Google Venture Capital?

Several sources have recently reported that Google is currently working on plans to launch their own Venture Capital fund. I will start with some of the facts (at least as reported by more reliable sources than myself) and then I will share an opinion or two.

The new fund would supposedly be led by Google's current SVP of corporate development, David Drummond, however Google has recently hired former entrepreneur Bill Maris to help get the fund going. Details are few and far between at the moment: no information on deal types, typical deal sizes, or even annual fund alotment.

Will it happen?
There have been plenty of rumors about a Google VC fund for years, but nothing has ever materialized up to this point. Until now, Google seems content just waiting to see which start-ups will gain traction and then buying them (and we all know they have the money to do it). However, getting involved in venture capital investing would not be unusual for a large tech company (Intel, Motorola, Comcast, Walt Disney, and Microsoft have all done it) - although acting like a large tech company is not Google's usual cup-o-tea. Given the recent hire of Maris, this does seem much more likely to finally happen. This would also help accomplish Google's goals to invest in clean energy (google.org). Now the question is...

Will it succeed?
Google will likely be hampered by many of the same issues that bother other corporate VC's. Any funded deal would likely contain purchase rights for Google, which may deter some start-ups and even other investors. Corporate VC's also tend to pay less to their management and don't always allow co-investment by managers - making it harder to keep good people.

However, Google has alot to offer potential start-ups. They have significant technical resources and creative/personnel resources that could make all the difference in success for a new start-up. Not to mention the access to information and the natural "gravitas" that comes along with being involved with Google in any way.

My humble opinion - the fund will probably happen, and see some success. But I definately don't think funding from Google will prove to be any golden ticket, afterall, not all their investments have proved that successful - they still can't make any money with Youtube...and didn't they buy some company called Grand Central a while back (what ever happened to that?!).

Here are some more places to read about this story:
Wall Street Journal
TechCrunch

**Images used here are not actual Google images**

Facebook Fail Message

So early today, facebook was down. When this happens, all you see is a browser error message. Given the rock-start like status that Twitter has somehow created around their "fail whale" (a message generated when twitter is down - meaning you see it quite often), Mashable was inspired to write a brief post asking for submissions about Facebook "fail whale" ideas. This is my first pass at any idea - your thoughts?

FriendFeed subscription rankings for sale?

Would you pay for FriendFeed subscription rankings?

There is no question that feed services like FriendFeed and twitter have become serious marketing tools for the tech elite out there. I often wonder if guys like Scoble, Arrington, and Kawasaki ever actually read the feeds or just post to them. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy seeing updates from my friends or snapshots of the latest techcrunch and mashable articles without having to check the sites, but I imagine these marketing opportunities are the main reason for the adoption to date (an assumption possibly proven by the fact that if you subscribe to someone, they subscribe right back to you - I can't imagine Andy Kaufman or Guy Kawasaki are really that curious about what I am up to...).

So lets assume this to be true - FriendFeed is often used as a marketing tool. A recent blogger made an interesting observation - there does not appear to be any obvious method to the order in which someone's subscriptions are displayed. One constant though is that Robert Scoble, Michael Arrington, or Fred Wilson seem to appear in almost anyones front page list. Lets be honest, who hasn't spent a little time surfing people subscriptions. I have found plenty of new subscriptions by seeing who my existing subscriptions are subscribed to. But who ever clicks on the whole list and scrolls through them all? I usually only look at those people listed on the main page.

So assuming I am not an anomaly, these "top spots" are actually very valuable for anyone hoping to market themselves and their content. Which lead to the first question: how do you get in this "top" list? Which spurred the question at hand - will FriendFeed be able to charge for this listing spot? Just like Google charges for ranking in search results, why not here? There has definately been a lot of speculation around the monetization of FriendFeed - well this is just one more of those speculations. I am interested in your thoughts.

Orgoo - Total email?

I have recently discovered a cool new service: Orgoo is a new web based application that aggregates all your email accounts into one place. This is something I have been wanting for a long time and I am excited to see how well it works.

I have always loved the functionality of outlook, with the reading panes, the multiple account aggregation, and the ability to create folders and sub-folders. However, it just isn't practical for me to have all my mail stored on one machine - I have a computer at the office, two at home, and sometimes I use someone else's machine. I need to be able to see all my new mail and my stored mail in one place, no matter where I am. Some of the online providers have the ability to organize in folders and access from anywhere, but then I have to check 4 different websites for my various accounts. Forwarding messages helps a little, but then I have to be very careful about which address I am using to reply to a given message.

Orgoo seems to be trying to solve this problem (and honestly I am surprised it has taken this long for someone to do it). They bring in various email accounts, allow organization in folders, and its all web based! For an added bonus, they can also aggregate all my chat clients.

