Archive for the ‘Entrepreneurs’ category

The Economist “Ideas Economy” Conference at UC Berkeley

March 25th, 2011

This week the Economist sponsored The IDEAS ECONOMY Conference at the Haas School of Business on the Berkeley campus.  I attended both days and enjoyed meeting many innovation experts from around the world.

A  look at Twitter:#ideaseconomy provides some short insights from the conference and here are a few of my favorite tweets:

  • H Chesbrough – Opening up processes to include the customer is even more important with services #ideaseconomy
  • Paul Kedrosky (Kauffman Foundation): We think of ourselves as economic virus hunters #ideaseconomy
  • Elon Musk: Success = talent x drive x opportunity. If any of those goes to zero, success is impossible #ideaseconomy
  • RT @govlab: Aneesh Chopra on stage showing that govt, innovation, and entrepreneurship can go together. #ideaseconomy
  • Fun at Economist Innovation Summit! IRS asking question of Scott Cook (Intuit) then NASA asking Elon Musk (SpaceX) #ideaseconom

What were the “big ideas” from the event?  Here are my top four:

1) The World is turning into an Idea Economy- we have entered a period where the Democratization of Ideas seems more potent in many ways than technology, leadership, and geography.  In this new economy, one’s location (Silicon Valley, New York City,  Cambridge UK, Beijing, or Finland) is not so important as the way in which ideas are shared and collaborated on.  The concept of  Open Service Innovation is taking hold (see my Haas colleague, Henry Chesbrough’s new book on this topic,) – and innovative companies are getting their ideas, as well as their execution from all corners of the world.

2) Education will be radically transformed in the next 10 years – lots of examples were presented at this conference that indicate that the global education system is about to be transformed by technologies such as cloud computing, virtual classrooms, video conferencing, and distance learning tools.  This transformation will bring affordable teaching to third world and developing countries, but also represents an opportunity for major “brands” like Harvard, Brown, Cal, Stanford to take a leadership in creating the “virtual” campus to extend their brand.

3) Government programs for entrepreneurship seem to be a priority of the current administration – for example, entrepreneurs have a tax break and angel investors have a break as well (through the end of 2012) for angel investing (perhaps partially explains the rush of angel capital investments moving into start-ups these days). Other programs like Start-up America (this is a good video – done YouTube style)…. Aneesh Chopra, CTO of the United States was interviewed at this conference.  He was praised for how worn out his shoes seem to be. Point of fact, he seems to intimately know many of the entrepreneurs, angels and VCs here in the Silicon Valley.  A good sign.

4) Think nimbly, make mistakes, fail often – this theme was stressed at the conference in many different forms and seems to capture the mindset of today’s most successful entrepreneurs.  Marc Zuckerberg , CEO of Facebook has been said (in an interview in 2010) “move fast and break things”.   This is a radical departure from 15 years ago, when companies carefully thought out and planned software development.  Given costs associated with cloud computing, open source programming, and other technologies, companies can afford to experiment and fail often – as long as they are tracking the results on their customers and changing course to reflect customer needs quickly

In contrast to TED, The Economist conference is smaller and more intimate.  So, it’s easier to talk with leading experts. Unlike TED, the conference was attended largely by a group of corporate executives and writers who are all intrigued by notions of

I’ve enjoyed attending both TED and The Economist events this Spring, but I still miss the intimacy and power of the early TED events in Monterey, when only 400 people attended and one could more easily kibitz with founders from Yahoo, Google, Amazon, MIT Media Labs, Microsoft and more.

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Posted in Creative People, Entrepreneurs, Event, Innovative Company, Leadership, University

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Searching for Synthia – hottest innovation of the 21st century

August 22nd, 2010

Introducing Synthia

So popular is she, that 3 months after her birth, she already has her own Wikipedia page. Synthia may be the hottest innovation of the 21st Century.Yet, for many of us, we read about it casually on May 21st on our iPads  or home-delivered newspapers, next to stories about the latest Giants-A’s series showdown and local murder trials.  If you happened to miss the news that day, read on, as you might want to become familiar with this innovation.

