Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Entrepreneur Kevin Orzechowski got some much-needed cash for LearningPoint, his education software firm.

One Monday in January, Kevin Orzechowski was depressed and broke, sitting in his underwear, scouring the Internet for a job and trying to figure out how to pay the next month's mortgage. He'd just pulled the plug on his struggling education software business LearningPoint.

Then the phone rang and fate intervened with a call from a stranger in California who offered to jump-start the firm with much-needed cash.

It was a hard-won reprieve after 18 drama-packed months in which Mr. Orzechowski went from seeming to be on the verge of success to teetering on the brink of financial ruin. He wanted to give up but was in too deep to get out.

"I stayed with it because I got funding before I found a job," Mr. Orzechowski said. "Is that the dumb luck of the draw or some kind unconscious control over my destiny? Beats the heck out of me."

The battered and toughened Hampton businessman's story is merely a glimpse into the how-to-get-a-business-started school of hard knocks.

Risk is one thing but blind ignorance is another, he said. "We were naive."

Mr. Orzechowski's entrepreneurial spirit, like that of many of his brethren, was spun out of necessity after watching the cozy consulting business he'd built with his former employer vanish.

The pipeline of customers looking for custom-made computer-based training programs dried up, giving Mr. Orzechowski and his two co-workers-turned-partners three months to find new jobs or venture out on their own.

They didn't have much -- a little money saved, a shaky business plan, about a dozen would-be clients and no real clue as to what they were doing, Mr. Orzechowski said. But the trio was optimistic that their talent and Rolodexes would sustain them. Thus, LearningPoint was born.

When their first big customer fell through, the trio scraped by, picking up smaller orders for Collaborate, their e-learning software aimed at helping businesses easily create customize training courses.

But each time LearningPoint seemed to catch a break, a setback would pop out of nowhere; a pattern that came to a head last summer.

The company, whittled down from trio to duo and with just a few months of cash, placed second in a business plan competition sponsored by the Pittsburgh Technology Council. Soon it began seeing results from the networking strategy of reeling in key contacts by buying lunch in exchange for a chance to be heard.

After his remaining partner landed a new job, Mr. Orzechowski was left to go it alone. LearnPoint seemed to be saved when Oakland-based economic development group Idea Foundry offered to take it under its wing and finance it.

But the deal, worth nearly $200,000, fell apart late last year over legal snafus that left the company vulnerable.

At the end of his rope, Mr. Orzechowski gave up.

He had just shut off LearningPoint's phone and dismantled the firm's Web site on that January morning when Greg Friedman, who runs a wealth management advisory and a software firm outside of San Francisco, got his home number and called.

A few weeks and one product demonstration later, Mr. Orzechowski "got really lucky." Mr. Friedman was going to pay an undisclosed sum upfront for versions of LearningPoint's software tailored for his financial advisory firm.

Armed with a check sent overnight, Mr. Orzechowski had enough cash to keep LearningPoint afloat, smooth out the snags with his former partner and fortify the firm from future legal problems.

Sending a check to a man he'd just met wasn't a big deal, according to Mr. Friedman.

LearningPoint's software was better than anything else that he'd seen, Mr. Friedman said. "I didn't think it was that risky. Kevin's a good guy who ran into a bad situation that any entrepreneur can run into."

Two months after cashing Mr. Friedman's check and landing nearly $175,000 from Idea Foundry, Mr. Orzechowski said he's as shocked as anyone that LearningPoint has been resurrected.

He credits the message found in a fortune cookie from a Chinese take-out meal purchased during one of LearningPoint's toughest days: "Great men live dangerously, small men don't take chances."

The mantra clicked when Mr. Friedman called.

"I was in my underwear searching for jobs, I thought 'What do I have to lose?' "