It's a grim sight: the brain drain of leaders in the D.C. startup community making their way to what appears to be a more bountiful and capital-backed hubs in California. It's like the Yankees attracting the best players just because they have the money to do so. And as unfair as it seems, it's just what happens in business.
San Francisco has gotten yet another one of our great ones, according to the Washington Business Journal. Friday, AddThis co-founder and chairman Hooman Radfar packed his bags and sent himself west relocating to the Golden State seven years after bringing what was then Clearspring Technologies from Pittsburg to Northern Virginia. For those unfamiliar with AddThis, the company is a social media tools and analytics company that helps users share and learn about their brands.
Though he'll be on the other side of the country, Radfar told WBJ he intends to maintain his role as chair of AddThis; he will also continue to to mentor and invest in D.C. tech companies like Always Prepped and RateItAll. Still, having a player in tech community of his capacity – in the past having been featured one of Tech’s Best Entrepreneurs in BusinessWeek, one of Washington DC’s 100 Tech Titans and one of iMedia’s 25 most influential online marketing professionals – leave us still stings. It is entrepreneurs like him that not only bring recognition to an area, but also would reinvest in the future up-and-coming companies and advise them.
Radfar was a bit mysterious in revealing his next move once he's settled into San Fran, but gave a subtle hint saying that AddThis "we've built a pretty substantial online marketing platform when it boils down to it. I think I'm going to use those skills."
He continued, "Data quickly became the name of the game. When you reach 1.3 billion users and 14 million sites and are processing as many terabytes as we are a day — last year we crossed 1 trillion views serviced — you better be a data company or shame on you."
Most of all, Radfar emphasized there was no negative feelings for the D.C. tech hub, just the West Coast is a different place with different opportunities. It is, he said, "a different scene. There is only one Silicon Valley."
