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Category: Advice

The Sili-CON Game

The Sili-CON Game

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image by Leuchtturm81 at Pixabay

What captured the attention of the Twitterverse of late was the thread from Bolt founder Ryan Breslow (@theryanking) who called out the Silicon Valley Mob. We quote: “two forces have the most power in Silicon Valley. And like… tenfold more than anyone else. Their names: Stripe and YCombinator. The kicker → Their power is in how they work together. Stripe is the darling child of Silicon Valley. Early to YC (YCombinator), Stripe made payment processing APIs easy and signed up all their YC batchmates to use their product. The “official payment processor for YC”, Stripe became a HOT company. Sequoia, the most powerful VC firm in the world, went all-in. Their position today is upwards of $20-$30B in Stripe stock.

 

By the Numbers

“Three forces combined quickly: 1/ The most powerful VC firm in the world. 2/ The most powerful startup accelerator in the world. 3/ The most powerful startup in the world, with the help of #1 and #2.” Read More...

“Beware the Tech Industrial Complex”

“Beware the Tech Industrial Complex”

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It was President Dwight D. Eisenhower who said that when leaving office, although most people quote his warning to beware the military industrial complex. He was right on both counts, but the former seems just a bit more prescient at this juncture.

The news that grabbed the headlines this week was Microsoft’s $70B bid for the troubled Activision (Microsoft’s Activision buy could shake up gaming), but the real news is that Microsoft is bigger than Google, Amazon and Facebook. But now lawmakers treat it like an ally in antitrust battles.

Odd, given that so much attention is focused these days on anti-trust and Big Tech and note to self, the acquisition would make Microsoft bigger in the gaming space than Nintendo. This, as we stand at the threshold of the metaverse and given Microsoft’s ownership of LinkedIn, this would consolidate its position in the metaverse in both work and play. Read More...

Where in the World Is Travis Kalanick?

Where in the World Is Travis Kalanick?

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If your reaction to the above was ‘who cares?,’ do not pass go, do not collect $200. How can we so quickly forget one of the seminal unicorns of Web 2.0.

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes was convicted of four of the 11 counts of fraud brought against her (three of the charges were dismissed and the jury was deadlocked on the other four, so it may not be over yet), and while she may serve (a reportedly fairly negligible amount of) jailtime, did this send chills through Silicon Valley, which at this point has become a generic term, like ‘Band-Aid’ and ‘google,’ considering that Report: Californians Leaving for Texas So Rapidly, U-Haul Ran Out of Trucks?

Will this verdict be a wake-up call? The Elizabeth Holmes verdict: Silicon Valley’s reckoning or a single bad apple? Will the guilty verdict change “fake it ’till you make it” culture?, the Mercury News asked. “Experts say the guilty verdict and the potential prison sentence it carries are sure to send a chill down the spines of entrepreneurs and investors — especially in the health care field — and prompt them to tread carefully. But it may not be the major reckoning that some have been clamoring for in Silicon Valley, where criminal charges remain rare and money continues to flow.” Read More...

Life, the Metaverse and Everything

Life, the Metaverse and Everything

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The reference is the third book in Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, The Answer to Life, the Universe and Everything, FYI.

It’s traditional at this time of the year to either look back at the best/worst ofs from the year before, or to prognosticate about the year ahead.

This point in the trajectory of tech feels different, as we venture across the threshold of Web 3.0. meaning that there have been two prior iterations: Read More...

And the Winner for Worst Company of 2021 Is…

And the Winner for Worst Company of 2021 Is…

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According to an audience survey conducted by Yahoo Finance, Facebook/Meta takes the prize, hands down, with 50% more votes than its competitor, Alibaba. According to the article, “its stock price is up 22% year-to-date — strong, but lagging the S&P 500— but down around 13% from its September high.”

So how does one achieve such a dubious honor? Well, there’s CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg himself, whose list of missteps are just too long to enumerate, considering that many of you no doubt still have holiday shopping to get done and this wouldn’t necessarily be the holiday list worth getting into – again – despite the fact that it is that time of the year.

Then there were “The Facebook Files, a series of investigative reports published by the Wall Street Journal and based on leaks provided by whistleblower Frances Haugen. Much of the publicity around the leaks focused on the impact of Instagram (a subsidiary of Meta Platforms) on teenage girls, and the company’s alleged indifference… Haugen also alleged that Facebook’s potential for radicalization has contributed to genocides in Myanmar and Ethiopia, among a myriad of other concerns expressed in the reports,” as ZeroHedge reminded us. Read More...

Is Tech Starting to Get Under Your Skin?

Is Tech Starting to Get Under Your Skin?

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We used to play competitive field hockey. Center halfback. Winning team and why? We and our center forward had a strategy: Yours Truly always fell back – to the least protected part of the field – rather than shadowing her.  She would invariably get the ball at some point, send it to us, who would guard it until she was in position to score, return it to her. Score! Game over. Worked every time.

It’s one thing to skate to where the puck is going, as per ice hockey great Wayne Gretzky’s advice. And quite another to follow the strategy/keep an eye on the field at large. Which is also potentially a winning play.

