Business Innovators Radio - Episode 1: Building a Tech Ecosystem Beyond Silicon Valley

Episode Date: March 19, 2025

Welcome to the very first episode of Fractal Focus, where innovation meets entrepreneurship! Hosted by Philip Lorenzo, COO of Fractal Group, this episode sets the stage for why we launched this podcast- to explore the technology landscape, highlight emerging tech hubs beyond the usual hotspots, and showcase the power of collaboration among businesses.Tune in as we kick off Fractal Focus and explore how innovation is thriving in places like Folsom, CA- and beyond!Fractal Focushttps://businessinnovatorsradio.com/fractal-focus/Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/episode-1-building-a-tech-ecosystem-beyond-silicon-valley

Welcome to Fractal Focus, the podcast where innovation meets entrepreneurship. Hi, and welcome to the very first episode of Fractal Focus. This is a podcast where innovation meets entrepreneurship. My name is Philip Lorenzo, and I am the C-O-O of Fractal Group. It is a group of like-minded entrepreneurs who work together to create shared success across our technology businesses. And this is the core and the foundation of why we've decided to start a podcast. We're based in Folsom, California, and a wonderful space called Granite City Workspace. And we have met with many entrepreneurs and innovators over the years that we've been here.

And recently, we have been planning an event called Folsom Tech Week. And I'll get to that in a bit later. But the thing I really wanted to touch on in this very first episode is, of course, why we're starting a podcast. And ultimately, the reasons why we start a podcast or anybody starts a podcast is because they want to share something or because they have certain topics on their mind. They have certain ideas on their mind. They have things they really need to get out in the world. And for us, what's really important is having businesses work together, leveraging efficient systems, driving high quality product across the board to really accomplish a few things. One, to shift the technology landscape and do it in a way that really invigorates the community that we're in.

And so we're talking very specifically about the Folsom Tech community in particular. And I think it is something of a mistake that could be made by some people. I can only assume this is definitely a more anecdotal thought that areas that are not in the big technology hubs just have more talent, have more value, have more innovation. And that couldn't be further from the truth. And when we think about communities like ours here in Folsom or in Portland or in other areas of the country, like maybe some parts of Texas, like maybe some parts of Iowa, et cetera, that have these vibrant micro tech communities growing up, that the landscape is going to continue to change and diverge a course as we continue to work remote. and as we continue to find opportunities to infuse technology with all sorts of sizes of community and city and municipality, etc. So a lot was just packed into what I just said, but I think the greater point is that fractal focus serves as a podcast to communicate these ideas, to talk about concepts and, structures and businesses that normally would be talked about if we were in San Francisco,

New York, Los Angeles, Miami now, et cetera. And now we're in the kind of opportunity to do so in smaller cities, quote unquote, and in cities that have not been traditionally looked at as hubs for technology. Although Folsom does have an amazing semiconductor community, a semiconductor industry. And so there's that. And Intel is here in the area, et cetera. So that is all to say that it's really, really going to be key for this podcast or for the listeners of this podcast to keep in mind kind of the foundation and context of where we're coming from. That is not to say we're not going to talk to people from outside of the Folsom Tech community. We are. In fact, one of the first episodes will be with Austin Belsack, who is based out of New York.

But not New York City directly. He's outside the city. And that conversation is about hiring it, about finding the right talent for your startup. So that is something that startups and scale-ups and smaller and larger businesses in this community certainly can listen to and take some advice from. Now, I'd like to talk about fractal group, and the reason why is because that is the core part of the name of fractal focus. Now, as I mentioned before, fractal group is this group of like-minded entrepreneurs who work together to create shared success across technology businesses. This has been formed as a family of businesses through the idea that we need to be able to grow together. And it's not an old idea, certainly, but for us it was a very novel idea because we were starting to look at the different businesses that the owners of some of the companies that are part of this list started looking at other businesses and saying, wait a bit, there is a little bit of synergy here.

And there's also an opportunity for us to be able to become bigger as part of this core syndicate, consortium, family, whatever name you want to call it. So, FYC Labs is a B2B professional services business that helps businesses build software app experiences on full stack. It also helps with website development through WordPress. It also helps with branding and design. And it has been for, gosh, since 2012, a company that has been dedicated to driving business growth for its clients through developing technology solutions using technology in a way that is not adversarial to the customer, not adversarial to the client.

We never put ourselves on top of a pedestal to say that we, in FYC labs anyways, are beholden and in arbiters of the technology and you as a client shouldn't know about it. know, we definitely cherish a transparent relationship with our clients, and we do so in a way that fosters that trust and that family feel. And FYC Labs at this point has grown a great deal, and it continues to grow. And it does so because of the fact that there is such a vibrant culture on the company, there's a vibrant culture around learning, there's a vibrant culture around sharing information and there is a vibrant culture around transparency and around being great stewards for our clients products and also being good partners to our clients. And so the owners of FIC Labs also

have another company called FYM agency, which also does B2B. It does professional services and it does so for musicians, for touring groups, for different entities that require video production service, sound services editing. And FYM agency shares a lot of the same values, if not all the same values as FIC Labs does. And although it's a different ownership group, it is considered part of the fractal group of family. A crew is one of the newer products.

