VBWeekly: Sh*t startup people say
Watch out! There’s some adults-only vocabulary in Startup Land.
For this week’s video show installment, we decided to deliver a very special VBWeekly addressing the dangers of myopia and jargon.
Also, we decided to slay what’s left of the “Sh*t People Say” meme.
Since we get a lot of press releases, talk to a lot of VCs and entrepreneurs, and live the dream ourselves as startup employees, who better to skewer the startup community than … Continue Reading
Join us at Vator Splash in San Francisco on February 2nd
This sponsored post is produced by Vator.tv.
If you want to mingle with top venture capitalists and angels, who are funding the next wave of innovative powerhouses, join us for Splash SF at Cafe du Nord on the evening of February 2, 2012. Ten early-stage startups selected by their peers share the stage with rockstar CEOs who share their secrets to success with the crowd of 400 startup CEOs, investors, service providers and bloggers.
Splash … Continue Reading
Startup incubator just for teens is picking its next class
Hey kids: If you’ve got a great idea for a startup, we know a guy who’d love to help you out over the summer.
The Teens In Tech incubator started last year as a way for ambitious, bright teenagers to accelerate their business and app ideas.
This year, the Teens In Tech gang is welcoming a second class and is taking applications now.
Last summer, six teams went through the incubation process. Nine out of … Continue Reading
Obama calls for reforms to support the “next Steve Jobs”
In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, President Obama recognized startups and entrepreneurs for innovating and creating new jobs, while calling for reforms that would support everyone who “aspires to become the next Steve Jobs.”
The speech focused heavily on leveling the playing field between the U.S. and other countries so that America’s economy could be more competitive, and included key calls to action that would directly affect the startup community. He asked … Continue Reading
The 3 key limitations of “spray and pray” investors
This sponsored post is produced by Doug Renert, Co-Founder of Tandem Capital.
Remember during the dot-com era when your mail carriers and cab drivers were giving you stock tips? Now it seems as though they’ve all become angel investors, pitching their countless early-stage portfolio companies to anyone and everyone who will listen.
Yes, the arrival of the “lean startup” model — and the heightened exposure of entrepreneurs through online media, pitch events, and social networks … Continue Reading
Startup and the city: A great moment in history
Editor’s note: Julia Plevin recently started a job at a startup that’s still in stealth mode. She’ll be posting occasional columns on VentureBeat about her experiences.
Like most great ideas, the inspiration for this article came to me while at a bar at approximately 11:37pm on a Thursday night.
It must have been 11:37pm because I had been working on a report to present the next morning until eleven o’clock.
My roommate convinced me to … Continue Reading
The 14 hottest Chinese tech-startup clones of 2011
Cloning or copycatting ideas, companies, and products is nothing new in China. Westerners, especially Americans, loathe cloning; it hurts their pride and is an insult to their creativity and hard work. The Chinese, however, love it. It comes as second nature and presents a grand opportunity to seize a massive market potential.
People outside of China often wonder why the Chinese love to copy things. The answer is that it’s the way they’re taught to … Continue Reading
Find your startup’s voice: Why I hired a journalist to run my company blog
As a CEO of a startup, my online voice – a blog called Greg’s Corner — is the place where I share my company news, try to differentiate myself from competitors, and showcase the value I’m offering. But until about a year ago, my online voice wasn’t saying much.
I knew what I wanted to say in these posts but I struggled to find the right words to express my thoughts. I knew my blog … Continue Reading
Hello VentureBeat — I’m your new sleuth in Silicon Alley, serving up scoops with your morning coffee
Hi VentureBeat! I’ve just joined VentureBeat as East Coast editor, based in New York. I can’t wait to get started on Monday.
I didn’t know much about the Silicon Alley scene until the day I stumbled into NYC Resistor, a hacker collective in Brooklyn. That was about three years ago. The air smelled like burning metal and people were talking about laser cutters and 3D printers and robots that dispensed drinks. It was a little … Continue Reading
Cool private companies: Software to help companies tackle risk and reward
As a software securities analyst for investment banking firm Canaccord Genuity, Richard Davis spends 200 days a year on the road visiting companies. He goes to public companies such as Oracle and Salesforce.com, but he also visits up-and-coming software companies he thinks will go public in the near future. In his new column, Davis talks about some candidates he thinks may be ripe for the IPO class of 2012 or 2013.
