Naeem Zafar and Concordia Ventures

posted by David Wolf on Jun 6, 2010 | Comments (0) | Permalink | Trackback URL

Naeem founded Concordia Ventures in early 2007. Naeem is also a part of the faculty of Haas Business School at the University of California, Berkeley, where he teaches Entrepreneurship and Innovation in the MBA program. Naeem focuses on educating and advising entrepreneurs in all aspects of starting and running a company. Naeem has been a team member in six startups and has extensive experience with mentoring and coaching founders and CEOs. Until 2007, he was the president and CEO of Pyxis Technology Inc., a company specializing in advanced chip design software for nanometer technology. Naeem has been president and CEO of two other high-tech startups (Silicon Design Systems and Veridicom, a Bell Labs spinoff that invented the silicon fingerprint sensors today found on many laptops). Naeem has held senior marketing and engineering positions at several companies, including Quickturn Design Systems, which had an IPO in 1993 and grew to $125M in revenues.

Naeem holds a Bachelor of Science degree (magna cum laude) in electrical engineering from Brown University and a master’s degree in electrical engineering from University of Minnesota. Naeem was a Presidential Gold Medalist and a recipient of the National Talent Scholarship with first-class designation.

Naeem is a charter member of TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs,www.TiE.org) and president of OPEN (http://www.OPENSiliconValley.com). Naeem is also the president of Bay Area Council for Brown University Entrepreneurship Program. He also serves on the boards of Numetrics Ltd., Brainstorm Pvt. Ltd, and Auxo.net Inc., and is a member of the advisory boards of several other companies.

Contact Naeem Zafar at

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Naeem did six business startups and has extensive experience in mentoring and coaching entrepreneurs. He was the president and CEO and has held senior marketing and engineering positions at several technology focused firms over the years.He’s also the author of 3 books on entrepreneurship. Here are the questions guiding our discussion:

1. Your career has been very rich in terms of growing companies and developing innovative products. What were your key “drivers“or ingredients that you think made your particular ventures successful?
2. Are there any big missteps or mistakes you learned from that would be beneficial for our entrepreneurial listeners of E Factor Radio?
3. You’re the founder of Concordia Ventures. What was the genesis of the creation of this company?
4. When you talk about creating a start up, what do entrepreneurs seem to under-estimate or “get wrong” about the road that’s in front of them?
5. What are some of the external challenges new start ups face right now-give us a temperature reading on the flow of capital into new business ventures. Has the velocity of new capital or the chemistry in therms of the way companies are considered for funding changed?
6. Tell us about the primary activities you’re engaged in at Concordia? How do you work with entrepreneurs-what is the format for educating them?
7. As you speak to and with entrepreneurs and students across the world, what are some of the key points you communicate to them.
8. What is Tiecon, and what role do you play in that endeavor?
9. Where can listeners get more information?

FILED IN: Creativity & Innovation, Entrepreneurship, Technology