The spin is good, but the underlaying problem is clear. They missed the boat and top leadership seems to be somewhat disconnected to market and reality. To me it reads like another Microsoft and Ballmer story.
Interesting to read that the focus for good ideas should be more towards organic ideas. But I would add in order to have a real impact the solution offered does need to solve a real problem where people are willing to pay for or do use the solution.
His article is pretty dark and I can not fully share the theoretical models.
Clearly he wants to use a simple model for a visual representation and that is fine for the purpose. But the assumption of a fixed 4% increase in revenue is to simplistic for me.
Either the product has some traction and success than the percentage numbers will be far higher, which totally changes the graphs dynamics or it does not generate sales.
Than the product should be rather sooner than later changed or axed. There are many other reasons why business are not successful short term or long term, than just revenue/expenses.
Playing the game, hyping or as some called it marketing is part of being an entrepreneur. You always have to encounter that the information given to you is often fashioned in that way. As long as the facts are not misrepresented or blank wrong information which can get you in some serious trouble it is part of business.
I personally stay away as far as possible on stretching the truth because of a simple fact. When you start it you have to remember, what you said to whom, how much you said and so forth. At some point it starts to catch up on you and people start to remember it. Despite all the thinking it just gets messy and integrity in business in the long run is key. Therefore I stick with facts and truth which keeps it simple. That might sometimes mean that I do not get the deals I wish, but I have a good sleep and no headache and for sure I will survive.
"Unless you have tested the assumptions in your business model first, outside the building, your business plan is just creative writing.”
Here is one of the key elements stated "testing your assumptions". Often all the valuable time spend on business plans has limited value if the assumptions are wrong.
As a Founder Institute 2009 inaugural graduate I share the same opinion as it was written here. With my strong technical background the training added most valuable information on how to build and run a start-up, which I thought I knew, but I had to learn that I actually missed a lot.
I agree that the course might not be for everyone depending on the business and strategy you try to establish. But anyone who intends to found a company and knows he needs to add on more knowledge in certain areas the training can help tremendously. You also gain a strong network.
But it does not come for free and the 4 months are a lot of work. Listening to these mentors and CEO’s and understanding the stories why they were so successful helps you to use this information and apply on your own. On top you can get short advice from the mentor’s which can be also highly valuable.
What I enjoy now most is the network of the other founders from our course. Founder Institute program was awesome.
I have a hard time to see reality in this survey and as the physics professors said, if did not create the statistics you can’t believe it. German society is in general skeptical on advanced technology when it comes to bio-science.
usually first article in Inc magazine I read was from Joel. His overall comprehensive thinking was a great resource and inspiration to me. I will miss his well written articles and often good topics.
I met some of the people from Docsnaps.com showing of the automated bookkeeping website. I think for an early startup the service can be real helping hand.
This kind of major undertaking is admirable, because it will reduce suffer and pain to the people who are not so fortunate.
The charity contribution I offer is limited and do the best I can through organizations like Kiva.org. I just wish that other well known and well off tech leaders e.g. Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs would be more active.
Maybe the Gates Foundation with their actions encourages them to do something on a bigger scale.
which is tax money and they tax the society enormously , e.g. sales tax alone 19%.
DARPA called in the past for some great technical innovations, but this one bringing manufacturing back to US is questionable. Not that I don’t like to see it, but it is an open worldwide market and may the best business model win.
I see this initiate more a reaction from the government, because they are scared loosing the access to the companies who run the semi fab process.
I do share the observation of technical leaders with a quick observation very well and it has 2 sides of the coin.
It can be crucial in the early stage for a company to survive. Some people see it as control, but on the other side it often carries a certain degree of success.
The flip side is that kind of close relation of the founder/CEO to customer and not letting go the control can limit growth of a company. And if the company keeps increasing on revenue/employees and the situation has not much improved it sometimes turns to chaos within the organization.
There is not much in the world which has not been thought about. The challenge and success is in the execution.
Depending on what the idea is realizing a minimal feature set of the idea and go public will quickly lead to some feedback if the idea is "huge".
Usually with many attempts the chance of success goes up.