“Synthia” is the nickname for a brand new bacterium developed by Craig Venter and his J. Craig Venter Institute.  You may recognize Venter’s name – he led a team at  TIGR (The Institute for Genomic Research) which in is credited as first to fully decode the genome sequence for a free living organism, Haemophilus influenzae in 1995;  in 2001, Venter and his team along with Celera Genomics decoded the first human genome entirely.  After leaving TIGR, Venter went on to form the the J. Craig Venter Institute and several related companies, such as Synthetic Genomics.  Bottom line:  Venter is among the leaders in understanding how to decode the basic building blocks of life and has a significant advantage in combining creative ideas on how to use this information commercially in the future.  It’s no wonder several investors and VCs like Steve Jurvetson kept close to him.

Her Story

The story of Synthia is truly something out of a Robin Cook novel – but in this case, the technology that has been perfected may truly have lasting effect on our lives and the lives of our progeny. It’s no simply science fiction.

Synthia was created by a synthetic genome. The team at Venter’s institute essentially pieced together from DNA fragments a modified version of a natural genome (mycoplasma mycoides - a chromosome with some 1.2 million base pairs) and implanted the hand-made genome into the shell of a  bacterium.  The new organism essentially came to live and is self-replicating.  That means that it essentially takes on a life of its own.

Uses and Abuses

One can only image the possible uses of this new approach to synthesizing life, as Synthia only represents the very beginning in a likely long exercise in creating new life forms.

Other areas that Venter and his team are apparently already exploring, and hoping to use their approaches on are:  fuel/energy, vaccination production, pollution control/clean-up,cell production,

Since genomes are the building blocks of heredity and proteins, and proteins are the building blocks of cells, and cells are the components of complex systems (organs, etc) within living organisms, the implication is that a synthetic self-replicating organism can become the basic building block to almost any change in life one can imagine.

Shades of “Singularity”

The question that many have had is whether biologists will soon be playing God with this new-found approach.  The new technology ultimately leads the way to new forms of genetically produced bacteria, viruses, plants and animals – and since they would be new to our world there would be no way of predicting how they might affect our global environment, ecosystem or biosphere.

What  might occur when eventually the recipe for synthetic life falls into naive or evil hands?

This is the essentially the first time that an artificially-created organism can self-replicate. It’s somewhat reminiscent of the predictions by author Ray Kurzweil who has written numerous books predicting new innovations that will explode from the intersection of biology/biotech/genetics, artificial intelligence and nanotechnology around the year 2030 (for more on this read The Singularity is Near by Kurzweil).

Love Her, Hate Her

So, that’s Synthia.  The bacterium you will come to love and hate.  Either we’ve unleashed a new “Manhattan Project” or we’ve got the beginning of a new Era in science.   Or, both.

I’d like to hear your impressions on this important innovation.

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Posted in Entrepreneurs, Innovative Company, Product / R&D, Technologies

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Keeping Innovation Simple – social entrepreneurship

July 19th, 2010

I get little argument when I suggest to entrepreneurs that they keep their businesses simple, that they focus on getting the simple steps done first, or that they focus on products that meet simple consumer needs.

But TALKING ABOUT simplicity and actually enabling it are two different things. It’s amazing how complex things can get when you hire a team of bright minds, create partnerships or define the functions of your product!

I was on the website Echoing Green (a early-stage social venture firm) and came across the video for one of their “Green Fellows” – a woman named Jodie Wu.  I love the innovations that she is creating with a somewhat mundane (by US standards) technology and transforming it into something of value to the poor villagers in other countries around the world.  This is simplicity in action.

What I see here is an entrepreneur who is taking a basic/antiquated technology – the bicycle – and looking at the world through the eyes of the social entrepreneur in Africa, South America, India, or China – and coming up with an innovative way of approaching this technology for alternative uses.

Will the organization itself get funding, grow successfully and launch? Perhaps? But they certainly are off to an innovative approach to social entrepreneurship that may re-purpose an old technology for the benefit of the Third World.