It is a venture. It is a B2B product, and it is a SaaS platform. And it's an accounts receivable platform that allows people that use it to do so in a way that makes accounts receivable a lot easier to communicate, a lot easier and less frictioned, for lack of a better word, to go ahead and connect people with a smooth process with their accounts payable and accounts receivable.

And so a crew through a statement view allows an accrue user to communicate with their customers, their balances do, and a very easy to use interactive way. And exciting news on the payment side of that world will be announced soon, but a crew is going to be something that I think will be a big part of the fractal group labs as we've cultivated this product for a long time. Attack Vector is a wonderful product that does vulnerability scanning. It is a platform that essentially just wants to make sure that you can navigate your digital landscape through the highs of a hack. And so you can see what potential hacker can see. And it helps you understand what defenses you need to do with your product to fortify it, to prepare it against any particular vulnerabilities.

And so this attack surface management platform scans your company, finds actionable intelligence to help bolster security. And it has a lot of expertise built in in the cybersecurity side of the world. So that allows you. to leverage that expertise in a way that is really easy to use. DealSend is another B2B platform. It is a deal flow management solution, and that allows you to streamline the complexities of deal flow in a platform that can connect investors and founders together, driving efficiency

and making it easy to track all sorts of deals that you have as an investor. And certainly if you have, if you're a founder of a product, it allows you to track the the processes of all your deals and where they are. That's currently in beta. And finally, Highland Principles, this is another B2B platform. It is a professional service that is recruiting. And the great minds at Highland find really great talent and do so in a way that really takes all the input of their clients into consideration.

And so all these businesses and more, this is just a highlight. wanted to highlight a few of them are really in the spirit of just making sure that there are businesses that can work together that have the same common goals, which is providing excellent service across the board. All these businesses in some capacity or another, whether they're a SaaS platform, whether it's a professional services platform, the idea is no different. It is to ensure that there is a quality of service behind it. and of course, a problem-solving aspect behind it. The fractal group is just one of those entities that is truly special in this community,

and it took a long time to get to the point where we can call a fractal group. So we want to work with builders, and we want to work with people that are really going to get their hands dirty and really get to solving problems. With that being said, if you want more information about fractal group, you can go to fractalgroup.io, and you could also email info at fractalgroup.io. Now, in talking about fractal group, which is a recent development in the history of what we've done at FYC Labs and at FYM and at a crew, et cetera, et cetera, and forming this group, we're going to have a few podcast episodes with the founders and some of the ownership behind Fractal Group.

including Justin Forteé, who is the CEO and CTO of FYC Labs, and Graham Peck, who is the CFO, and also in charge of growth for FYC Labs. He also oversees and owns quite a few products that are part of the craft fractal group. And so his expertise about venture and about being a founder is going to be a great, great part of content for this podcast. And there will be an episode where we will all three talk together about the challenges, the triumphs, and the pain and the losses of running a business, of running multiple businesses and of working with multiple projects. So that is going to be an exciting part of the journey. The podcast will also feature guests that have a lot of different perspectives in technology.

One episode I'll be talking to Sidel Trabowski. about the challenges of the public and private sector in the times that we are on right now. I also get to talk to Sarah Letterman about the challenges of fundraising and also she's a woman in venture capital. So she has a lot to say. And there's also going to be a few episodes following Folsom Tech Week. And I'm going to get into that later on in this episode. And so the Folsom Tech Week really inspired us to talk to a few people that were guest speakers. one of them, Sadie St. Lawrence, is a fantastic, fantastic speaker who was the keynote speaker

at Folsom Tech Week. And she's someone that really communicated and kind of set the table for what we were going to talk about in that entire week. And that hinged really on AI. And so Sadie, who is the founder and CEO of the Human Machine Collaboration Institute, or HMCAI, has been pioneering research and education to optimize human and machine interaction and to expand and to educate about the work with AI and what is possible with AI. And to do so in a way that's measured, not, you know, it's based on data. So this is not a, AI is the greatest thing in the world. It is what is AI right now and what it could be.

And so she did a really great job as heading the table. he's going to be a guest on the podcast as part of a special session that we tried to do, but it was really difficult to get multiple guests on. And the paddleboard sessions is what we're calling it because we literally put a laptop and the mic and everything on top of a paddleboard. And that was pretty cool. But needless to say, there's going to be other guests from Folsom Tech Week, who we got to meet, who we got to interact with. We're going to be talking to people in venture capital. We're going to be talking to people involved in cybersecurity.

