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The Interviews - Part 10 - David vs. Goliath

8/14/2018

 
This is the tenth in a series of 11 videos produced by the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. This one focuses on startups versus established players.

The Interviews - Part 8 - Change Management

8/7/2018

 
This is the eighth in a series of 11 videos produced by the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. This one focuses on managing growth.

The Interviews - Part 7 - Hiring and Firing

8/2/2018

 
This is the seventh in a series of 11 videos produced by the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. This one focuses on team recruiting, growth, and culture.

The Interviews - Part 6 - Culture

8/1/2018

 
​This is the sixth in a series of 11 videos produced by the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. This one focuses on creating and maintaining a productive corporate culture.

The Interviews - Part 5 - Partners

8/1/2018

 
​This is the fifth in a series of 11 videos produced by the Smeal College of Business at The Pennsylvania State University. This one focuses on the dynamics of founder partnerships.

Epilogue - Part One

3/6/2015

 
In late 2002, Neoforma forwarded me a message from a writer for Fortune magazine. She was writing an article, following up with the founders of companies the magazine had written about during 1999 and 2000. She was interested in what had become of an array of momentary business celebrities, including me...

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August 2000 - Continuity

3/2/2015

 
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40 Healthcare Facilities Now Signed Up for marketplace@novation. Signed Healthcare Organizations Represent More Than $1.2 Billion In Annual Supply Purchases
Neoforma.com, Inc. and Novation today announced that an additional 21 healthcare facilities have signed contracts to use marketplace@novation, powered by Neoforma, as their Internet purchasing solution. A total of 40 healthcare facilities are now signed up . . .

August 3, 2000, Neoforma Press Release
Even as the physical residue of our influence upon Neoforma continued to dissipate, I saw great evidence that something solid was still firmly planted underneath...

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May 2000 - Cliffhanger

2/25/2015

 
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Neoforma Lays Off 80 People
Just days after announcing the abandonment of previously announced merger agreements that would have added Eclipsys and its healthcare Internet affiliate HEALTHvision to its holdings, Neoforma.com has announced that it is laying off approximately 80 employees . . .

AuctionWatch, May 26, 2000
Thalia was one of those rare women who seemed completely oblivious to her extraordinary attractiveness...

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February 2000 - Fame

2/19/2015

 
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What the Heck is Healtheon?
Jim Clark set out to build an Internet start-up that would revolutionize healthcare . . . Clark, never one to admit mistakes easily, concedes his vision was perhaps “a bit” too big and the industry more resistant to change than he had imagined . . .

Fortune, February 21, 2000
I was lost in the place between external validation and internal detachment. Between elation and dread...

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November 1999 - Compatriots

2/12/2015

 
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VerticalNet and Neoforma.com Announce Exclusive Multi-year E-commerce Agreement
VerticalNet, Inc. the Internet’s premier portfolio of business-to-business vertical trading communities and First Mover in the space, today announced a strategic alliance with Neoforma.com, Inc., a leading provider of B2B e-commerce services in the market for medical products, supplies and equipment . . .

Neoforma Press Release, November 22, 1999
I hadn’t exactly expected to metaphorically run toward each other in slow motion, arms outstretched, through a field of flowers on a sunny day. I just thought that we had been watching each other fondly from afar for so long that something slightly magical might happen between us when we first met...

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September 1999 - The Ramp - Part 3

2/11/2015

 
More fun pre-IPO drama...

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August 1999 - Pick-ups

2/6/2015

 
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Neoforma.com, Inc. Acquires General Asset Recovery, LLC
B-2-B Services to Include Live Auction, Internet Auction, Classifieds and More. Neoforma.com, Inc., the global healthcare marketplace, announced today that it has acquired Arlington Heights, Illinois–based healthcare auction company General Asset Recovery, LLC (GAR) . . .

Neoforma Press Release, August 17, 1999
eBusiness and the Supply Chain
Are you at risk of being “Amazoned?” Depending on who you talk to, it’s more a probability than a possibility . . . Can a fledgling dotcom company really swoop into health care and “re-intermediate,” as Amazon.com has done in the publishing industry? . . . “Any GPO or distributor that signs a contract with an e-commerce company will have just signed its own death warrant,” says one GPO executive . . .

The Health Strategist, August, 1999
Land Grab
It’s funny to think of eBay and Amazon.com as the dinosaurs of the Internet. But it’s becoming clearer that the Web’s real promise lies not so much in auctions and consumer sales, but in the exploding business-to-business market . . .

Forbes, August 23, 1999
A company’s ultimate product is its culture.

Whenever we saw a gap in our organization, Bob, Jeff, some other manager or I would meet with others to discuss the need...

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July 1999 - The Cast - Part 2

2/5/2015

 
The last big position we had to fill was someone to lead our engineering organization...

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July 1999 - The Cast - Part 1

2/4/2015

 
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Chemdex Shines on Market Debut
Chemdex, an online seller of laboratory chemicals and equipment with sales of $29,000 last year, rose almost 60 percent in its first day of public trading . . . The Palo Alto, California–based company rose 8.87 to 23.87 . . . The company closed with a market value of $758.65 million.

Chemdex’s investors include Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers . . . The company will use $30 million of the net proceeds to fund anticipated operating losses . . . It will use the rest of the proceeds . . . possibly to acquire complementary businesses, it said.

CNET News.com, July 28, 1999
Doing what’s good is not always what’s best.

At first, I didn’t see much of Bob...

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June 1999 - The Star - Part 3

2/3/2015

 
Here's the rest of The Star. Things get a bit surreal and intense...

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    About Me

    I am an architect, writer, and serial entrepreneur. 

    I'm also a dichromatic tritan, which means I'm one of between 150 and 1,500 people in the US with this rather extreme form of colorblindness. I write about how colorblindness has profoundly affected my life's path on my other blog: dichromat.com

    My surreal journey as co-founder of Neoforma (formally NASDAQ: NEOF, later acquired by GHX) is the basis for Starting Something, a multiple award-winning book, used in many biz school entrepreneurship classes:

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