work out um on, you know, wasn’t working at the time on the internet, but I knew it was coming.

Mark Swanson: So we we waited till the right time to start moving into a business that you know allowed you to get some traction much quicker. So we had within six months, we had 100 customers and we were not even, we hadn’t even built our service yet. We rented infrastructure and got these customers and then we um developed our own soft switch technology and stuff like that. so And then the other innovation, the the second thing would be we I was much better at targeting a very specific group of customers. So we were a leader in voice over IP, connecting multi offices and health care, which is a very good niche. And then we expanded from there. So that business grew really by following a more traditional strategy of a market penetration and a niche and then growing from there, getting a beachhead first.

Alejandro Cremades: Now, in this case, you know you experience it more as a CEO, you know given the fact that you are a technical person. So I guess, how how has it been to that transition from the technical side to the business side?

Mark Swanson: Well, I think my nature is to look at a business like ah and a work of engineering. um And I think, you know, your newsletters are the same way. You know, you look at it from a a prospect is, you know, how do I design and operate this machine in the most efficient way possible?

Mark Swanson: And I think having that ability to do abstract your business and and really take it away from your identity um is is a powerful thing because you probably aren’t you know the right person for every job in the company. And I think if you learn how to operate as a machine and find the exact right person to operate that piece of the machine, the whole thing is going to work better.

Mark Swanson: um And so um that engineering, I actually didn’t enjoy the first go around when I became more business in the internet days, because I left the tech space. But by ah thinking of it differently and in enjoying the nature of building a company as an engineer, ah thinking it like that, it’s it’s actually a very rewarding experience.

Alejandro Cremades: Now, ah with with this company, with Televations, the company ended up getting acquired by Bright House. I mean, obviously, at this point, you know you’re quite a CSUN guy, you know having done you know a bunch of liquidity events. So how did the ah the whole transaction with Bright House come together?

Mark Swanson: Well, there’s an interesting story and and the I’ve already told the guy to do this, but um my ah I ended up having some health problems and we were right around the time we we needed to raise some money.

Mark Swanson: And so you have a very important juncture, whether you raise a bunch of money Series B and get diluted, or do you you you see what you can get now? So I knew, I looked at potential, who would be in a potential inquirer or acquirer of the company.

Mark Swanson: And so I called like an industry pundit, a guy that blogged all ah all you know, it was his life to blog about voice over IP and the transforming of the telecommunications industry. So I called him up and said, hey, I’ll give you some money if this if this closes. Actually, I think I paid him outright. But can you put a bug in the ear of somebody at Bright House because he knew everybody ah that our company might be open for acquisition and and know They don’t have an offering like ours. And I really think that the strategic fit there would be good. So he did that. And sure enough, a few weeks later, I got a call from them, unsolicited. you know and And so he asked me if we were entertaining any offers or about the business. We ended up talking. He referred us. It was the head of the sales did this ah in Florida.

Mark Swanson: And then he referred us over to the guy that ran acquisitions and we developed a relationship. And sure enough, it was a it was a great um fit. And I think it was a great fit because we knew a lot about their business. We were a partner with Bright House. And it was also something that we had spent some time modeling and figuring out how would we do that. And we had a ah great I think we had a good internergate integration plan, and and the acquisition really worked out for them. And I’m still um best friends. And the guy who’s on my board, the guy that did the deal, who was the head of strategy for Bright House, um and I are still close friends and and business acompes accomplices, I would say.

Alejandro Cremades: So you eventually find your life purpose, which he is saying helping others succeed. you know And you became also a startup coach, which led you to to getting involved with VU technologies.

Mark Swanson: Yep.

Alejandro Cremades: no So how did that life purpose, that hit that thing that hit you you know how did that happen?

Mark Swanson: Well, I remember um you know my goal when I was young was to be, ah when I started, I said, I want to be a millionaire by the time I was 40. and And I accomplished that. and so But when you have you know I really didn’t have any thinking or any plans after that. And so I kind of wandered for a round during that period in the beginning of the 2000s. And so after the televisions exit, and I had to put in ah two years with Bright House

Mark Swanson: um i I said, hey, you know i I had thought a lot about what I wanted to do. And I felt like you know’ve I’ve learned enough now that I could be valuable to help others succeed. And so I did some consulting jobs with a couple of um organizations. And then my most recent one was a you know I was an advisor. I talk once a month to the CEO of a video production company, and they they were a client of mine, or I was a client of theirs at Bright House. um And they ended up, when pandemic hit, I got a call from the CEO there, and he was like, hey, what should I do? And i we talked about the PPP and turning his company into ah more of an R and&D shop. But he went out and found this technology called virtual production. It came from the movies.

