Its amazing what a role model can do to your perspective. Facebook, founded by Harvard ex-students Mark Zuckerberg and Dustin Moskovitz, have set an example of finding success through dropping out of school. And their success was not lost of fellow students. This WSJ article explores how Facebook has been a [...]
A new model is emerging for VC’s. As noted in this Industry Standard article, Benchmark Capital, a prominent VC in the Silicon Valley who funded ebay back in the day, has been hiring “entrepreneurs in residence”. These people are entrepreneurs who reside at the VC while looking for business ideas. Once [...]
Today’s venture capital firms are increasingly focused on the individual founder(s), and will often pass on an interesting start-up if the founder does not have the right pedigree. They believe that certain profiles are more likely to be successful. This approach, although less risky, results in VC’s missing some outstanding opportunities. For the start-up that [...]
Its often refreshing for me to read about entrepreneurs who operate in more traditional industries, as these companies often have much less buzz and abiguity that obfuscates the true value proposition. It doesn’t get any more traditional than a beer brewer, selling a tangible and consumable product that has been enjoyed by people for [...]
Sometimes, when a little guy gets swallowed up by a big guy, some of the stakeholders are not all happy about the deal. This Wall Street Journal article uses the case of Coca-Cola and Vitaminwater. As Glaceau, the company who sells Vitaminwater, is being sold to a company with a mature distribution network, its clear [...]
A Y Combinator is a new concept being used with venture groups, whereby individuals are chosen instead of businesses. The concept is based on the fact that business models often require tweaking, and sometimes drastic changes, and so that begs the question of whether venture group are actually investing in a business, or the [...]
One of the difficult things that an entrepreneur often has to do is project revenue and expenses. While revenue projections are often complete guesses, its also difficult to accurately estimate expenses. This is especially true for the first time entrepreneur. This article on Guy Kawasaki’s blog provides a real life example. [...]