In this episode, Hall welcomes Pano Anthos, Founder and Managing Director of XRC Labs.

XRC Labs is a startup accelerator and venture fund dedicated to fostering the next generation of disruptors in the retail technology and consumer goods sectors. 

The NYC-based company launched in 2015 with its founding sponsor, the Parsons School of Design at The New School. Having invested in nearly 100 startups, XRC Labs has built a world-class ecosystem with corporate sponsors including Mastercard, The Estée Lauder Companies, CVS Health, and more than 330 business mentors.

As the former leader of the digital practice at Eaglepoint Advisors, Pano enjoyed the challenge of understanding how far retail was from digital excellence and served in a number of interim roles from CEO, to Chief Product Officer and Chief Digital Officer for media companies, retail, consumer durable goods, and industrial companies.

Under Guided Launch, he advised or co-founded 4 digital media and software companies. including Gather Education, an ed-tech company building virtual reality classrooms that serve the 3G market. Prior to co-founding Gather Edjucation, Pano co-founded Hangout Industries, which was the first to bring video game technology and name brands to Facebook in 2007 and grew the Hangout Facebook apps to millions of users, leveraging: media brands (e.g. NBA, Conde Nast); fashion brands (Steve Madden, Abigail Lorick, Rich and Skinny Jeans), and lifestyle brands (Red Bull and Skull Candy). They were a Techcrunch 50 finalis,t and MITX Digital Media winner for “Best Use of Technology” in 2008.

Previously, he co-founded two enterprise software companies, Pantero, which sold to Progress Software at 13x trailing revenues & Syntra/Clearcross, bootstrapped to over 1000 customers in 30 countries with one of the first commercially available web services (1999) that was licensed into Oracle ERP and embedded in their ERP suite.

Pano discusses his investment thesis, advises startups and investors, and shares what he thinks are good opportunities for investors to pursue.

You can visit XRC Labs at www.xrclabs.com/, via LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/company/xrclabs, and via Twitter at www.twitter.com/xrclabs/.  

Pano can be contacted via email at www.xrclabs.com/contact, via LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/panoanthos/, and via Twitter at www.twitter.com/ptanthos.  

For a full transcript, click here.

Music courtesy of Bensound. 

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Disclaimer:
Hall T Martin is the director of Investor Connect, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to the education of investors for early-stage funding. All opinions expressed by Hall and podcast guests are solely their own opinions and do not reflect the opinion of Investor Connect. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon for the basis of investment decisions.