Mark Swanson: And he built a stage on his own and borrowed some money from the government then. it was It was very low interest and called me up and said, hey, I’d like you to come by and see this. So I was pretty blown away by what he had done. And he’s got a great team. So I ended up, we he said, hey, can you help me come on and turn this into a business?

Mark Swanson: Maybe it’s a in the inside my company now, or maybe it needs to be spun out. So um I helped him write this him and his partner write this spin-out plan. and And then we ah spun the company out and raised money for that. so And it’s gone really well. We spun it out in in early July of 2021. And we’ve already had well over $30 million dollars of cumulative revenues in the company. so

Alejandro Cremades: And how much has the company raised to date?

Mark Swanson: it’s Well, we raised $17 million as a seed round. So that allowed us to buy all this infrastructure.

Alejandro Cremades: Wow.

Mark Swanson: It was it was a highly cap capital intensive business. And then we raised another $3 million. So we got about $20 million dollars into it right now. And then we we haven’t gone out yet for a Series A.

Alejandro Cremades: That’s incredible. Now, let’s say let’s let’s let’s talk about here about the the past, because obviously, what you’ve done is remarkable. you know Now, obviously, you know at VU Technologies, you have an executive chairman role. ah So I guess say you know even though you are operational, you know I’m sure that you have some time to, to perhaps now, you know to spend time with me and with us and and to be able to reflect together. So I want to put you into a time machine.

Alejandro Cremades: and I want to bring you back in time, Mark. I want to bring you back in time to that moment where you were coming out of Georgia Tech, and you were thinking about starting a company, which ended up becoming Swan. But let’s say you have the opportunity of having a chat with that younger self, that younger Mark, and being able to give that younger Mark one piece of advice before launching a business. What would that be and why, given what you know now?

Mark Swanson: Well, I think there’s always a feeling amongst um new entrepreneurs and there should be a sense of incredible urgency. You’re immersed in your own little bubble and and there’s an opportunity there and other people see the opportunity too. And so you’re looking at, and you probably do know peers and you’re looking at these other people and you always feel like they’re ahead of you.

Mark Swanson: And because companies, I’ll tell you, look a lot better from the outside than they do the inside. So um you you feel incredibly rushed. And I would think that um my you know I wish I had told my younger self that, hey, be better prepared for for success, not you know rushing headlong into a business and and having to answer the questions on the fly while you’re trying to operate a business at the same time.

Mark Swanson: um So, because if you have a good plan and you’ve done your homework and especially do scenario analysis and what happens if this happens, what happens if that happens, do that. And we did that at um at Vue. We actually looked at, we drew a ah quarterly roadmap out for three years. We did, tim Tim John and I, the three founders of the company.

Mark Swanson: and And we spent a lot of time in the beginning, three months just planning the business and in laying it out. And I am am really kind of shocked to see that almost every quarter we’ve we the business has evolved the way we thought, with the exception of AI. That was about that came out about two or three quarters early. um But as a result, we did ah we were able to handle ah a very big pivot because we knew it was coming.

Mark Swanson: And we became we’ve now at Vue become the first company really to develop a ah video production system and workflow that’s fully enhanced by AI. And that’s a big system we’re selling into corporate America. And I think if we hadn’t gone back and recognized that at the beginning, we’d be we would have scrambled. And we built this system when we pivoted in about three months, which was an amazing I actually thought it couldn’t be done. But the the team there is fabulous and and was able to respond and make that happen.

Alejandro Cremades: That’s incredible. So Mark, for the people that are listening that would love to reach out and say hi, what is the best way for them to do so?

Mark Swanson: Just my profile, I guess I’m assuming you share that. um I respond to to most of my requests on there, um unless you’re trying to sell me something.

Mark Swanson: But and and people what?

Alejandro Cremades: And that’s on LinkedIn, correct, Mark? LinkedIn is the platform I use the most.

Mark Swanson: Yeah, linkedin.com. I was i was the 500th member of LinkedIn, so I got the slash Swanson. LinkedIn in Swanson.

Alejandro Cremades: That’s amazing. There we go. There we go. That’s awesome.

Mark Swanson: All right, thanks, Alejandro.

Alejandro Cremades: um Well, Mark, well, thank you so much for being on The Dealmaker Show. It has been an absolute honor to have you with us. Thank you.

*****

If you like the show, make sure that you hit that subscribe button. If you can leave a review as well, that would be fantastic. And if you got any value either from this episode or from the show itself, share it with a friend. Perhaps they will also appreciate it. Also, remember, if you need any help, whether it is with your fundraising efforts or with selling your business, you can reach me at al*******@pa**************.com“>al*******@pa**************.com

 

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