So far the drawbacks are available services. Right now I can't integrate my free Hotmail or Yahoo accounts, only paid ones. I can bring in Gmail and any other POP3 service, as well as AOL and .Mac - but the 2 largest free email services definately need to be added. One other slight irritation is the fact that I need be on their page to use the chat function. It can be popped out, but then you still have to have a seperate browser window open for it to work.

Anyhow, I am looking forward to using the service a little more.

*Disclaimer* These guys are from USC (Fight-on!) and this author did also graduate from that fine university.

Stop Agregator Noise!

So "aggregator" must be one of the most popular terms being thrown around the social web ring of late. There are plenty of start-ups entering this space (seemingly all at the same time), in fact the population of this new territory has grown so rapidly that Techcrunch create a hilarious joke site called FriendFeedFeed. All joking aside, there is no question that aggregation could be valuable, very valuable. Imagine all the time we could save if we didn't have to login to 16 different sites everyday. However, I have spent some time on these new sites and I am not convinced they have it figured out yet.

I appreciate the attempt, and long for the right solution, but I don't think it is out there yet. I see two main problems with the existing aggregators, most of which suffer from one or the other:

Creating even more noise
This includes the "news feed" style sites like friendfeed, twitter, iminta, and spokeo. These sites, especially friendfeed and twitter, have their useful place on the social web - but they don't simplify my life. In fact, I am worried they may be crating more noise than necessary. The sites provide you with a continuous feed of what your "friends" are doing on the web. However, if you follow any fairly active people, this feed can move quickly. If you aren't watching it constantly you could miss something, the last thing i need is a site I have to stare at constantly....

No/Limited Interaction
Most aggregators seem to suffer from this problem. Friendfeed allows me to interact with a particular feed post by making comments, or join a "room" - a.k.a. chat rooms 2.0. But I can't view email, messages from friends on social networks, etc. Friendfeed seems to be a pretty good service, which I do use, but it doesn't solve my management issues.

Other services like Fuser let me see new messages, and sometimes even reply (when the site is working), but I don't get updates when my friends do anything else like post a photo or make a blog entry. I can't even see any of my social friends unless they are on my Fuser "leader board." Fuser is basically a "dashboard" product for viewing email and social messages which runs slowly and requires me to leave the site and go login elsewhere if I want to interact with people. It's a good idea and a so-so attempt, but ultimately unsatisfying.

I am sure someone will get this right eventually, but who will it be?

So many sites, so little time

There is no question there are a number of great sites available to us on the web today, everything from photo sharing to social connections to blogging to games to art to . . . pretty much whatever you can think of. In fact if there is anything you can think of that isn't already out there, let me know so we can start it together. That seems to be the hard part these days, creating useful services on the web that aren't already being done by at least one or two others. A lot of the new start-ups out there seem to be tweaks or modifications to existing services. Don't get me wrong, many of these re-finishers can provide added value, and even lure away users (including me in some cases), so I am not complaining. But it does leave me wondering what some of the next big utilizations of the web will be....

Which brings me to the second half of this post. With all these useful sites, I want to use all of them. However, this leaves me with a new problem - management (I wrote a funny post about this on the Gruvie.com blog). Last time I checked I had 61 log-ins for various sites, and I am sure this doesn't include everything. With that many sites I can spend my entire day just checking my various profiles and accounts, before I even try to upload any new content or interact with any friends.

Aggregation seems to be the thing these days, and given my points above, it seems logical that someone will make some progress in this space. I look forward to using these sites, like Friendfeed, spokeo, twitter, etc... to see if any of them are getting it right.

Business Plan Competition Deathmatch - gets bloody!

Can you believe this newsworthy event was months ago and I am just writing about it now? As much as I would like to bore you with my excuses for laziness and preoccupation, I think I should get to the gore!

The competition began with more than 50 (mostly) worthy opponents (new start-ups), all slammed into one 40x20 room. All thought they brought the goods, although some must have been kidding themselves. So after alot of scratching and pulling hair, possibly a little bribery, three lovely ladies made their way into the finalist ring to battle it out for $50,000 in prize money!:

SchoolTipline
Weighing in at a maximum of 150lbs, these goodie-two-shoes love their mom and just want to make schools a safer place. They offer an anonymous reporting system designed to empower school children to report almost anything to school officials. The site is well built and they have impressive traction, supposedly they are close to a deal with a major school district (thousands) in Canada.

Pros: Good product, charismatic management, good traction, "sticky" customers

Cons: No protectable IP, plenty of competitors

They're quick, scrappy little fighters - but if they find themselves on the wrong end of a right hook from some 225 goliath, they could be in trouble.

