Silicon Valley Frontlines

Evil Mad Science! Get Some for the Kid (or the Kid in You)!

One of the great things about what I do is getting to meet interesting, sometimes wacky people. Sounds corny but true. I spend a lot of time at Plug and Play Tech Center in Sunnyvale among the 180 or so startups there and I had heard a while back of one tenant called "Evil Mad Science". Who, or what could this be? No-one running Plug and Play seemed to know (which is not unusual as it happens).

Today I ran into one of the founders, Lenore Edman, at a community meetup at the Center. She came to sit at our table and plonked down a device which seemed to consist of a printed circuit board, a row of sequentially flashing yellow LED's and four legs.

Now you will probably never guess what this is. A miniature road safety device for warning other cars about your breakdown? An electronic signpost prototype? Nope, you are completely wrong. It's an electronic menorah (of course!!). Celebrate the holidays! C'mon, only $14 from their online store!

Lenore and her husband started Evil Mad Scientist Labs ("DIY and open source hardware for art, education, and world domination") a while ago as a kind of hobby to provide amusing electronic projects and kits and it's grown into a big enough business to employ her full time and her husband part time.

Why here in Silicon Valley? Even though they could do this from anywhere, this is where the people are who enjoy and support this kind of thing. Everyone from open-source geeks to robotics interest groups. As Lenore said - not in Portland, not in Austin, not in Boulder Colorado (she has lived in all three) but right here!

Here's my favourite EMSL kit. In this LED clock kit (from their site): "The basic Bulbdial clock kit ($65) comes complete with three custom circuit boards, 72 ultrabright LEDs, pre-programmed ATmega168 microcontroller with Arduino bootloader, tactile button switches, aluminum standoffs, 20 ppm quartz crystal, custom clock face, gnomon spike, universal-input plug-in power supply, stainless mounting hardware, plus the resistors, capacitors and other little parts needed to build the Bulbdial clock."

Isn't that lovely? Order one here! I have to get one just to see what a "gnomon spike" actually is!

Now, you might say this is cute and fun, but not really TECHNOLOGY as we tend to think of it. Not so. For example, the clock kit includes Arduino technology that is one of a new breed of very low cost, open-source-based microcontrollers now emerging on the market and providing little building blocks for controlling all kinds of things - lights, switches, motors etc - that could, for example, make interesting and useful household gadgets in the future.

EMSL has lots of other fun stuff on their site that isn't "productised" but are fun things to reproduce at home with your kids (or just by yourself if you want). Here's one I love - the Bristlebot, a "tiny directional vibrobot". Watch how this sucker goes!

Young Social Entrepreneurship - the Benicia High SAGE Team Rolls On!

In my post from mid-May I talked about the team from Benicia High School that won the California SAGE (Students for the Advancement of Global Entrepreneurship) championship and how encouraging their win was as evidence of young people's energy and commitment to entrepreneurship and social responsibility.

Today I received an email from the team saying they were one of the two winners of the U.S.-wide SAGE championship and will now be going to Brazil to compete in the world SAGE championship in August. Here are some highlights from their email.

"Benicia High has had a SAGE team since 2002 and we have consistently been one of the top teams in the state, but this is our first opportunity to represent the United States at a World Cup.  As a SAGE team, we have created a number of real businesses and conducted numerous environmental, social and civic projects in our community.  Perhaps our greatest accomplishment has been working with the City of Benicia to address the dangerous traffic conditions in front of our high school.  Thanks to the 3-year campaign by our SAGE team, construction is to begin this summer on lane and curb changes and a new stop light which will greatly enhance the safety of students and drivers on Military West.  This year we helped develop the City’s Climate Action Plan and our continuing business of home energy audits has been written into the Plan.  Our new business this year was the sale of aluminum, BPA-free water bottles with 80% of our profit used to grant micro-loans to third worth entrepreneurs through KIVA.org.  We have already loaned over $1000 to four different entrepreneurs in Ghana and Peru.  It has been our privilege to help our community and in our small way, the world."

Great stuff and a well deserved win! Of course, now they need financial help to get to Brazil - about $14,000 worth of help. If you are interested in donating to help them, here's the information:

"Tax deductible contributions may be sent to Benicia High School SAGE, c/o BUSD, 350 East K Street, Benicia, CA  94510.   Our tax id # is 94-6002197.  If you have questions or would like more information about our team, please call us at 707-745-1831."

Congrats again to the team - Lauren Bronson, Ryan Kuenzi, Kristen Osterholt, Johnny Nunes, Emmalyn Tringali and Adam Sass, along with Polly Farina, Advisor

Young Entrepreneurship Alive and Kicking ...!

Last Friday I had the pleasure of helping judge the California finals of the 2008-2009 SAGE tournament. SAGE is "Students for the Advancement of Global Entrepreneurship" founded by Chico State professor Curt DeBerg. SAGE's mission is to help create the next generation of entrepreneurial leaders whose innovations and social enterprises address the major unmet needs of our global community. In other words, future entrepreneurial leaders in Silicon Valley, California and way beyond.

