Buying and Selling Online Schools: The Unusual Career of Michael Clifford (Part 4)

SM: Is it fair to say that you focus your time primarily on the strategic planning and long-term outlook of not only your schools but the industry?

MC: I spend a lot of time thinking about what degrees are going to be valuable two to three years from now and it just made common sense to me that health care was going to be bigger and bigger because of baby boomers. >>>

A New Generation of Gaming: Social and Viral (Part 4)

By Guest Author Cindy Weng
 
Zynga is the king of online social gaming. You may not know the company by its name but rather its games: Texas Hold’em, FarmVille, Mafia Wars, YoVille!, Scramble, and more. Its newest game, Roller Coaster Kingdom, was released only one month ago and already has almost four million users. >>>

Buying and Selling Online Schools: The Unusual Career of Michael Clifford (Part 3)

SM: When you were building Bridgepoint, what was the investment thesis you followed?

MC: I was involved in the company for the first six years, and the remainder of the time I was just a shareholder. I introduced the guys I recruited at Warburg Pincus, where there was a CEO named Andrew Clark who wanted to financially back us. >>>

IT Business Edge Interview on Bootstrapping

Ann All interviewed Sramana for IT Business Edge recently: Bootstrapping A Better Alternative than VC for Most Startups.

“[In the ’90s,] there was so much hoopla about venture capital that it created a completely wrong way of thinking about entrepreneurship.”

“Entrepreneurs tend to be very extreme people. You kind of have to be crazy to be an entrepreneur. If you are going to make reality out of a from-thin-air idea, it requires an extreme type of personality. You need confidence to even think it’s possible.” [More]

Forbes Column 2009: India’s Idle Tech Talent

The slow economy has meant less work to go around for thousands of employees at Indian outsourcing firms. But their time need not be wasted: read India’s Idle Tech Talent to find out more.

Buying and Selling Online Schools: The Unusual Career of Michael Clifford (Part 2)

SM: What kind of projects were John Spurling and Brian Miller giving you when you volunteered at the University of Phoenix?

MC: I offered to get coffee and help Brian in any way possible. He would kick ideas off me and I would go out and research them. Brian inspired me to go out and buy a school. During that time, I had an idea to use satellite cable TV to teach courses over the TV. >>>

Entrepreneur Journeys Book Review: Bootstrapping In The UK

Two bloggers in the United Kingdom reviewed Bootstrapping: Weapon of Mass Reconstruction this week. And, UK readers, don’t forget that London is one of the locations for Sramana’s FREE Telepresence video conference for entrepreneurs on September 15, 2009. You can find more details and register here. To see the book reviews, click on the full article view. >>>

Buying and Selling Online Schools: The Unusual Career of Michael Clifford (Part 1)

SM: Take us back to your beginning to give us some context about who you are.

MC: I grew up in Phoenix, Arizona. My father was a musician and started a radio station, so I grew up around a radio station and music. I never went to college and yet went on to be a catalyst for and founder of six universities. >>>