WebAward Judge Profile: Jon Bradford
Colab
CEO
Jon Bradford got his entrepreneurial start early, creating several businesses while attending Indiana University. These endeavors ranged from an online custom birthday cake delivery service to a late-night restaurant that served breakfast food to the after-hours college crowd. After these ventures, Jon founded his leading company after moving to Los Angeles, with his current business partner, creative director, and operator, Michael "Squid" Buchanan.
Together, Jon and Squid started Colab (short for "Company Laboratory") after selling their first tech venture to Media Temple (acquired by GoDaddy) in August 2013.
Serving as CEO of the company and applying his strategic efforts to guide startups in their earliest stages, Colab is a business incubator that follows the Venture Studio model. Colab takes a founder-first approach to the companies it accepts into its venture program, helping startups bring ideas, resources, and expertise together to create companies that solve significant problems. Since its start in 2013, Colab has founded or advised over 100 startups, helped raise more than $300m in venture capital, and seen eight exits across its portfolio, with notable acquirers including Google and Viacom; and most recently celebrated Charge Enterprises's uplisting to Nasdaq in April 2022.
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