Sorry for the slow posting lately. I'm involved with a new startup that consumes most of my time and energy. I must admit that it's fun to be in the middle of action and see results fast. Only a few weeks from ground zero to total market launch sounds like something unheard of in the software business. It still is as far as I'm concerned. This time it's about real customers, consumers. B-2-C and nothing to do with IT or any high tech. I have been enjoying every bit of it. And no, I'm not copying Jim Clark. Real estate development was in the agenda last year...
New excuses for lousy profit margins in the film industry: teenagers rate the movies on spot and send the text messages across. This piece has raised some buzz around the community.
Wired covers the difficulties in Wi-Fi business models.
VCs have been through the rough times with their portfolios but that's not all: limited partners can be as tough cookies as well. Privateequityonline comments.
Nanoparticles to pinpoint viruses in body scans. Gradually the next hype wave shows its way to consumer market. New funds are coming up in this field like the first timer Seraphima Ventures of NY.
Arnold is currently leading the run and having some big names supporting him from the high tech field. If you fancy to see Arnold in politics why not give him a few bucks for the good cause - Tim Draper does it at least.
Gartner predicts that mobile data services will increase this year by 31% till $16.8m in Western Europe.
My deep throut in Nokia tells that Nokia people are as astonished as anyone else about the Sega.com deal. The quickest have named the deal as 'SNAP, crackle and POP'...
My personal bull market has started - I won a lunch thanks to my pessimistic friend who did not believe that the economy will turn for better in Q3. Hmm, where to get the dessert?
Recently I have found some nice resources for newbie entrepreuners. Innovateur has free templates for financial and business plan needs among others. BillSnow offers advice how to get VC funding and especially why one is not getting it. 'Tongue in cheek' valuation estimator for your new venture with a few question by CayenneConsulting.
Ventureblog seems not to agree with Jim Clark that Silicon Valley is totally dead...
Would you buy a light bulb online? Well, check www.topbulb.com and see with your own very eyes that ecommerce ain't dead yet (link via Rafe Needleman).
A friend of mine is having an interesting start-up in the media platform space: Zinek. I must admit that I have started to get excited about the possibilities of a set of flat screens, a publishing platform and a combination of rich media content and advertisment. The target group will be hanging around the hotspots such as night clubs, bars, coffee shops, restaurants, hotels, ferries etc. I should be surprised if we are not starting to see media targeting for this type of retail segmenting soon. Enough said...
Jim Clark is leaving Valley. The legendary IPO mania was started by Netscape and mainly due to some funding requirements elsewhere (a boat to be exact). You can read the whole story from the New New Thing. So, Jim got tired of the boring athmosphere and is relocating to Florida. Hmmm. I just wonder how much there is to do if Valley was not enough...
Finally, I see a business model that works with WiFi. It's used for improving your service offering and not targeted to generate revenues. How to compete with free?
Nasdaq Germany will cease trading soon. So much about high tech in Europe...Well, Europe is fragmented and there is not one single place to be. However, Nasdaq had also their failure in Japan. Softbank introduced the concept for the conservative Japanese market but the success was less than great.
Is Nokia really serious about N-Gage? Nokia is penetrating for a real tough market. In the last 15 years only Sony and later Microsoft have introduced game consoles for the niche. In both of the cases they have spent tons of money and still sold their consoles in loss. The money is made in the content (i.e. games) after the market has accepted & loved the concept.
Nokia has claimed that it will not sell their devices without profit. In the senior management level they show commitment but in the middle management level their signals are mixed. Lots of talk but not that much decisions. Considered the market segment and dedication it requires it seems that they are not 100 % committed. The market launch is just a few months away but the back office is still undecided and non-investing. Just wondering why. Maybe the past GSM success has made them a bit too confident? Meanwhile the playfield has changed. Content and entertainment don't have that much in common with manufacturing, logistics and hardware design. Introducing a new phone is not the same as penetrating for a totally new industry with established and worldwide competitors with years of track record. In this business it's not enough to design and build the device - it's just the beginning. At least it should be.
