Moving on to the next phase of my professional life.

As of midnight tonight, I am a free agent for the first time in a long time. I am leaving Ignition and beginning to plan the next phase of my professional life. It has been a while coming.

I’ve been associated with Ignition for 13+ years – the longest involvement I’ve ever had with a company. The early days were exciting, I was fully engaged. But in 2005, some personal issues caused me to step aside for a while. I eventually was able to recommit time to Ignition, but I never really had the same connection after returning. I found myself frustrated with the venture model, uninspired about the nature of the work, and too often thinking that I was on the wrong side of the table – my empathy was with sweat equity, not financial equity.

And so I’ve made no new investments the last couple years, I’m not part of the latest fund, I’m not currently on a board seat. I’ve effectively voted with my feet, I don’t really want to be involved with the venture business anymore. So effective now, I am completely out of Ignition, I am not involved with management of Ignition or the funds at all. I still have an investor’s interest in the funds, but I am just another LP now. It’s an amicable separation, I wish my remaining friends at Ignition all the best, I will still help them out when asked, as I will my friends at portfolio companies.

Going forward, I am not going to be sitting in the park feeding pigeons. I am as excited about technology as I’ve ever been. I am working hard on retraining myself to be a modern developer, becoming conversant with all the current technologies and tools. I am very excited about the coming wave of ever cheaper devices and the Internet of Things (terrible name tho). It still feels like early days in the digital revolution. I am meeting folks, talking about ideas, prototyping little things, learning open source, brainstorming, etc. I have 25 devices and sensors spread all over my desk. I’m working with some other folks on all this and having a blast. We may form a company. We may do angel investing. We may do something else. At some point I, and we, will be ready to talk about what we are doing next.

For now tho, I am enjoying the freedom of a completely blank slate, and the chance to really dig in to technology. And the opportunity to do more of the things that I enjoy – working with great people, betting on the long technology waves, and figuring out the thin edge of the wedge for new technologies and new products.