Techstars Atlanta has named co-founder of Salesloft Tim Dorr as its new managing director.
Dorr will be replacing Dave Payne, who held the role for three years after founding Atlanta startups such as Scoutmob and Switchyards Downtown Club.
Techstars is a startup accelerator that helps alleviate early-stage businesses and product development through mentorship and connection to funding. The organization hosts a program where 10 startups receive mentorship over three months.
Over 25% of the companies in the program relocated to Atlanta, according to CoxEnterprises.com, and the first three classes have collectively raised over $40 million since completing the Techstars Atlanta program.
Originally from New Hampshire, Dorr attended Georgia Tech and stuck around Atlanta to become a key player in the technology startup ecosystem.
While attending Georgia Tech, Dorr founded his first company A Small Orange, a web hosting company that reached 25,000 customers, which he sold in 2010.
After his work with his first company, Dorr became Entrepreneur in Residence at Georgia Tech’s business incubator ATDC where he ran into Kyle Porter who was building his company Salesloft from scratch. Dorr worked with Porter and Rob Forman to rebuild Salesloft into the $2.3 billion company it is today.
Through the years, Dorr has also held various roles for Atlanta startups including Chief Technology Officer at Army of Bees and Chief Executive Officer at Billfold. He also founded several companies, including co-working space Ignition Alley and software platform Spaceship.
Now, Dorr is embarking on his long-term goal of providing hands-on training as an investor to other startups.
“I got a lot of help from the Atlanta ecosystem, and I want to give back to that ecosystem by creating more success stories … investing was the most direct way I knew to affect that,” Dorr said.
The managing director position at Techstars Atlanta has been a launchpad for entrepreneurs and founders to become investors. Michael Cohn, co-founder of Cloud Sherpas and Logicept, held the position for nearly three years without prior investing experience and now runs the venture capital firm Overline.
Dorr looks to take advantage of the resources provided to tech entrepreneurs in Atlanta, such as the Atlanta Tech Village and local university talent, that weren't there when he started his career.
“When I got started 15 years ago, there were meetings at bars talking about startups and not doing anything about it,” said Dorr. “It’s shifted now to having funds and spaces and events that mean something."
Dorr will capitalize on a network of exceptional university talent from schools such as Georgia Tech, funds such as ATV and record amounts of investment funding.
“My goal is to create more brand names, more Calendlys, more Mailchimps, more Greenlights coming out of here to establish Atlanta as another place to be that’s not turbo expensive,” said Dorr. “We got some initial fire, let’s pour some gas on it and create a big explosion."
Correction: A previous version of the article stated that David Payne held his former position for over five years. He held positions at Techstars Atlanta for over five years but held the position of managing director for three. The article has been corrected.
