FAST COMPANY: What do you outsource and what do you keep in house?
JOEL WEINGARTEN: In deciding whether to outsource or to keep a project in house, we look at what we feel are the core competencies of our team and what our company's really about. For us, that means being at the intersection of fashion, technology, and social networking. And so when a project is in that domain, we like to keep it in house. Where it's at the margins, or tangential, we look to the best of what's out there.
What do you outsource and what do you keep in house?
Prior to founding StyleOwner, Joel taught robotics at Penn in the Electrical and Systems Engineering Department. There he developed a successful inner city education initiative using robotics in classrooms under an NSF grant.
During graduate school at the University of Michigan, Joel was a part of a DARPA (defense department research) grant where he helped develop the world’s fastest legged robot (RHex). When not building robots or websites, Joel can be found cooking with his wife Anna, playing in Central Park or turning the temperature down in the office (he kindly bought Snuggies for everyone in the office).
