Peldi Guilizzoni
Giacomo ‘Peldi’ Guilizzoni is the founder and CEO of Balsamiq, makers of Balsamiq Mockups, a fun little wireframing tool for programmers, UX experts and yes, even business types.
Balsamiq has been a bit of a poster child for a new wave of tiny but ambitious bootstrapped tech startups, netting over $4M in sales in the first 30 months of operation and gathering rave reviews.
Peldi is a champion of the “radical transparency” trend that’s sweeping the Internet, through his posts on the popular Blog. You can read Peldi’s story in this blog post, or get to know him more through these interviews and videos.
Video
Contact Info
Balsamiq Studios, LLC / Balsamiq SRL
Giacomo (Peldi) Guilizzoni on LinkedIn
Peldi from Balsamiq on Twitter
Interview questions:
- Let’s start at the beginning: how did you manage to go from being a programmer at Adobe to running your own startup?
- You moved back to Italy before starting Balsamiq, if I remember correctly: Why not stay and start your startup in Silicon Valley?
- “Radical Transparency”: what is it and why is it the cornerstone of Balsamiq Mockups?
- At the Business of Software Conference, you mentioned David Allen’s Getting Things Done methodology. Is that how you get things done?
- Why Mockups?
- What do you mean “Do the Time”?
- How about “Don’t be afraid of going too small”?
- And what do you mean by “create more value than you capture”?
- One more: “Fall in love with the problem, not your solution”?
- So what is myBalsamiq and why are you bringing it to market?
(Interview set for March 7th, 2011, Show date: TBD)
What would you like to ask Peldi?
One I want to ask – the idea that your customers to a large degree shape the direction of your company. You might want to be small, but the market may decide it wants you to be large(r).
How much do you think it mattered to have the business US based too? Do you think that it raises customers confidence or are other things that do?
I look forward to a great interview and insight into my favorite startup.
How do you get the most out of your team?
How much role did social media play into the initial success of Balsamiq?
Great interview – and made even better by your questions! Thanks Cristian, Michael and Gaurav!