The retail price for the device is €300. Still the console is targeted for casual players that have already played mobile games. This market has a size of 250m people. Any bells ringing? Paying 300€ for a machine that is build for gaming but you play snake only once in a while? A repeat N-Gage is not targeted for gamers. Maybe it's just me and the hot summer...
According to the sales director of an IT retail store chain I met today SME sector has not yet started to make big investments. However, might the case be that the basic infrastructure is already in place and thus only adjustments and enhancments are required? Ellison of Oracle has started to think so. He says that "the industry in total will actually shrink."
My personal barometer for high tech activity is sensing once again more action. Yesterday I had some discussions with entrepreneurs who were active during the last dotcom and mobile mania. It seems to be in the air that many serial entrepreneurs are starting to found new companies again. Funnily enough things seem to happen in patches like in the past hype. Everybody is starting to move at once and thinking along the same lines. Well, this time I don't mind since new companies will mean more activity and energy to the economy.
"With the NASDAQ stock index up some 25% since March, history suggests that venture capital will soon follow." The vibes are that funding environment might start to move again. Well, within 12 months at least.
German VC market temperature by privateequityonline.com.
Wi-Fi in perspective by Sky Dayton who founded Earthlink, the second largest ISP in US. And how Boingo got started.
My favourite browser is gaining foothold by having already 10m downloads this year. But don't hold your breath yet: Opera has only 0,6 of the market compared to Microsoft's 95 per cent.
Vinod Khosla of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers tells what went wrong with Excite and why it's a good time to be a venture capitalist. And things he's excited about...
Mr. Terminator is now running for governor of California. Somehow this seems to be the trend around the globe. People with media time will get elected from various backgrounds such as modeling, acting, sports, music etc. Is it telling something about the voters or more about our fragmented society? It's a no surprise that many people have lost their confidence for politics and the real substance behind it. Hence they don't actually care who gets elected. Any 'puppet' will do for the 'Muppet show'. Another issue might be the pure financial power required. Nowadays the society is so fragmented that it's ever more expensive to reach enough people to get elected. Either you need huge financial backing like Mr. Berlusconi or Mr. Bloomberg or then you just simply have to be a familar face across the nation via public media. No matter what's the cause but somehow meritocracy might not sound that bad after all...
Recent statistics show positive market signals at least from Germany and Japan. Also Eurozone interest rates start to rise again after the lowest peak for ages. After all we might gradually get to the revenue increase mode once again. Remember how to do that after all those cost cutting and layoffs? One should actually start to chase new customers and increase the market share. Might be more difficult than it sounds. Pretty many companies have been laying off people and keeping them in fear of losing their jobs. Those that are talented and have had enough might begin to move around when the positive swing is getting back. They will remember the horror and terror and leave the employer with increased demand without sufficient supply and resources. Many companies had the mantra that 'our employees are our most presicous asset' - well that loyalty might get some acid testing soon.
Maybe it's just me but I'm receiving pretty positive signals from the high tech scene. I'm not talking about any hard core facts but just how people talk and the buzz & excitement in the community. It might be just the holiday energy converted into first days enthusiasm before turning into the usual apathy. Well, Jim Breyer of Accel Partners thinks that the VC cycle has hit rock bottom.
In the last few months I have discovered some new exiciting ventures that have previously been in the stealth mode. What's typical for those ventures is that they are not pure software but more 'concrete' products that might have some software components bundled in them. Investors seem to favour tangible products over pure bits based businesses. Well, for the readers of this blog this should not come as a surprise. Horizontal software market is gone and long live the vertical application areas!
The Economist had a great piece about the changes in the IT industry globally (subs req.). Outsourcing is taking its toll for the industry and the focal points are moving away from US and Western Europe to places like India, Russia and China. Are the old 'hotspots' able to compete with the new-comers and renew themselves in order to shift for the next level? How much of the current IT business is actually rocket science - most of the work is pure converting, merging and tinkering of the old business processes and systems...