We're going to be talking to people involved in other parts of the technological community here in Folsom and in the greater Sacramento area. We're also going to be talking to other guests around the country, people and groups that have really inspired us at Fractal Group. We're also going to be talking to people that really want to get better at technology. We're going to be talking to founders who could be in the early stages and need help. We're going to be talking to founders that are in the later stages of their funding, of their rounds, and they still need help. We're going to be talking to people who figured it out. And we're going to be talking to people who maybe haven't quite yet figured it out. And what does that mean anyways?

What does figuring it out mean, right? And so across the spectrum of success and failure in just trying to figure out what success looks like, the podcast will hopefully be a place for, for inspiration for all of that. And ultimately, if it can even inspire one person, if it could even inspire one company, if it could inspire a community or a city to be better, to do good things with technology, to build strong businesses with technology, to build sound profitable businesses with technology, that would be an accomplishment in itself. And so with fractal focus, I do want this show to be about innovation, the entrepreneurial spirit,

and how they can come together to become a source of energy, a source of inspiration, a source of discovery for us to grow business in a good way, in an ethical way, in a transparent way, and in a way that we could look at it as cooperative competition, collectivism, if you will, while still honoring the spirit of what it means to run a good business. So fractal focus is going to be a lot of things, but it's also going to be focused for forgiving the pun there. It's going to be focused on innovation and entrepreneurship, always. even if we orbit around other topics that don't feel entrepreneurial immediately or don't feel like conversations about innovation, they will eventually, you will see the connectiveness.

You will see the dots connect. And in that way, you'll go, aha, that was an innovative discussion. Or that was a discussion that was entrepreneurial and spirit. And so look at us as a place where you can just comfortably sit and listen for 25 to roughly 45 minutes, depending on the podcast episode, where you can listen about great ideas and not feel pressured at any point, but certainly feel inspired. But I promise you that every episode that we do record, in every moment, word that we speak to each other, is going to, in some way, connect again to innovation and to entrepreneurship and the spirit of those things, the spirit of those two words.

So I hope that as you listen to these episodes, that as you understand where we're coming from, and as we continue to grow this podcast together, audience with us, guests with us, that we can build a truly amazing forum for building on ideas, innovation, theories, discoveries, success, failure, and the joys of all those things. that we could do so in a form that allows us to express that and allows us to do so together. And that's fractal group. That's fractal focus. That's going to be all these things.

So I hope that these episodes that you'll continue to listen to will inspire you. And again, you can always go to info at fractalgroup.io to ask about podcast episodes, to ask about working with fractal group, to ask about any of the services that we do interwoven in the language and the discussions and the ideas. that we share are going to be foundational concepts and things that we think about a fractal group every day. And so that's going to be interwoven within all of our conversations. And that is a reflection of me as the CEO of the group and of the companies like FYC Labs and a crew. And I have these discussions often off podcast, of course, as we all have discussions

at work. And so I think that is really important for us to continue that on the podcast. And there's going to be points where I bring in current events or I bring in things that are very acutely on our minds. And that happened in the episode with Sidel. And I'm going to at times bring in history and bring in other sources of information that will contribute to the conversation that I'm currently having with a particular guest who has an expertise in something that I really want to key in on. So, of course, when I talk to Sidel, for example, be an experience with the public. private sector and how they work together and specifically in grant making. We talked about a lot of the funding that was happening, other funding freezes that was happening in the federal government.

And it spun us into a lot of conversations about government efficiency, et cetera. So great conversations can come from moments and time too. And we'll acknowledge that. As we're recording an episode, we will make sure to focus on, of course, the guest and And what they do, we're going to focus on what fractal group does. We're going to focus on those conversations together and how to become better, innovative businesses. But when the world and when the world around us also affects factors that allow us to be innovative

or that hinder innovation or allow us to be entrepreneurial or and hopefully not hinder entrepreneurialism, we'll explore that together. I hope that this is a good introduction on what we're in for, and I hope that you enjoy every episode. And if you don't enjoy the episode, maybe you're learning something. And maybe you get something out of it. And maybe it inspires you to write me a name on and say, how could you talk about that? Or I think I have a better idea. And please share it.

So with that said, this will be the fractal focus podcast. We're going to be releasing episodes most likely. on a weekly basis, but there's going to be a flurry of a few episodes to be released soon, and then we will continue to release every week. So we hope you enjoy it. We hope that you learn and grow with us. And with that said, continue to be entrepreneurial, have that spirit in mind, whatever you do, and we'll talk soon. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Fractal Focus. We hope you found valuable insights. If you enjoy the conversation and want to stay updated on the latest trends in expert advice, make sure you subscribe and leave a review. Your support helps

us continue bringing you the content that drives your business forward. Until next time, keep innovating and stay ahead of the curve.