ST did not do much on the software, tool and community side lately. The Atmel ATmega processor, which has been well accepted by the open source in Arduino moves ST to this subsidizing PR and marketing approach.
An interesting example how influential open source can get and how careful a chip company has to be with the overall system of the product, not only the silicon.
The efficacy drops with junction temperature.
Incandescent lamps are at 15 lumen/watt and CFL reach 40 to 50 lumen/watt. LED still has a long way to go and system efficacy are now reached up to 60lumen/watt. Key players like Nichia have parts in the lab running close to 200lm/Watt.
There are single LED packages on the market like from www.luminus.com generating 6000lumen in one part. That is about 8 times of a 60W incandescent light bulb.
Problem is more the LED itself still has a 10cent/lumen cost. Many LED manufacturer are bringing more and more fabs online and with volume the prices keeps dropping. So far the Haitz law is still good for the LED world.
In the next 4 years the LED illumination market in the US will go from couple million dollar to $5B per year and the 60W pulp replacement is expected to be around $16 retail price. Calculating the energy and invest cost a LED replacement in 4 to 5 years you will have an ROI of less than a year for LED light product.
In this particular instance you could use semiconductor market statistics, they often break the component usage down to market. They are usually for free and give some kind of indication. But as mentioned before there is lots of smoke around the market size subject and someone has to take these stated numbers with a grain of salt.
The key LED manufacturer are working hard with all kind of R&D programs to improve the situation. I saw on a presentation lately that e.g. the new Osram high bright LED has an improved process addressing the issue. I agree that this is an engineering process improvement problem and will be mostly resolved over time.
You say "feedback I've got from people". People will tell you what you want to hear and often don't really know. Most important ask customers or potential customers, listen to them.
And on the financial part lots of good ideas here and as usual minimize your expenses and find some income (part time, consulting) you can go a long way.
You need to believe in your cause and if you listen to the successful entrepreneurs they will tell you don't give up than you know what you need to do.
Set yourself specific limits now when it is time to stop (financially, emotionally), but when you agree to give up, give up fast and learn from it.
Is this a joke?
No, it is not. As a slide show only it might be hard to see the point. But having listen to the speech and knowing how Trip approaches problems, thinks through it and emerges with new ideas it makes a lot of sense. There is a reason why he is very successful.
I feel similar like these guys. Today I got the news that I am accepted to the program and can’t express how thrilled I am. I think the program has a lot to offer.
I only have 10 years SV on my back, but here are some points I have observed. SF as mentioned is not a place you want to have your children to go public school. I was told that schooling is not necessarily assigned to your local area and you can end up sending your child to school by bus, which I think is not such a good idea.
My home is in Redwood Shores and Peninsula overall is a good place to be (except East Palo Alto) with children, many good schools. Most cities on the west side along the foot of the Mountains are prime locations like Los Altos, Saratoga, Los Gatos, Woodside, but for sure not cheap. There are a couple of cities very desirable for families, because of the good schooling like Cupertino, Fremont Mission, Foster City.
You will find many good places to raise your children, but for SV has a steep price tag. Personally despite living at a nice with highly rated schools I still ended up enrolling my daughters into private school, which tells a lot about California and the broken education system. Good Luck
“fact that diesel cars are usually more efficient...”
is true if compared to a gasoline combustion engine. But there is no simple comparison on efficiency between the 2 different technology battery vs gasoline.
My take is the other way. Loan several billion dollar to any of the big three is not doing much. The cash burn rate they have will eat the money quickly and just to survive. Since the first oil crises in the ‘70 any of the Detroit companies had lots of time to spend R&D money on alternative power train solutions. They decided not to do a lot for multibillion dollar revenue companies other than building bigger and bigger SUVs. Japanese car manufacture by now have some lead in hybrid and battery technology and a small company Tesla has in my opinion a better chance to compete in this segment.
For some time I read hacker news nearly daily (one of the rare places) and mostly because of the comments. Some members here have good points, ideas and are right at the mark. Even with this valuable board discussion if many of these non sense comments increase it will turn away good members. With the anonymity of the internet there will be always some characters that need moderation and so far ycombinator did a good job. Keep it up.