Have examples of simplicity that you can share? I’d love to hear from you…

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Posted in Creative People, Creative Problem Solving, Entrepreneurs, Innovative Company, Social innovation

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Hunger-driven creativity

June 30th, 2010

One of my favorite charities is Opportunity International, a global non-profit that in the past 27 years has put in place an incredible network of overseas banks and NGO partnerships to provide small loans (aka “micro-finance”) to poverty-stricken families starting small businesses. These occur in Africa, Asia, and Latin America primarily.

A lot of small loans moving the needle

According to Opportunity’s SVP of Resource Development, Dave Knibbe, 1.3 million individual loans (each on average about $150 or so in size) were given out to “clients” in 2009. That’s a LOT of entrepreneurs getting funding at a micro level…enough to move the needle in a small community, given the loans are appropriated on a group basis (usually 20-30 families cross-collateralizing each others’ loans as a group and paying small interest weekly) Opportunity claims a 96+% repayment rate on these micro loans…and the loan money is then available for the next family and the next and the next….

Opportunity reports that there are some 2 billion people in the world today living with under $2/day in wages or income.  The organization is on a mission to affect 1 billion people through it’s financial operations in the coming years.

Seeing the work – in Latin America

My recent trip to see Opportunity’s work took me (along with daughter, Kayla), to Colombia.  We visited deeply impoverished sites outside the capital, Bogota, and the coastal city of Cartagena.  Our week-long visit with other families who give to Opportunity, consisted of visits to the local bank/NGO offices to meet “loan officers” and regional managers and then out to visit “clients”, most of whom ate living in unbelievable conditions…photos of the trip are posted HERE.

What drives creativity?

This is my 3rd trip to see this innovative organization in action – and these trips are ALWAYS uplifting…because it turns out that the street barracks of Cartagena, Colombia — or the villages of Malawi, Africa or the inner city in Manila, Philippines — are full of highly motivated and creative entrepreneurs. They create businesses ranging from pottery to vegetable stands to leather goods to beauty salons…

These Entrepreneurs are a whole lot different from those that I’ve deal with for the past 20 years in the Silicon Valley. The education they have may not be what it is in the Silicon Valley, but the drive is is more focused and never-ending.

By  our U.S. standards these are very basic businesses with basic business models.  What amazes me is the differences in motivation. It got me thinking about 3 types of entrepreneurs…the typical American entrepreneur I’ve engaged with either seems to be focused on social needs or conquest/wealth generation.  For example, I know a lot of young entrepreneurs who have engaged with Web 2.0 and developed unique social applications – it was their way of providing something back to the world to allow us all to be more social.  Some of these companies haven’t created great wealth, but they’ve connected people like never before. Most of the entrepreneurs I’ve dealt with are after wealth creation or simply proving they can build something (“out for the kill”). Looking at Abraham Maslow‘s theory on hierarchy of human needs (see purple band above), these two sets of entrepreneurs fill needs for Social growth or Esteem.

The Opportunity entrepreneur (90% are woman, ages 25-55), in contrast, is driven by the need to feed her family personal hunger, desire for shelter, desire for safety – and or desire to see her children have a better life. Most are driven by all three.  Farther down on Maslow’s hierchy they are.  There’s quite a bit of motivation involved when your food shelter and clothing depends upon it.  The result is quite a bit of human ingenuity…finding solutions to getting around the system, using I call it true hunger-driven creativity.

At the top of the Pyramid

The third type of entrepreneur, an area that I am exploring in detail with my own career these days, is what I call the “social entrepreneur”.  These are typically those that have started a non-profit, or even a foundation, to serve others or a for-profit with a triple-bottom line.  These are sometimes successful entrepreneurs who have decided to give something back to others. Examples include Bill George, Bill & Melinda Gates, Bob Buford (author of HalfTime). Their Life work is focused on the top of the pyramid, self-actualization – typically in giving to others.

Although I teach a course at UC Berkeley about all the impressive ways that entrepreneurs use their creativity – in all aspects of business – I’m truly amazed when I visit and interact with hunger-driven entrepreneurs.

Of the 3 types of entrepreneurs, can you guess who shows the most gratitude?

