So little time, so much...

Thank you Steve Jobs...

2011-10-05T20:59:00.002-04:00

For reminding us to stay hungry and foolish
For enriching our lives
For truly changing our world

Notes from a classmate's visit to Anna Hazare's camp today

2011-08-20T10:37:00.000-04:00

‪
        I had visited Ramlila Maidan, Anna Hazare camp today. A midst loud slogans of "Anna aap sangharsh karo, Hum aapke saath hain" there were seated peacefully not less than ten thousand people from all strata of society. Professionals, businessmen, entrepreneurs, workers, hindu, muslim, sikh, christian, Indians from all over the country, speaking different languages, having different colours but they all spoke of only one thing."Vande Matram" and "Bharat Mata ki Jai." No one was there with any personal interest or any personal benefit.

       All sat there only for one thing. TO REMOVE THE CORRUPTION FROM OUR SOCIETY so that we make our country a beautiful place for us and our children. There was a lot of positive energy in the air. A group of 50-100 doctors joined the movement in front of me, School students in school uniforms in hundreds carrying Tiranga shouting Vande Matram, College boys and girls carrying huge banners and The Tiranga shouting Bharat Mata ki Jai .

       For a moment I thought that I was a part of THE INDIAN FREEDOM MOVEMENT in 1947. I have spent 40 years of my life in Delhi. But I have never seen this Josh and Energy among the people of India ever. I appeal all people to please visit the place and spend at least a few hours there to show support to this MOVEMENT.Jai Hind.‪

Captain Barnwal

Beijing Entrepreneurs

2011-07-03T09:33:00.001-04:00

It was a terrific evening in Beijing, thanks to hosts Eric and Olivia of China Entrepreneurs, and an enthusiastic and passionate team lead by Tony An. Wayne Shaiyong of Bertelesmann Investments Asia, and a Core Advisor to SLP also attended, as did interestingly, several women investment bankers with technical degrees. There were entrepreneurs and hackers from leading multinationals. Didn't see anyone in lifesciences or cleantech, but I know they're out there.

This is an interesting time to bring SLP to China since nothing like this exists, and the program will connect Chinese entrepreneurs to the rest of the world. I am keen to see what sort of collaborations and new startups these relationships create, especially along the Bangalore-Beijing and Silicon Valley-Beijing corridors. The Beijing consumer internet scene is very vibrant, but from my conversations, they seem to be following US innovation, rather than the other way around.

The Beijing program will run in Chinese, though there is a requirement that everyone in the program understand English. Its the only way to keep the network global and vibrant. Since SLP runs on google assets, and most of these assets are blocked in China (though there is a way some of them can get around it), the program is impacted by Google leaving China. We're having to recreate everything in a parallel universe that is acceptable to China. That's twice the work and half the fun, but its worth the trouble.

Its going to be a lot of fun seeing the Program develop in Beijing.

Happy Mothers Day

2011-05-08T12:32:00.001-04:00

@KateSpade

When digital disrupts print

2011-04-27T16:38:00.000-04:00

This sign in the magazine section of the library is a sign of the times. What will your library look like in 12 months ? 10 percent of our magazines are gone.

Pinkberry comes to Boston

2011-04-22T13:40:00.001-04:00

My prayers have been answered.

Sachin, Dhoni and the Team. Thank You

2011-04-03T09:38:00.002-04:00

iPad 2 launch

2011-03-11T15:09:00.002-05:00

Today Apple is serving coffee to the early adopters. Way to go !

And then there were three...!

2011-02-28T10:12:00.000-05:00

Never seen a Star Alliance plane before. This is the first I've seen @ Newark, and its run by Continental (see logo on bottom right). But if the airlines consolidate at this rate, it might be the way to go.

