Others were taken by the dual message--humor is helpful in conference plenary sessions, but having a true point of view is maybe even more important. A couple said, "you were absolutely insouciant about the primal importance of the meeting, and about HP--how did you 'get away with it'?"
And then, the heavens bestowed another gift upon me about my past. John Averill, the venerable marketeer for a small Security Encryption company, 7Tunnels https://www.7tunnels.com/ woke me from my afternoon nap (yes, I do these more regularly now, especially after my Covid bout) with the phrase "were your ears burning?"
Burning? What about?
Well, John had just gotten off the phone with a key investment banker working with 7Tunnels. And the guy had said, "HOW did you get Chuck House to be on your Board?"
Now, John and I have been together in a room exactly once, for a Board meeting a year or so ago, and I don't know about you, but I don't generally spend a lot of time on the sociology or personal history of most associates that I come in contact with. And he certainly had no idea about my background, other than the perfunctory comments on the bio page.
So he asked the guy, "how do you know him?" And the answer was, "he gave a talk at a company I represented about 22 years ago, and I recall it vividly."
Now, I don't know about you, but I cannot recall most speakers from last year, let alone 22 years ago.
So, now fully awake, I asked John for his name, which he gave me--Todd McMahon. I quickly found him on the web, and promptly sent him a note:
John Averill, with 7Tunnels, apparently met with you today, and his words were to the effect that you and I had met at some point. My apologies, for not realizing it. Could you perhaps fill me in?
Thanks, and best regards
The answer arrived almost immediately. He was representing a small company in Burlington, MA doing DSP (Digital Signal Processing) work in 1998/99, and I was with Dialogic out of New Jersey, as the head of engineering. Here's the gist of it:
Do you remember looking at a DSP engineering company called DSPse in Burlington, MA in late 90s?
I was representing them – Joe and John Della Morte, and Jason Macres were main shareholders. They may have been a vendor to you Dialogic but not sure – they had echo cancellation and other DSP related algorithms and toys.
Chuck, not blowing smoke here but you were masterful. That meeting has stayed with me to this day.
My guys were very excited that you were coming as your reputation preceded you. They were all obviously software engineers and instead of getting into “why you should go with us” (which is pretty much what Lucent, Motorola and bunch of other folks did), you took a different angle. You started with something along the lines of “voicemail sucks” and then went on about how communication was changing, needed to change, and you had a vision for how you wanted to position Dialogic given the same. You basically laid out a vision of how you wanted to create a Xerox Parc for audio communications. You had a grand vision and my guys were totally jazzed by it and swept up into that vision – I think by the end of the meeting they would have run through the wall if you had asked them.
I distinctly remember thinking to myself “this guy really knows how to speak to engineers.” You laid out a really hard problem before them and said they could be part of the solution. It was fantastic.
Can’t remember if Dialogic ever put in a bid or not but eventually they sold to Tellabs for all cash deal at an aggressive multiple of revenue. I’ve stayed close with Joe Della Morte and to this day he still recalls that meeting fondly.
Todd McMahon
Managing Director
Capstone Headwaters | Investment Banking Advisors
So, NOT TO BRAG, but mygawd, someone remembers you from 20+ years ago--Wow! I told Jenny, and we toasted "the old me" over dinner. Gawd, that was a while back. Wonder what they'd say now?
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