Molly Alexander: Quiet Time
Sometimes, there’s an idea that’s so good, you have to keep it under wraps.
In industries where competition is fierce, and funding scarce, secrecy is sometimes the only way one company gets an edge over another.
That’s certainly the case with DataWeaver, a two-year-old company that, according to its Web site, “provides outsourced engineering services and applications solutions for visual communications products.” The description sounds like gibberish to a lay person, but its intent, according to DataWeaver co-founder Molly Alexander, is straightforward: to give potential clients a taste of what the company does, without tipping off competitors to its secrets. Right now, DataWeaver is in what Alexander calls “quiet mode”: a mysterious phase between the time a company is established — DataWeaver set up shop in an office park overlooking the hills of Southwest Austin last April — and when it goes to market with its product.
For now, all Alexander can say is that her company is creating customer service products for Internet businesses. It has a lucrative contract with a company called VTEL, which makes video teleconferencing equipment. It’s privately funded by friends and family, but would like to start pitching to venture capitalists soon. And it’s in an extremely competitive industry, so they have to keep their mouths shut, like it or not.
It’s pretty clear that for Alexander, “quiet mode” isn’t exactly the default setting. Talkative, cheerful, and exceedingly confident, Alexander has the personality of an accomplished saleswoman: Even if you don’t understand what she’s pitching, you want to buy it anyway. Which isn’t surprising, considering Alexander’s years of experience in the high-pressure world of economic development, bringing businesses to communities including Elgin and Georgetown, where she served as Chamber of Commerce president. “I learned how to raise money, I learned how to strategically position things, and I learned how to build businesses by helping other people build businesses,” Alexander says. “It gave me the ability to wear multiple hats and do multiple deals.”
At DataWeaver, which Alexander started with “four other guys” in a garage in 1998, which hat Alexander is wearing depends on what needs to be done on a given day and who’s around to do it. Officially, her title is VP of sales and partnership; unofficially, she’s been the company’s spokeswoman, visionary, alliance builder, and equipment manager, among numerous other roles. “In the first month of operation, it’s just like opening a restaurant. You’ve got to make sure the food tastes good. But first, you’ve got to make sure it comes out [at all], before you try to bring customers in,” Alexander says. “You have to figure out who’s got the credit card before the check comes in, who can buy the furniture, what you can do on a 30-day note, who’s got the refrigerator, who’s got the coffee maker. Little things. But they’re very important.”
As DataWeaver prepares to seek venture capital funding, Alexander says she’ll stay on the sidelines while the company’s CEO, Dave Nelson, pitches the company to investors. Although she’s aware that women often have a harder time getting their feet in investors’ doors, Alexander says she learned long ago that “if I carried that chip I wasn’t going to get anywhere.” As a woman in the male-dominated world of economic development — and, before that, as an aide to a female City Council member in Dallas — Alexander learned which battles were worth fighting and which she should just let go. “I know in economic development sometimes I was not invited to the table because I was a woman. But I knew that,” Alexander says. “You get over it, and figure out how you can get to the table. I wouldn’t worry about the fact that I wasn’t invited, [I would ask] how do I knock on the door and say, okay, when do we start? … It doesn’t matter if I’m a woman. But if it matters to [venture capitalists], heck, bring someone else in.”
At the same time, Alexander says, she has found that women have to work harder than men to receive the same level of recognition: to “overachieve without making it seem like we’ve overachieved.” Although actions can speak for themselves in the business world, Alexander says she’s found that women “have to make people aware of their actions … Women have to be willing to stand up and say, look, I’m bright, I can accomplish things, and this is my track record. I had to be able to say, I’m good at what I do, and damn it, I deserve to be here.”
Company: DataWeaver
Web Site: www.dataweaver.com
What It Does: “Provides outsourced engineering services and applications solutions for visual communications products.” Currently in “quiet mode.”
Year Founded: 1998
How It Was Funded: Friends and family
This article appears in November 24 • 2000.