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Author: Manoj Ranaweera

Tool Hack: AWS WorkMail + Google WorkSpace Essentials

Since the dawn of Google Apps, which are now called Google Workspace, I had a free business account that Google no longer wants to offer free. Going from not paying to paying for 50 user accounts is not something my wallet would be happy to spend on. I’ve been scratching my head on how to find a no-cost or low-cost solution. Here’s what I found. Moving Email to AWS WorkMail If you have AWS Credits that last two years, you can move emails across to AWS WorkMail and use those credits to not pay for emails for up to 2…

David Lovett’s 18 year Journey and Exit

Just listened to the awesome story of David Lovett‘s Perceptive Engineering Exit story yesterday. Dave was brought in to lead a University spin-out in 2002. He raised investment, bought the investors and the university out through an MBO and Exited to Applied Materials. Dave and his team moved to Sci-Tech Daresbury just after me and a few early innovators in 2006. I left in 2011 and rejoined a few years back. Dave continued to leverage the campus all the way to the Exit. At the time of Exit, Dave owned 30% of equity, which in my book, is an awesome stake to hold. Dave also changed…

Don’t attempt to flog to laggards too early

The need to focus on early adopters – time to be clever. I should know better. But we all make classic schoolboy errors from time to time. Until now, I’ve worked on the principle that I could help any Tech Founder. But this is an illusion. You can only help people who are willing to accept that help and always looking for an edge to improve themselves and their businesses. They are the “innovators” and “early adopters” in the “technology adoption curve”. If your product is new, don’t think you could sell it to everyone who fits your customer persona,…

I need to ask my wife

I need to ask my wife before I buy #StartupLife [This is not about having a go at wives – opposite might equally be true, but I’ve only experienced this with men who wanted business advice from their wives]. During my tech startup carrier since 2004, I have come across above a number of times. Each time the deal fell through. If I hear anyone mention that now that they need to consult their partner (in my case all being wives), I just walk away from that deal. It’s simply not worth the expectation – as it won’t happen. Here…

Solo Founder Dilemma – Not accountable to anyone!

First published on Linkedin. (a discussion I had with myself whilst cycling this afternoon) Of course, no doubt you would argue that all of us are accountable to the taxman (Nah! – it’s just reporting), customers and so on. But truly, we are not accountable to anyone! In my case, I don’t have a Board or investors. Yes, I do have employees, users and customers. But if I decide to pack all in one day, I can! If I decided to be lazy, I can. Yes, there would be consequences of these actions, but the point is, I can, as…

WordPress Staging and Live

Who knows, this may be useful to some. Setting up a staging WordPress instance: Go to cPanelSelect the live site, usually www. and clone itPerhaps as staging. or dev. Once you have setup the new site using the clone site, usually replacing the theme and plugins, then to go live: Go to cPanelBackup live siteDelete www.Clone .staging or .dev to www. That’s it. To stop Google getting confuse with your multiple sites, worth changing settings to

China – You decide!

Following is taken from a YouTube comment without any editing by me. Make what you will. The following is what I borrowed from a Malaysian YouTuber’s comment: I’m from Malaysia. China has traded with Malaysia for 2000 years. In those years, they had been the world’s biggest powers many times. Never once they sent troops to take our land. Admiral Zhenghe came to Malacca five times, in gigantic fleets, and a flagship eight times the size of Christopher Columbus’ flagship, Santa Maria. He could have seized Malacca easily, but he did not. In 1511, the Portuguese came. In 1642, the…

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh

Been watching the life of Prince Philip on telly, who passed away yesterday aged 99 years. What a remarkable life he seems to have led. In 2014, I had the chance to meet him and have a quick chat. He had an impressive memory and a wit about him. My memory is so bad, I can’t even remember the exact conversation we had. At least I blogged about the event https://lnkd.in/dQqfYp7. Wish I keep a regular journal.

Hypothetical Product road map of SeedLegals

I started writing this post on Linkedin, but hit the word limit, hence posting this here first Which British tech company do you admire the most and why? You cannot nominate your own company. I was asked by Soumeya Benghanem yesterday when I joined her weekly Clubhouse session (for the second time – yes, they have not kicked me out just yet! Yes I am surprised as much as you are) which company I keep an eye on. Whilst I help 28 UK tech startups at Techcelerate and pushing forward 3 products (Deal Lite, SkilledUp Life and Progress Hero), I…

My world summarised

This post first appeared on Linkedin. My world summarised – It’s actually quite simple I am building a TRUSTED founder network called Techcelerate which focuses on PRODUCT and COMMERCIALISATION of UK Tech Startups (https://lnkd.in/ebyvmNh) before INVESTMENT. We deliver services via our growth partners (https://lnkd.in/e78Td3M). I’m building three products for our community, which are also available for outsiders for a small monthly subscription. 1. Intelligence – Fastest growing UK tech companies and investors backing them (https://deallite.uk) with two press release sites – UK Tech Investment News at (https://uktechnews.info) and M&A (https://uktechexits.news) – this includes weekly deal news going out on Monday 2. Free global talent…