Chris Lindstrom, 46

Mill Creek, Wash.
Laid off from: Motricity, Nov. 14, 2008
New venture: Ceptara
Last year's profile

Where he is now: Chris Lindstrom's consulting and training firm, Ceptara, landed two big deals at the end of 2009: contracts to provide consulting on Lean Six Sigma efficiency practices to the Army Dept. and to the city of Bellevue, Wash. Lindstrom, who has a staff of two employees and five contractors, plans to expand beyond consulting and training to develop products as well. Ceptara's first product is a free plug-in for Microsoft Outlook to help people manage tasks. "We started out consulting because consulting scales with people and is not as capital-intensive," he says. While Ceptara's revenue isn't where Lindstrom hoped when he wrote a business plan in late 2008, the company is profitable.