This week’s Founder Stories features Inkling Founder and CEO Matt MacInnis. Inkling, the 100-employee cloud publishing company, recently announced a $16 million Series C funding. With inevitable growth, it is an interesting time for Inkling. But that story is still unfolding, so Matt and I went back to the beginning to talk more about how the company started and what inspired him to leave Apple after eight years to build a startup:
You don’t see a lot of successful startup CEOs coming out of Apple. And what I think I’ve learned in hindsight is that a lot of the methods that you apply in a company that has a tailwind, where the resources you got are just sort of poured on, because the model works. The products are successful and in Apple’s case, for example, being insanely secretive about what you are doing. That doesn’t work. Nobody from Apple wants to come and talk about the next great thing they are building but you have to do that as a startup.”
Continuing our conversation, MacInnis talks in detail about the transition from Apple to leading a startup and his learnings about hiring, trust and transparency. He also explains why three co-founders can offer a better balance than two. Watch to find out more.
Editor’s Note: Michael Abbott is a general partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, previously Twitter’s VP of Engineering, and a founder himself. Mike also writes a blog called uncapitalized. You can follow him on Twitter @mabb0tt.