Archive for category Ideas Dept
What have you leveraged today ?
Posted by john in Ideas Dept, Question on August 13th, 2008
It’s rare that we come a cross a revolutionary idea these days. Most of the ideas we see are part of the ongoing evolution of internet based products and services.
Ev.o.lu.tion – A gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form.
The evolutionary process employs significant leverage by building on what has gone before. Similarly ,we find that the most promising internet businesses are those that are most able to leverage what already exists today to give them a leap start towards tomorrow.
So one of the recent questions that we like to ask is " What exisiting products, services or infrastructure are you going to be able to leverage that will have a significant impact on your ability to out maneuver your competitors?".
The development frameworks (Ruby, Jango etc.) are an obvious start but that won’t give you an edge over anyone else – it just keeps you level. What have you worked out that no-one else has ?
Remember that whilst the idea is important, the most successful start-up’s are the ones that out-execute the others.
Keep it simple !
Posted by john in Ideas Dept on July 18th, 2008
We come across many interesting ideas for products and/or businesses but more often than not it requires a lot of digging around to actually to find that gem of an idea.
Maybe that digging is part of the value an investor in start-up’s is expected to add, but as an entrepreneur it pays if you can explain your offering to an investor in a VERY simple manner.
Either it needs to make sense straight away, or you need to explain that it won’t make sense and explain why (simply!).
The importance of role models
Posted by john in Ideas Dept, role models on July 28th, 2007
The latest poll from Montreal Tech Watch (thanks Heri) asked what was Montréal’s best advantage as an innovation center and a permanent place for development.
23% Diversity in Montréal and Montréal’s culture (14 votes)
20% The Universities, student population, and R&D (12 votes)
20% Cost of Living (12 votes)
8% entrepreneurship spirit in Quebec (5 votes)
7% The design community (4 votes)
7% Avalaibility of tech developers (4 votes)
5% government assistance and programs (3 votes)
3% avalaibility of angel funding (2 votes)
2% avalaiblity of venture capital funding (1 vote)
2% presence of successful tech entrepreneurs (1 vote)
2% the technological infrastructure (1 vote)
Bearing in mind that the majority of readers of this blog are from the tech entrepreneur community, with results like this I wonder why on earth anyone is even attempting entrepreneurial activities in Montreal !
I mean, if we believe that our top 3 strategic advantages are cultural diversity, universities and cheap cost of living, then the fact that we actually have a tech community is amazing! So fortunately all is not lost.
It was interesting to see that the “presence of successful tech entrepreneurs” only received 2% of the votes. I see 2 potential reasons for this low vote: a) people don’t believe that the presence of successful tech entrepreneurs is actually an advantage in creating an “entrepreneur-centric environment” or b) people believe that it would be an advantage if we actually had the presence of successful tech entrepreneurs – but we don’t!
I can’t believe that anyone agrees with a) – and so it must be b) ?
As we have said before on MSU’s blog, in addition to smart people and “appropriate” forms of financing (which is an issue that we are working on improving), we need successful role modes to inspire people to stretch themselves.
Now – our digging around has shown that there are more successful tech entrepreneurs in Montreal than we would believe. By successful I mean people who have started companies, financed them and that have now been sold or are generating good cashflows. Has anyone heard of Eric Boyko, Eric Aubertin, Joe Poulin, Chris Royne, Rocky Murza, Faycal Kahloun? and the list can go on.
The best contribution that successful entrepreneurs can do for the community is to start talking about their successes. Most are willing but they just need an appropriate forum to “expose” themselves – one which doesn’t make them subject to what Carl Mercier refers to as “Quebec Jealousy” – or what we call “Tall Poppy Syndrome“.
It would benefit everyone to find the right forum – for example, would a slot at demo camp be appropriate?
The other benefit of raising these entrepreneurs profiles is that is shows to potential Angel investors that it is possible to make money by investing in start-up’s. For every successful entrepreneur there are probably 2 or 3 successful Angel investors !
“Hidden” revenue streams
Posted by john in FON, Ideas Dept on March 7th, 2007
I have been working on a post about the relative merits of FON and it has reminded me of the early days of the free dial-up ISP’s.
I was involved with setting up Livedoor, Japan’s first free ISP. It was based on software developed by Toronto based Chris Sukornyk*. This downloadable software controlled the connection and delivered non-intrusive advertising to subscribers.
It would appear that the main revenue stream was from advertising, but actually there was a much bigger “hidden” revenue stream – telco kickbacks. These kickbacks were paid to Livedoor on the basis that we generated incremental revenue for the telco provider that terminated our dial-up numbers. (At that time in Japan it cost approx $0.10 per 3 minute call). It seems obvious now, but at the time these type of revenue sharing agreements had never been considered, let alone implemented.
I think FON may have some “hidden” revenue streams – I’m still thinking them through but when i’ve finished i’ll post my thoughts. Now, I certainly don’t have a problem with FON making money, but no one should be confused – making money is their aim. They are working hard to “help create a community of people who get more out of their connection through sharing”; but they certainly plan to make money on the back of that community. They, unlike ISF, are a commercial enterprise. They have just raised another $US13 Million (total $US35 Million) but I am still reflecting on whether I think they will be a successful commercial enterprise.
Note: I do really like “hidden” revenue streams. When I review business plans I am always looking for revenue streams that may not be obvious. I ask myself, “who, in addition to the direct customer, is going to benefit from the market I am creating ?”
*(Chris and his brother founded X-stream Networks and he has recently been driving the technology behind Bubbleshare)
Montreal Wifi Network
Posted by john in Ideas Dept on February 23rd, 2007
I have been following the municipal wifi market over the last year following an investment I made in RoamAD, a wireless infrastructure vendor.
Quebec, as with Canada in general, has a strong wireless history (congratulations Mr. Sirois !) and it is still being driven today by VC’s such as Acta Wireless, Trio Capital and Garage Canada along with the “usual suspects” of Caisse de Depot and FTQ.
Montreal now has some serious players in the Wimax market, including SR Telecom, Maravedis and Wavesat; but Why, I ask, is nothing happening in the area of wifi? I know I’m going to sound very much like a conspiracy theorist but is this a coincidence ? The guys at Ils Sans Fils have doon a great job at getting hotspots throughout Montreal, as have Eye-In Wireless, but nothing of any scale has even been mooted in Montreal.
I have done some work on a wholsesale/retail business model for a Wireless ISP (along the lines of the UK’s Cloud and think that something along those lines could work in Canada (It does for Wimax!!), but one of the issues I’ve been tackling recently is the network roll out and in particular site acquisition.
Utility providers and the various “cities” of Montreal have infrastructure that might be usable but it has also been suggested to me that other companies may have citywide infrastructure that may assist in getting the site acquisition rolling quickly. Is anyone willing to stand up to the evil forces of Montreal’s Wimax community ?
(I don’t really think there is a conspiracy, or that the Wimax community is evil – sometime you’ve just got to, and I quote, “weave the pot of soup!”)
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