Having founded and successfully exited two tech startups by the time he was 43, Fredericton native Jeff Thompson brings a lot of street cred and star quality to his new role as chairman and president of regional startup support group, Propel ICT.

Thompson took up his role on Thursday, although he has been involved with Propel ICT, most recently as vice-president, since 2011 when he helped thrash out the vision for what has become the group’s successful regional accelerator, Launch36.

His new role will see him focusing on Propel 2.0, a vision of what should come next for Propel and the Atlantic Canadian region.

“The focus will be on achieving growth through working with regional partners and differentiating between the opportunities we offer early- and late-stage companies,” Thompson explained from his Fredericton home, having just returned from an early morning run.

Never one to do things by halves, Thompson is training for Fredericton’s Fall Classic half marathon.

He regularly runs half marathons (21 kilometres) and credits the exercise with helping him stay mentally and physically healthy during the stressful years spent building companies.

The early riser is often out running the trails around Fredericton’s St.John River as early as 4 a.m.

“I run solo so it is an opportunity to get away from everything,” he said.

“Sometimes I reflect on business. Other times I don’t think at all, just notice the birdsong.”

Thompson began running in 2006 when he was the founder and CEO of his first startup, Conseros Software, which prioritizes and distributes work to a company’s best-skilled and available employees.

“All startups are stressful,” he said. “We bootstrapped Conseros. We had no outside investment. There were months when we had no money for payroll and you don’t miss payroll, ever.

“The company had a line of credit and I was the guarantor. It gets really personal. I got hyper-focused when clients owed us money.

“But, of course, having no outside investors is good when you sell, and 100 per cent of the company remains in the hands of you and your team.”

Thompson hit payday with Conseros when he sold it to Genesys Telecommunications in 2009. He continued to work with Genesys for the next three years, taking the product into the Asia Pacific region, and garnering big clients like Telstra and PayPal. But the role meant he often spent 10 months a year abroad, usually living in hotels.

“Running became very important then,” he said. “I had to start my day with a run. If I didn’t, something would get under my skin and it would be a horrible day. The body gets into a routine.”

Eight months ago, he sold his second company, UserEvents, to California-based LiveOps for an undisclosed sum. The UserEvents product analyzes a corporation’s data to detect when a customer is having problems with a website or other communications channel. It then notifies the company’s call centre so the problem can be sorted out.

Since the sale, Thompson has continued to work with LiveOps on product strategy and business development.

All startups might be stressful, but Thompson said that experience helped when it came to working on his second venture.

“You are more realistic the second time,” he said. “The first time, if a sales meeting went well, I would expect them to buy and that doesn’t always happen. The second time, I wore less rosy glasses and I knew how to close the sale, and I think I was better at managing staff.”

Having spent so much time selling his products around the world, these days Thompson is happy to stay close to home.

“I haven’t found a better place than Fredericton to live,” he said. “It’s a good place to start a company. I’ve twice found good people to hire here.”

Disclaimer: Entrevestor receives financial support from government agencies that support startup companies in Atlantic Canada. The sponsoring agencies play no role in determining which companies and individuals are featured in this column, nor do they review columns before they are published.