make a startup.com | Life as an Entrepreneur

First of all - who or what is Venn?:

Venn Diagram: n.   a diagram that uses circles to represent mathematical or logical sets pictorially inside a rectangle (the universal set); elements that are common to more than one set are represented by intersections of the circles [After John Venn (1834-1923), British logician.]

• In a world with, unfortunately, only 24h of time - we need to create synergies between all parts of our life
• co-founded the on-web AG as a profitable, self-financing firm for internet services with 7 employees in 2000
• "interlectual touch points" are a good start - building intellectual assets which have synergy
• Build overlappings between different areas
• Overlaping moves you from vertical, not connected areas in life, to a more horizontal "world"
• If one set disapears, you can depend on the overlapping intersection on which you can refocus without having to start from the beginning.

As you can see on my example, my worlds have many "touch points" hence I can focus on more things at a time and rely on the "overlapping":

• CEO: driving the social commerce company in the startup phase & leverage my ecommerce know-how
• Incubator Business: provide startups with ecommerce / marketing / funding experience
• Consulting Business: leverage on the startup scene insights
• Blogging & news reading: using a very complex way to filter many news sources, I try to stay up-to-date in the Internet & mobile scene (important news anyway reachs you by it self), I turn into a "messenger" spreading the news across startups and investors

This results to a very strong and unique "Venn spot" feeded with fund raising know-how, marketing experience, startup scene insights and true innovation.

Work is a large part of our life and should be joyous.

recently I've read many articles about how hard the recession is hitting the startup scene or, whether the scene will profit from it and there is just the usual write-off phase for investors.

Do you remember the remarkable amount of startups in 2006 that were captured in this picture? Now there is a updated version from the same author, marking flipped companies (green circle) and shut-down startups (purple crosses). 

What does it mean?

Some have been to early, some have communicated wrong, some made a good deal by selling to big corporates and some went into the market with too high ambitions. In the end, no big surprise and a normal free market procedure.

What does it mean for the startup industry? Well, investment bankers are still gone (for good) and only the strong entrepreneurs are holding out for a market change. It might be to early to predict a recovery, but looking at the latest funding and acquisition activities, the market is clearly going back up again. Slowly but steady.

In the end, I don't understand hysteric reactions and claims like web 2.over - for those who haven't been out there during 1998 - 2001: there is much more potential in the market today and the "big bang" 2000/2001 influenced the scene much more. Now there is a clear opportunity for everyone out there to come back strong and bold in a much shorter time. Companies (almost) failed in 2000/2001 took 5-6 years to recover. This time it will go much quicker. Everyone is waiting for the next big wave. Be smart and catch it first!

Whether you are already a bootstrapper or planing to quit your job to run for your own startup, I'd like to refer to big wave surfer guidelines:

Big wave surfing is the extreme frontier of a fairly extreme sport. Big waves, or waves over 20 feet in height, add a whole new element to surfing that requires special boards, skills and methods of dropping into the wave. The rewards of surfing big waves are as big as the waves themselves, but with those big waves and thrills comes serious risks

1) Work up to big waves

= stay in the cold water, paddle, work and never ever give up!

2) Get the right board

= get good advisors, let them help you to complete your team - get people "infected" with your idea

3) Tow in

= partner as early as you can with companies that help your startup to grow faster

4) Learn to wipe out

= if your business case is not working out, rethink your business! never more than now, a business model is something that needs to change over time and can be changed so rapidly - you need to add value to a market (see Jeff Jarvis at 2:00 - 3:45).

As Paul Graham writes: "Don't get too deeply into business models." It's good to talk about how you plan to make money, but mainly because it shows you care about that and have thought about it. Don't go into detail about your business model, because (a) that's not what smart investors care about in a brief presentation, and (b) any business model you have at this point is probably wrong anyway. If you're solving an important problem, you're going to sound a lot smarter talking about that than the business model. The business model is just a bunch of guesses, and guesses about stuff that's probably not your area of expertise. A VC who came to speak at Y Combinator talked about a company he just invested in: He said their business model was wrong and would probably change three times before they got it right.

Holding on to innovation might not make you rich in the short term, but can change the world in the long run. 

And the most important thing:

PS: if you are also interested into surfing, check out the big wave surfing rules :-)

Highlights of Nouriel Roubini's keynote speach about the "long and dark night":

- The recession will take approximately 24 months 

- The recession started started dec. 2007 - so we are now in the 16th month of it

- Total losses for loans & securities originated by US Financial institutions may total $4 trillion

- It will take twice as long as the previous recession and end at earliest end of 2009

- The financial system, in aggregate, appears insolvent 

- Either the markets will take a U (and we are already at the lower part of the U) or the markets perform like a L (as the Japan markets did)

- We can either go the route of Sweden (nationalization) or Japan (Zombie financial system)

watch the full keynote online

what do you think?

I know, people like things to stay as they are. Especially in difficult economic times. But be prepared for this: everything you know will change in the next 10 years - at least once! 

As long as you stay hungry and foolish, you will always make something out of change! One of the best speeches I have seen is the one from Steve Jobs at Standord University during the 114th Commencement on June 12, 2005:

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

don't take anything for granted, expect things to change - why? here are some examples:

schedule meetings for doing business or meet with friends:

10 yrs ago: you used the phone. Or you scheduled this many days in advance

today: you use SMS, google calender or facebook invite and twitter direct messages

publishing announcements:

10 years ago: printing a flyer / copy at your school, university or work,

today: write a blog, comment on a website, send a email

and, of course, music:

10 years ago: go to virgin or any other record store, buy a CD. Listen to it. Tell your friends.

today: iTunes, single-click, iLike recommendations, free promotion of independent artists etc 

there are many many more examples out there. But the key message is:

only those will be successful and survive who don't take everything for granted - try to rethink everything, everyday!

update I: great article on how google books can make life easier - It's there, but you just don't see it. Even as an "online student" 

update II: Also check out the discussion on Y-Combinator how recession can help to change people's & corporates mind in terms of "be free to work from where ever you like"! This would be a big step ahead to allow people to rethink much more privately and for their jobs.