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Roundtable Recap: February 27 – Confidentiality is Overrated

We had a packed session during this week’s roundtable.

Avaz
First up, we had Ajit Narayanan, a 1M/1M premium member from Chennai, India, pitching Avaz, an autism app for children. Ajit is chalking out his marketing strategy now that he is in the process of wrapping up his funding round.

World Biotechnology
Then, Eugene Disnescu from New York City, pitched World Biotechnology that targets Ethanol producers as its first set of customers. Eugene expressed his concerns about their IP being stolen by potential customers who may also be strategic investors. Well, my take on most of these situations is that confidentiality is overrated. If it’s that easy to steal IP, perhaps there’s no point in doing the business. Most entrepreneurs who get too concerned about protecting IP end up not getting very far with their businesses.
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The Dark Reality of Entrepreneurship

There’s a really good story on Inc. on the dark realities of entrepreneurship. Not the rah rah, everything is so wonderful kind, but the brutal emotional truth: The Psychological Price of Entrepreneurship. Read it.

Successful entrepreneurs achieve hero status in our culture. We idolize the Mark Zuckerbergs and the Elon Musks. And we celebrate the blazingly fast growth of the Inc. 500 companies. But many of those entrepreneurs, like Smith, harbor secret demons: Before they made it big, they struggled through moments of near-debilitating anxiety and despair–times when it seemed everything might crumble.

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Not All Student Entrepreneurs Drop Out

Today’s generation of students has a high exposure to the Internet, smartphones, social and many other technologies from a very young age. It is not uncommon to see college students tinkering with technology, starting digital startups, and making millions (and occasionally even billions). Some drop out of school to build their business, but not all. Some stay on in school to get the best of both worlds.

Today, we are going to look at some such student entrepreneurs that we have worked with.

Jeff Nobbs is the founder and CEO of Extrabux, a highly regarded shopping rewards site monetized via affiliate commissions on online transactions. He co-founded Extrabux as a student at the University of Southern California in 2006. He and his co-founder, Noah Auerhahn, who lived in the same dormitory, worked on the project while they were still at school. Two years later in their junior year, they submitted Extrabux to the USC business plan competition, where it won first place and received $25,000, its first stamp of credibility. That helped them build a team and raise close to a million dollars over the next year. They are now on a run rate of over $10 million and their revenue in 2012 was about $5 million. Read more about how Jeff made Extrabux a success in my interview with him.
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Trend Spotting: Entrepreneurship Inside Corporations

There is a real trend developing right now of corporations becoming crucibles of innovation and entrepreneurship in a systematic way. In this post, I will discuss four specific sub-categories of this trend that we’re seeing, and for all practical purposes, participating in.

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Funding Rejection Statistics Of Key Players

You’ve often heard me say that over 99% of the entrepreneurs who seek financing are rejected. This post offers a set of rejection statistics culled from credible sources on some of the key players:

YCombinator: 97.15%

YCombinator started as a summer programme and the roots still show, with courses running for three months, about the length of an academic summer break. Teams all join at the same time, in batches. Applicants are rigorously screened and the best invited for interview. For the latest batch 74 (including six not-for-profits) were selected from a field of more than 2,600. Those lucky few get paid between $14,000 and $20,000 to attend. In return they have to hand over about 7% of their firm’s equity. [Source: The Economist]

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Who Are The Top VCs in Silicon Valley Today?

I have been having this discussion with a few people whose analysis of the venture capital industry I respect. The exercise is not just to assess who are the top investors, but more, to assess where the industry is going, and where the next generation of venture scale companies are going to come from. In this post, I will provide a framework for the discussion. Please weigh in with your thoughts.

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The Future of Education: 10 Trends To Watch

It is that time of the year when we tend to pause and reflect. What have we achieved this year? What are the highlights of culture, business, technology, and trends that we have observed around us?

For me, the most exciting and positive movement at present is in the domain of technology impacting education. And it is an impact that is coming from many different directions.

Let’s explore them in further detail.

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How Do You Develop Seed Ecosystems Around The World?

In the last five years, there has been a distinct globalization of entrepreneurship. There is a lot more romanticism about startups now, a lot more startup related events, organizations, incubators, so forth and so on.

However, the seed capital eco-system around the world is inadequate. How do we change that?

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