Bogotá

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Posted in Creative People, Entrepreneurs, Life and gratitude

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Pepsi’s Innovative Business Model for Entrepreneurship

June 14th, 2010

I was intrigued to hear about the Pepsico 10 challenge, announced at InternetWeek NY in May.

The challenge involves four main components:

How it works

Contestants from around the world are invited to submit their companies for the contest. The only criteria is that require is that the company already have a product, be producing >$250,000 year in revenue, and (presumably, but it isn’t stated on the website) the company should be focused on the Internet (but who isn’t nowadays?).  Ten companies will be selected during a 2-day event at Pepsi headquarters as finalists and invited to pitch to a panel of VCs, Pepsi execs, and other participants.  The winner wins money, fame and a host of contacts for increasing the lifespan of their company.

More details available here.

What’s innovative about this?

It seems like a win-win-win for all parties involved. Entrepreneurs who submit plans presumably get feedback on what works and what doesn’t about their current business model – and what’s needed to scale their businesses.  Mashable is a big winner in associating itself with leading edge entrepreneurial ideas – particularly those that are related to social media. This helps steal the thunder from its competitors (like TechCrunch) by allowing Mashable to report on innovations in entrepreneurship AHEAD of the competition and track potential hot companies of tomorrow.  InternetWeek wins by associating itself with a new model for recognizing entrepreneurship – potentially increasing its readership and following (among those who want to be on the leading edge of technology).  Highland Capital wins by seeing some of the best plans on the planet.  Pepsi, who presumably is matching the largest monetary and time commitment to this experiment, is potentially the biggest winner (although it may be hard to measure this) by associating its most precious asset – it’s brand/name – with young, risk-taking, intelligent entrepreneurs who are trying to change the world. In the world of the Millenials, these young social media start-up execs represent the future leaders…so Pepsi is associating itself with a great group of people.

Wait, Where Have We Seen This Before (Welcome Back Kotter)?

For those of you old enough to remember, the word “challenge” has a rich history at Pepsi, and is in fact a major component of the Pepsi brand. In 1981, here is one of the early commercials released by Pepsi in a series of “Challenges”…which went on to win many advertising and branding awards:

So, creating a “challenge,” in this case to find leading edge social media companies and technologies is a smart fit for this particular company and brand.

What Pepsi, Highland Capital and Mashable May be Missing

A short-coming I see from this model is the lack of specificity in the type of business start-up that is being sought.  What area of consumer internet should the company be from?  What customer needs should the technology address?  By being open to a wide range of opportunities, I think the contest creators may get a lot of applicants who really do not fit the criteria for what Pepsi was initially looking for.  I also think a lot of companies will pass on the opportunity to submit applications because of their uncertainty as to what Pepsi is really seeking.  On the flip-side, by keeping the “scope” wide, presumably the challenge brings in a wider range of opportunities.
Another short-coming might be awareness. The best plans will come to this contest only if entrepreneurs are aware of the contest.  Among 10 entrepreneurs I personally spoke with, only one was aware of the “Challenge” and no one I spoke with planned to submit a business plan.  (yes I realize my sampling was small and random)  Some significant marketing dollars (and lots more PR) need to be applied to this contest in order for it to become known to the community.  Perhaps partnering with Universities, other online social media broadcasters (TechCrunch or Vator.tv, for example) will help in the long run. As a professor at UC Berkeley, I’d love to get my MBA and Engineering students thinking about the contest next year.  Hopefully, Pepsi realizes that it needs to commit to 4-5 years of this model in order to really reap the benefit.

Noth withstanding these things, I like the fact that a major brand who could have spent millions by throwing out more advertising, billboards, and magazine back covers, is devoting some attention to this (yes, I realize the budget for this contest was infinitesimlly small compared to Pepsi’s overall brand annual budget). Give them kudos for trying…and give Mashable and Highland high marks for assisting in an innovative new approach to partnering for entrepreneurship.

Y Combinator …look out! There’s a new innovative model on the block.

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Posted in Business Models, Entrepreneurs, Innovative Company

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