1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With T.M. Ravi of The Hive (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: You mentioned BPO jobs going from US to India and now being replaced by bots. That is eliminating all jobs. Same thing is happening in manufacturing. Manufacturing went from America to China and now it’s getting automated. If we get to self-driving cars, there won’t be Uber drivers. There will be self-driving Uber rides.

At this point, my estimate is in the next 30 to 50 year timeframe, we’re looking at a real possibility of there being very few jobs. What was eye-opening for me is how deep the fears are. I had a little afternoon event on Saturday at my house for Smith College Computer Science group. There were these young women with extremely fantastic resumes. >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With T.M. Ravi of The Hive (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Can you take us through a couple of your portfolio companies that are really interesting? What can we learn from them?

T.M. Ravi: In the Internet of Things space, the big shift is the growing commoditization of devices. Much of the value is moving to applications and data. That commoditization is not just happening on the consumer level but also on the industry level.

As economies like China become better and better at manufacturing, companies like GE realize that the $50-million rotating devices like turbines are being produced with pretty good quality in other countries also. There’s the general shift >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With T.M. Ravi of The Hive (Part 1)

Responding to a popular request, we are now sharing transcripts of our investor podcast interviews in this new series. The following interview with T.M. Ravi was recorded in September 2016.

T.M. Ravi is Managing Director and Co-founder of The Hive, a venture studio. The discussion touches upon a couple of key issues: the prevalent incubator/accelerator model of 3-month classes, we agreed, is bogus; and Future of Work: Utopia or Dystopia?

Sramana Mitra: To set context, please introduce Hive to our audience. What kinds of companies do you incubate? What is the thesis around which you’re building this program? >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Yanev Suissa of SineWave Ventures (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: This is your first fund, right?

Yanev Suissa: Yes.

Sramana Mitra: Have you had any exits yet?

Yanev Suissa: No, we’ve been investing for about a year.

Sramana Mitra: Next question is about unicorn mania. How does a seed investor protect themselves in the event that there is huge amount of capital being raised? You said that you follow through in your investments, but how far can you go with that given that the trend right now is raising huge amounts of money. >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Yanev Suissa of SineWave Ventures (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: In this continuum of de-risking, where are you playing?

Yanev Suissa: All of these things are reasonable factors that any VCs would look at including us. But to build an investment thesis of only investing if certain factors exist is not logical.

We invest whether you have revenue or not, whether you have built the technology or not. It depends. If you’re a brilliant engineer in a space that you have expertise in and have worked in and we have either an existing relationship or a faith in your >>>

What are Some Current Opportunities in Marketing Technologies?

Sramana Mitra Named LinkedIn’s #10 Top Influencer

Congratulations to Sramana Mitra on being named LinkedIn’s #10 Top Influencer! You can check out a video of her discussing the future of tech and entrepreneurship here.

Infidelity In The Digital Age

Ashley Madison, the web site that uses the tagline “Life is short, Have an Affair” is in the news for a hacking incident whereby the names and email ids of its 32 million registered users have now been exposed to the public.

The whole episode brings to focus a simple reality: large numbers of people are discontented in their relationships.

This has always been true, from the beginning of time. That it is still true should not come as a surprise to anyone.

In this digital age, there are convenient ways to explore various levels of extramarital intimacy. Ashley Madison and its competitors have simply tried to cater to that need in human beings. The “customer need” is amply validated by the site’s very large number of registered users. That they have failed to provide a solution that they promised – a private match-making service – is really what will potentially kill the company at this point, not their inability to identify a widely felt consumer need.
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