Evolution of NetForum

As we prepare for our 6th event, I feel it's time to share how NetForum has evolved over the course of the last nine months. It started as nothing more than a hypothesis. Back in September we thought there was a market need for NetForum and said, "There is no TechStars for expansion stage Web companies. All the attention is focused on the new start-ups.  But the challenges to scale from early stage to later stage are enormous." NetForum tried to fill this need by bringing together in a roundtable format a small group (20-30 people) of C-level executives of expansion stage Web companies and Strategy/Corporate Development executives from leading public and private companies.  We decided that at the NetForum there would be no admission cost, no presentations, no pitches and all attendees would be expected to contribute to the discussion. We wanted to generate though-provoking and engaging discussions in a "friendly" and confidential setting. In the beginning we had no idea if this would actually work. Over the last nine months our hypothesis has been resoundingly confirmed. We have had breakfast sponsors such as the NYSE, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, Willkie Farr & Gallagher and Duane Morris. Participants include senior executives from a wide-range of companies such as The Street.com, Virgin, Reuters, XO Group, EdVentures, Sony, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and numerous rising web companies. We will post brief summaries of our first five events below and in the future start posting event descriptions prior to and summaries after events.