About J Cornelius
Most product consultants come from one world. This one comes from several.
The career started working with live sound systems at 16 — and learning fast that working for yourself beats working for someone else. That turned into a touring sound & lighting company working with bands like Nine Inch Nails, Metallica, B.B. King, and many more.
Then the internet showed up.
CoffeeCup, one of the first HTML editors ever made, came next — 14 years, roughly 60 software products, and a web hosting company that grew to over 25,000 customers in less than 18 months. Both businesses were sold. After that focus turned to building a multi-million dollar product strategy and design consultancy.
Along the way: J authored Loops: Building Products with Clarity & Confidence — the book that lays out the framework for successful product strategy. He completed an executive MBA program through Wharton Business School's Executive Education, served as an advisor to Georgia Tech's Advanced Technology Development Center, and spoke at conferences and workshops around the world.
Still focused on emerging technology
That curiosity hasn't slowed down. Right now, the focus includes AI, crypto, and blockchain — not as buzzwords, but as tools that fundamentally change how companies build products, reach customers, and create value. Understanding these technologies at a technical level makes it possible to cut through the hype and help organizations figure out what's real, what's useful, and what's worth building around.
The thread through all of it
Figuring out what people actually need, then building it. That's the same work today — just without the guitar amps and pizza ovens.
Product strategy grounded in real experience.
Not frameworks borrowed from a textbook — patterns that have worked (and failed) across dozens of industries over three decades.
A human-centered approach.
Everything starts with the customer. Their problems, their behavior, their perception of value. Get that right and product decisions get dramatically easier.
An AI-informed perspective.
Knowing where AI creates real leverage and where it's just noise matters. Not every problem needs a model. The ones that do need the right strategy around them.
Honest, direct thinking.
Expect to hear what's true, not what's comfortable. That's the only way the work is useful.