In this case they are students from some 30 high schools around California presenting an annual report about their commercial and societal/non-profit ventures, competing to go to the U.S. national finals and with the winners of that event going to the global finals in Brazil.

Honestly, I didn't really know what to expect from this event. Boy, was I impressed by many of the teams and their presentations! The ventures and ideas from some of these kids are amazing! My favourite team was from Benicia High School - and they were the ultimate winners of the event. Just to give you a sense of what they have done this school year:

• Started a reusable water bottle venture to replace plastic disposable bottles
• Changed their business model on home energy audits started last year - now the City of Benicia pays them to do these for senior and low income residents of the city
• Raised money and collected books for children in Uganda
• Won a contest and contributed $4,600 to BeRewarding
• Used business profits to make loans to 3 small business people in Peru and Ghana via Kiva
• Held a mock debate for the 2008 presidential campaign with 1,200 students participating
• Helped obtain a grant to improve traffic safety around their campus
• Partnered with the City of Benicia on a Climate Action Plan

Here's the winning team - congrats to them!!

Google, Goats and Grass ...

Image via Wikipedia

I'm very amused by the recent announcement by Google that they are employing goats instead of lawnmowers to "cut" the grass at the Googleplex. Or rather its not that announcement but the stream of comments about it on TechCrunch and - no doubt - on other sites (Goats-R-Us? Rentagoat?). Some of my favorite comments below. But its worth remembering that people have done this for thousands of years - and in many other places in the Valley already. Its not new but the reactions are always fun! Go goat, save the world!

Amy Cook, an Assistant Manager of Marketing for PETA:

"PETA has no problem with letting goats do what goats want to do (e.g., look cute and eat weeds), but we do have concerns about how the goats may be transported, whether they are provided with access to shelter during storms and shade as well as water during hot weather, where they are housed when they aren’t “working,” what kind of veterinary care they receive, and what becomes of old and/or excess goats. PETA has found over and over that whenever animals are used by a business to make money, corners are cut and animals often suffer as a result. And that really gets our goat, if you’ll pardon the pun."

Of course, no one worries about the medical care of the workers that previously did the job, their shelter and care, etc. (my quote, not PETA's).

From "Sammy":

"google herds; another beta project? expect a google herds farm for this project it is will be open source."

From "MoneyBoss":

"I thought that perhaps as a cost-cutting measure, Googlers were going to be forced to eat the grass themselves for lunch. Organic *and* cost-efficient."

From "WTL":

"It could be argued that the methane produced by goat belching and farting may indeed be more harmful to the environment than the exhaust components of gas-fueled lawnmowers. Methane is in fact a much more potent greenhouse gas than co. The true environmental play here would have been to hire any local homeless (aka: engineers) for a small sum to push rotary mowers across the property. NO emissions, lower cost and contributing to employment (albeit on a tiny scale). Don’t be evil."

From "Corey":

"Last I checked, even unemployed engineers fart, thus releasing methane. And they do that whether you hire them to push a hand mower or not."

From "PSSTabbing":

"After they do their jobs, can the goats be served as lunch?"

From "Adisa":

"They should cook and eat the under performing ones. Roasted over camp fire one, i’d say."

From "Mr Dave":

"I like that idea - the ultimate penalty for underperformance."

100 Companies That Will Survive 100 Years - Not!!

Back in January Forbes published a list of 100 companies that - in their view - will still be around in 100 years based on 4 key factors - Strategic Governance, Human Capital, Environment and Stakeholder Capital. One good thing about this, of course, is that none of us - including the author - will be around to find out if he's right or not (though, darn it, I will give it my best shot)!

Interestingly enough, the original research behind the list was done by Innovest Strategic Value Advisors - who a month later were acquired by RiskMetrics group and therefore no longer exist (on their own anyway)! At least they didn't put themselves on the list ...

Not surprisingly, some of the companies on the list are the ones doing very basic things. Digging stuff out of the ground and flogging it to unsuspecting passers-by, like BHP-Billiton. No Exxon-Mobil though! Some are still basically monopolies  - East Japan Railway Company???

Interesting to look at some of those on the list vs. some who are not. No U.S. bricks-and-mortar retailers (no WalMart, no Costco). J.Sainsbury in the U.K., yes, but H&M from Sweden?? No Ikea? OK, so most Ikea stuff does fall apart quickly but they do have a pretty good, responsible model. Air France - KLM is on the list??? No Singapore Airlines, no Virgin, no British Airways???

In the Valley or technology related, here's what they have. On the list are:

• AMD(surely not?? See my thoughts below on this)
• Amazon.com (yes, totally agree. Disclosure: I own AMZN stock)
• Dell (don't think so - no longer the behemoth or cost leader and not enough innovation)
• Ericsson (maybe)
• HP (don't think so - HP will break up into many parts before then or be cost-cut into oblivion)
• Intel (yes)
• Nokia (maybe)
• Roche (if they keep the innovation at Genentech going)

Who's not on the list? No Apple. No Google. No IBM. Or anyone else in tech for that matter.