Klymit
These science nerds turned alternative sports punks are the best funded competitor in the battle. They appear to have a noble gas based technology that they claim provides super effecient insulation. Using their valve (patent pending), jackets, pants, tents, whatever can be filled, emptied, and refilled with this gas to provide adjustable insulation. Concept is cool and they claim to be working on deals with several of the major outdoor companies.

Pros: Some IP (intellectual property), good advisory board members, maybe some traction?

Cons: inexperienced management team, playing in a red ocean with alot of big sharks

Greeting Call
I must be honest, at first I had to wonder about these flower-lovin, feel good boys - but they are the biggest and most experienced of the finalists, so I quickly changed my mind. Greeting Call is a profitable company - they provide a service whereby purchasers of flowers or other gifts can add a voice-recorded personal message to their delivery for a small fee. Apparently they already have deals with some major national and international florists and a large national grocer.

Pros: traction, traction, traction

Cons: easy to duplicate, big sharks

The Mayhem!

The day of the finals started out just fine, nice cool winter afternoon.... All the finalists got to make their beg - i mean pitch - and then.... It's unclear who instigated the madness, but their were reports of lazor sharp pencils and pointed paperclips being launched with rubberbands from the area around SchoolTipline. One pencil lodged itself in the neck of an innocent spectator (now assumed deceased). Greeting Call, thinking it had been aimed at them, began attacking with giant thorny Rose stems! Klymit wasn't going to be left out, so they came flying in, slicing and dicing with freshly sharpened snowboards. The bloody madness lasted for almost 10 minutes, by the time it was all over there were so many laying on the ground, I couldn't say how many deaths there were. Once order was finally restored, the 1st place prize was awarded to Klymit, 2nd place to SchoolTipline, and 3rd to Greeting Call (possibly for trying to fight with rose stems?!)


*Obviously, some of the facts of the events mentinoed above may have been modified, misconstrued, or completely made up. If you didn't already know that - well thats just sad. The truth is:


Overall the competition went very well, with over 50 companies submitted - and the 3 finalists all being of high quality. The event went well and was full of energy (although no real violence). All three companies gave good presentations, although some were more polished than others, and the results were as reported above. Congratulations to all the competitors in the 2008 BPC - it was a great event as always!

HireVue - Video Interviewing

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to have breakfast with Bill Allred and my good friend Jay Hart. Bill is a former Junto Partner and founder of Fire Pole. He is now working with the guys at HireVue and I got a chance to learn a little more about what they are doing:

HireVue is basically saving time and money for companies that do long-distance hiring. So rather than have an executive fly accross the planet to interview a bunch of people, just to narrow it down to a few they will have to fly back for more interviews; HireVue sends a webcam to the candidates and the candidate does the interview online, answering pre-entered questions from the company. The interview is stored and the company can review at their convenience. It is pretty cool - check it out www.hirevue.com With clients like Google, E-Trade, and Overstock, they must be doing something right.

I-Banking

So I had the pleasure to have lunch today with an investment banker of a regional investment bank with a presence here in Utah. It was nice to meet with him and hear his perspective on LBO's., IPO's, and the markets in general. One especially nice thing to hear was his opinion of an automatic ethical responsibility of disclosure that exists when brokering the sale of a company, something I-bankers often don't get credited for.

Another important distinction - the idea of the 100+ hour work week for I-bankers - myth?. He confirmed that many analyst programs, especially on Wall Street, can consist of these types of hours. The important distinction is between Wall Street firms and the second or third tier firms. At these firms, the hours tend to be less intense, although still heavy.

There is no question, I-banking can be a great place to start a career, just be prepared to work a lot. But if it can fit your lifestyle, you can make great income and gather fantastic exposure for future career moves. Not for me though...

Let the Blogification begin

Ok, so I am way behind the technology curve, but I am trying to catch up. What is this this blog all about, I am not sure yet. I expect I will mostly blog about entrepreneurship, venture capital, and other things I find interesting in this industry. I decided to start blogging because I have spent more and more time meeting entrepreneurs that I admire, and I noticed they all have a presence in the blogging world. (Brock Blake, Paul Allen, James Endicott, etc.) Plus, this will allow me to feel as if I know what I am talking about, hopefully without offending anyone.

Of course, you will need to excuse the occasional EPL reference (English Premier League for the uncultured), rant about local drivers, and personal pontification about who knows what. I will try and keep my posts relevant and interesting, but I am placing the disclaimer now: I am no expert, I only have opinions. This Blog will not be all inclusive, and often may not even be correct, but hopefully it will be fun.