About Me
Background
My name is Alexander Muse and I am the author of the Startup Muse. I live in Dallas Texas with my wife Michele and our two kids, Ethan and Erin. More than a decade ago I figured out that I was better at starting businesses than finishing them. Since then I have raised and lost millions of dollars from investors. One of my startups went bankrupt while another sold for millions to a public company. The Startup Muse is my attempt to share my experiences, both good and bad, with entrepreneurs. You can read more about me in a recent piece from The Dallas Morning News, an older piece from MyVenturePad or check me out on LinkedIn.
I began writing about entrepreneurship and startups back in 2005 amassing a body of more than 2,000 articles and 70,000 monthly readers on the Texas Startup Blog. The Startup Muse is a fresh start, a new outlet for my writing.
Today I spend the majority of my time running a company called Big in Japan (aka ShopSavvy) that I co-founded back in 2008. ShopSavvy is a mobile shopping application that allows a user to scan the barcode of a product to compare prices from local and online retailers. Millions of users, in more than 24 countries use ShopSavvy everyday to find the best deal.
Previously I was CEO of Architel, the largest managed service provider in North Texas. Today my co-founder, Scott Ryan runs the company allowing me to focus my attention on our software development business, namely ShopSavvy. Prior to Architel I was founder and CEO of LayerOne, a venture-backed telecommunications infrastructure company I started in the late 1990’s.
I have been involved in various organizations over the years including the Entrepreneurs Foundation for North Texas (EFNT), the Young Entrepreneurs Organization (YEO), Association for Corporate Growth (ACG) and the IEEE.
Speaking
Over the past three years I have been honored to speak throughout the United States, Europe and India. Last year I was asked to speak about the market for mobile applications at the French Senate in Paris. Over a two month period of time last year I was invited to speak to various groups about mobile entrepreneurship in Barcelona, Hamburg, Amsterdam, and London. Several times a year I speak at conferences including 4G World, CITA, SXSW, Barcamp and Startup Weekend. I especially enjoy speaking to students and have been asked to lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Rice University, Southern Methodist University, The University of Texas @ Austin and I am a regular guest lecturer at The University of Texas at Dallas. Alumni organizations from the MIT Enterprise Forum to the Texas A&M have also invited me to speak to their organizations. I am comfortable speaking to small intimate groups to very large conferences. I am happy to moderate or participate on panels on topics including startups, entrepreneurship, bootstrapping, mobile technology and ShopSavvy. I am also available to give 30 to 60 minute presentations on those same topics. To book a speaking engagement please contact my publicist Scott Baradell at sbaradell@ideagrove.com or at 972.235.3439.