ProcessUnity: Operational, compliance, and
CES tips for startups: The smartest thing you can do is wear your company t-shirt
Chances are if you’re working in tech then you’ve spent time deliberating over which of the multitude of conferences, events and shows you should attend in 2012. Time out of the office is a luxury most startups can’t afford, so how can you justify CES, NAMM, Macworld, Mobile World Congress, SXSW, plus the hundred or so others you’re considering?
The rule of thumb is that a few crucial conferences are a must, and that it’s … Continue Reading
Startup and the City: A startup vocabulary lesson
Editor’s note: Julia Plevin recently started a job at a startup that’s still in stealth mode. She’ll be posting occasional columns on VentureBeat about her experiences.
I come from a right-brained family of lawyers, English teachers and journalists. We dabble in word puns and bananagrams but not math or logic puzzles. That is to say, I don’t come from a culture of engineering.
Each day I work at my startup, I learn to understand the … Continue Reading
How to tell your story in 2-4 minutes…and win
One of the things I’ve learned over the past two years years while leading the DEMO conference is that great entrepreneurs are able to pitch their company stories clearly and engagingly in about two minutes.
I’ve now seen thousands of pitches, and it’s surprising how few entrepreneurs have mastered this. A flat or unfocused pitch can cause serious harm to your chances. Potential investors give up trying to see magic in you. Potential business partners … Continue Reading
Is innovation leading to higher unemployment? Meet the new haves & have-nots
Technology entrepreneurs love to talk about disruption while simultaneously touting themselves as job creators, but the two roles are often contradictory.
By definition, disruptive innovations are characterized by a streamlining of process or product that is more efficient. Typically, the inefficiencies removed from the incumbent system result in less required labor. Less labor means fewer jobs.
Consider Amazon. For all the jobs created by Amazon’s online sales model, I suspect there were significantly more jobs … Continue Reading
Can you code PHP like a Ninja? We should talk
Wanted!
Someone to help us change the face of modern news reporting.
VentureBeat is looking for an experienced PHP coder with experience working on WordPress VIP.
Design skills are a big plus. We’re looking for a coder who is creative, and who is also familiar with the LAMP stack. You’ll be working on various widgets and CSS JS interactions, but also more ambitious products that we’re rolling out on VentureBeat over the next year.
You will be … Continue Reading
Shiny, happy company: Why happiness is the new metric for startup success
The seal of the high school I attended contained two Latin mottos: Non Sibi and Finis Origine Pendet. Despite seeing those words everywhere, I paid little attention to them. I later learned they mean “Not for one’s self” and “The end is determined by the beginning”, respectively.
Years of studying neuroscience and psychology has led me to believe those are truly insightful mottos that should be instilled not just in high school students but company … Continue Reading
Must-read for startups: 6 tips for raising capital in 2012
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”
This famous introduction by Charles Dickens sums up what entrepreneurs seeking startup capital are facing in 2012.
On the one hand, banks still aren’t lending. And with the debt crisis looming over Europe and political uncertainty here in the U.S., there’s an increased perception of risk for early-stage investors.
However, record low interest rates, stagnant public stock markets and real estate, and weakening … Continue Reading
Why the biggest companies aren’t wiping the floor with social startups
It’s paradigm shift time — again.
Fab.com is the latest in a string of companies that is seeing huge success by applying principles to commerce that at first glance, seem like old hat; Thematic fire sales. Big deal… right? Actually, it is. And we (in North America at least) have Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and (soon) Google+ to thank for it. But you already knew that.
So the real question is, why haven’t the biggest retailers … Continue Reading
Thiel Foundation: Silicon Valley needs to stop requiring college degrees
Everybody knows that if you’re smart and ambitious, you attend college. Why? Tradition. But if we’re ambitious about creating a better twenty-first century, should we follow traditions from the nineteenth?
In the past hundred years, technology entrepreneurs have given us cars, jets, vaccines, cell phones and computers. The college industry, meanwhile, has made remarkable innovations in raising prices and offering novel forms of debt.
College tuition has gone up 500 percent in the last 30 … Continue Reading
Cool private companies: 3 business services for doing more with less
As a software securities analyst for investment banking firm Canaccord Genuity, Richard Davis spends 200 days a year on the road visiting companies. He goes to public companies such as Oracle and Salesforce.com, but he also visits up-and-coming software companies he thinks will go public in the near future. In his new column, Davis talks about some candidates he thinks may be ripe for the IPO class of 2012 or 2013.
Xactly Corporation: Compensation management