So, lets look at a couple of examples. Why do I question AMD's inclusion? Well, on May 1st - just two days from now - they will have been around exactly 40 years. During that 40 years they have managed to have accumulated losses through the end of 2008 of $6.2 billion. That's right - in 40 years they have lost $6.2 billion. Basically every penny of the $6.1 billion investors over the years have put into it. You can see this right here on page 93 of their last annual 10k filing with the SEC. Given that the fundamental premise of any business is to deliver increasing value for all stakeholders over time, surely this is a monumental failure? Does this seem like a company that could be around in 10 years, let alone 100?

By comparison, Apple, a younger company, has retained earnings (cumulative profits) of $16.6 billion on $7.6 billion of money put in (page 3 of this filing). They have top management, not just Jobs, and the best products and innovation in their category on the planet. Enormous cash flow. Disclosure - I own AAPL stock. I don't own AMD. Or Dell.

So, the list looks like rubbish. But, heck, its a lot of fun!!

Two Interesting Posts ...

Image by Sklathill via Flickr

Over the weekend I checked out quite a few other blogs and sites and a couple of things caught my eye.

First was Fred Wilson's blog post "Earning Your Media". Now here's a great use of Twitter by a small business called Kogi that operates two Korean barbeque taco trucks (!) in L.A. Basically they twitter their planned location each day and their 13,000 or so followers then know exactly when and where to get the goodies! Isn't that great! No cost media to your closest followers!

Second was by Camiile Ricketts on VentureBeat purporting to be a comprehensive list of venture capital firms that are "walking dead". These are firms that no longer have funds to invest, are closed down etc. While the list appears to need further scrubbing it clearly reminds one that the VC world is not always a happy one ...

Work - Life Balance ....!

So I'm at the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco this week, and sitting in on a workshop about pitching to VC's. In addition to Christine Herron from First Round Capital and Bryce Roberts from O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures there were some guest entrepreneurs and CEO's, one of whom was Jeff Bonforte who recently became CEO of Xobni ("Inbox" spelled backwards), an exciting startup with a plug in that helps you organize your email inbox.

Jeff is quite a character (take that however you like) but he spent some time talking about life in a startup and how important it is to get a good "work-life" balance. For instance, he quoted a study someone did to show how a software programmer's productivity drops dramatically after 50 hours in a week. He also noted how ridiculous it is that so many startup people wear their 100% commitment to their idea or business as a badge of courage (I'm paraphrasing but that's the general idea).

Shortly after, Jeff starts getting distracted by checking his mobile device while still doing his talk (another typically silly multitasking thing everyone does here) and then tells the audience he's keeping an eye on it because he and his wife are due to have their first child that day.

Am I the only one to see the irony in this?

There are (Far) Worse Places to be Right Now!

A few years ago Paul Graham (now with Y Combinator) wrote some pieces about Silicon Valley and whether it could be reproduced elsewhere, and pointed out some of the things that make the Valley what it is. When it comes down to it, though, he rightly says its about people. The right people. Specifically, rich people (aka investors) and nerds. And specifically young nerds who are attracted to the universities, the environment, the lifestyle, the buzz and the general nuttiness. Even the investors don't want them to be somewhere else - Valley investors want them here, close by where they can reach and meet them at any time.

This struck me again today at a visit to Plug and Play Tech Center in Sunnyvale. To be successful, a huge number of startups from outside the Valley - from Europe and Asia - are trying to establish roots here because they know if they want to take the tech world by storm they have to be here. Many of them set up at Plug and Play, and there are many more that set up somewhere else in the Valley. To me this is a huge thing - despite the recession, despite the economy, THIS IS WHERE TECH PEOPLE WANT TO BE!

There are, of course, a lot worse places to be. ORC Worldwide and Business Week just last week published a study on the World's 50 Worst Places to Work, "based on a set of criteria that includes levels of pollution, disease, political violence, and availability of goods and services". I don't necessarily agree with the list, but I am pleased that some I think of as terrific places to work (Prague, for example) are no longer on the list. Anyway, here are the top 10 worst places and if you're in the Valley then be glad you're here. I am!

The worst: Lagos, Nigeria
2. Jakarta, Indonesia
3. Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
4. Almaty, Kazakhstan
5. Mumbai, India
6. New Delhi, India
7. Nairobi, Kenya
8. Bogota, Colombia
9. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
10. Chennai, India.

.... and a bunch more Chinese and Indian cities follow.

Coolest Business Card Ever!

If you work at Lego, this is the kind of business card you get to hand out! Isn't this the coolest! Not so easy to carry around as the usual - but people will remember you! Or their kids will.

Thanks to Alexander Kjerulf's Chief Happiness Officer blog for the find ...