As a result of our lessons from field hockey, we personally don’t necessarily only follow where the puck is going, but rather, attempt to sort out the underlying strategy as well – and look to what else is happening on the field. For example, it was recently widely reported that Elon Musk says the US should ‘get rid of all’ government subsidies re EVs. As The Verge said, “Musk’s companies have benefitted from many different federal and state subsidies over the years, and the government is a major SpaceX customer (though SpaceX won much of that business by dramatically undercutting the prices of established players). Tesla has also found tremendous success in China after receiving lots of help from the central government there. Musk said Monday that Tesla “did not anticipate any subsidies” when the company was in its early years. Read More...

The Startup Methodology, Sung to the Tune of…

The Startup Methodology, Sung to the Tune of…

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Jimmy Chamberlin, founder and drummer for The Smashing Pumpkins, spoke at a recent StartupOneStop investor breakfast. Besides being a rock star, he is also not only an investor, but a tech company founder as well. It was interesting to get the perspective of someone who is involved in technology – and who has a very successful career outside of the industry.

As he was describing the process of songwriting, it struck us that those rules do apply to startups as well, whether you’re working on an investor deck, or your business plan. And note: whether you’re looking for investment or not, always important to have a business plan when you’re starting a business. We paraphrase:

You have to have a story to tell – and believe in it Read More...

Fake It Til You Make It – To the Witness Stand.

Fake It Til You Make It – To the Witness Stand.

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We are all aware that fake it til you make it is one of the premier mantras of the tech industry. At this point, we should also keep in mind that you can fake it for just so long – Adam Neumann’s WeWork being a notable case in point – and careful what you fake: in the case of Theranos and the company’s founder and CEO Elizabeth Holmes, it led to 11 counts of fraud that are being litigated as we speak.

As the Mercury News reported, “Holmes is charged with allegedly bilking investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars, and defrauding patients with false claims that the company’s machines could conduct a full range of tests using just a few drops of blood.”

Here’s a cautionary tale for you: despite the fact that Holmes followed the Silicon Valley playbook – attend an Ivy League school (Stanford dropout); be mediagenic (the tech might have been flawed, but in every photo of Holmes that the media proffered, she looked perfect); get a LOT of press (aka due diligence for clueless investors). Bonus points: dress in a manner that recalls a tech icon – in this case, Steve Jobs (easy one: black turtlenecks. Done!). Read More...

That Seldom Discussed Reason Why So Many Startups Fail

That Seldom Discussed Reason Why So Many Startups Fail

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We visited NYC recently and stayed at our apartment for the first time in over 18 months. We all know that the city has changed. Many people left, and have no intention of coming back, from what they’ve said to us, including founders, investors, developers and everyone in between. Their reasons are varied. The weather. The lifestyle. The changing school curriculum – and the policies in place for their children to be able to even show up. Not easy keeping rambunctious younger children in masks all day – what to speak of the possible long-term health effects. Ironic, since if you enter NYC from downtown, you’ll see New York Harbor where the Statue of Liberty stands as a welcoming beacon, with the words ‘yearning to breathe free,’ inscribed on the base. And thanks for playing.

Even though we’d lived in NYC since our college days, we were on terra incognita. Even our apartment felt foreign.  After having imbibed in only artisanal water for well over a year, the NYC tap water tasted horrible. Salty, with a distinct chemical-y flavor. Isn’t NYC tap water supposedly among the best in the world? Had that changed, too?

In-person networking events are back, and although we didn’t have time to attend any, papers required? Echoes of Nazi Germany and while it may be the new normal in NY, not required where we are and it felt disturbing. We’ve also gotten feedback from investors and readers who’ve attended the in-person events, commenting that they’ve changed. Not the same energy. And not the same level as they were prior to the exodus. Read More...

Whose Metaverse Is It, Anyway?

Whose Metaverse Is It, Anyway?

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Image by Okan Caliskan from Pixabay

The line is a reference to a comedic variety show hosted by Drew Carey, Whose Line Is It, Anyway?, which was basically an homage to the absurd.

Enter Meta, the Company Formerly Known as Facebook, which some wags have referred to as Mark Zuckerberg’s attempt to escape his many problems in the physical world.  Not the least of which is his loss of a younger audience, and every advertiser knows that it’s best to get them when they’re young.  Even Instagram can’t seem to hold on to those younger eyeballs. In Meta, kids can strap on their headsets (and CFKAF is betting that they will) and enter their own virtual worlds – with friends too, if they choose. Although it won’t be the Oculus headset, since FB is killing off the brand, which means, btw, as Techcrunch pointed out, that  it took Zuck roughly 15 seconds to tell his first lie: “Our mission remains the same — it’s still about bringing people together. Our apps and our brands — they’re not changing either.”

“Mr. Zuckerberg painted a picture of the metaverse as a clean, well-lit virtual world, entered with virtual and augmented reality hardware at first and more advanced body sensors (or neural implants?) later on, in which people can play virtual games, attend virtual concerts, go shopping for virtual goods, collect virtual art, hang out with each other’s virtual avatars and attend virtual work meetings,” wrote The New York Times. Read More...