Ten interesting nuggets from Jeff Bussgang book “Mastering the VC Game”

2011-01-27T11:34:00.000-05:00

I read Jeff Bussgang’s book on a cross-country flight – an interesting read, so it made sense to share some highlights with all of you. There’s a lot more but you’ll have to read it yourself). Hopefully I won’t get a nasty letter from the publishers for telling bits of the story. Here they are.

1. Digital Electronic Corporation was the first venture backed startup (started in 1959 with $70K in investment)
2. Christoph Westphal, founder of Sirtris, a biotech company (sold to GSK for $750MM) tested biological six formulations on himself which saved 6 months on development time (and money), and helped raise the Series B round
3. Jack Dorsey (founder of Twitter) wrote dispatch software to see if couriers would work out in St. Louis as a teenager. In college, he found a company in New York doing the same, so he transferred to NYU simply to work at the company
4. The first tweet was “just setting up my twttr” from Jack on March 21, 2006
5. Kleiner Perkins instructs its support staff to treat entrepreneurs like superstars when they walk in the door
6. Entrepreneurs may want to pause 15 minutes into a presentation to see if the pitch is going anywhere (by which time VCs have often made up their minds, says Jeff)
7. Gail Goodman of Constant Contact was rejected by 40 VCs before finding her first round and 60 before finding her second round of funding. Market cap is $600MM.
8. Eric Paley turned down a final meeting with a VC firm that was looking to fund them a few days before the meeting, then rewrote his business plan because he hated his first idea, and then when he came back 8 weeks later to the firm, they turned him down. The company was later sold for $95 million.
9. There are three types of VCs in the Board room – Randy Jackson (domain expert), Paula Abdul (cheerleader) and Simon Cowell (the truth teller, who’ll tell it like it is). [The truth is most entrepreneurs spend a lot of time with Randy, love but ignore Paula, and dread talking to Simon]
10. Terry McGuire, well known biotech investor has his biggest success in Akamai, and used to code software for a living.

Google Fiber: Who will win ?

2010-07-14T07:54:00.001-04:00

This is a very interesting time. Google Fiber, a chance to win an ultra highspeed network from Google resulted in an outpouring of excitement from small towns and cities across America. Here is an inspiring video.

Entrepreneurs can change the world

2010-06-30T14:40:00.000-04:00

An incredible story of poor young girls....who are ranked at the top of their class

2010-06-28T17:39:00.000-04:00

Lines @ the Apple Store

2010-06-24T14:30:00.000-04:00

4G goes on sale today. What's cool is that the employees handed out umbrellas, sunblock and mint to those in line. Something to learn about being thankful and taking care of your customers.

Wonder if the Immigration and Naturalization Service would ever do that...

Google's 40 angels

2010-06-23T20:01:00.000-04:00

This photo is an interesting map of ex-Google employees who have financed 200 new startups at last count. the most prolific

Aydin Ankut, 40, Founder Felicis Ventures
Chris Sacca, 34, Founder, Lowercase Capital
Paul Buccheit, 33, Entrepreneur
Andrea Zurek, 39, Co-Founder, XG Ventures
Joshua Schachter, 36, Google Engineer

These entrepreneurs have funded Mint.com, Facebook, Foursquare, Tapulous, Bit.ly, Posterous, VentureBeat...and a lot of other companies.

IPAD lines @ the Boston Apple Store

2010-04-30T16:54:00.000-04:00

IPAD Lines @ the Boston Apple Store

2010-04-30T16:52:00.000-04:00

How a movement begins: Great simple learnings about the first followers

2010-04-15T20:59:00.001-04:00

How a movement begins: Great simple learnings about the first followers

2010-04-15T20:59:00.000-04:00

Smart Medical Devices Panel

2010-04-11T21:27:00.003-04:00

The Smart Medical Devices panel on April 1 turned out to be a content-and-learning rich event, thanks to the efforts of all the panelists to provide 5-7 minute learnings on various matters, demo-ing products, providing guidance on regulatory, reimbursement, areas that are growing, and following up with an interactive panel discussion.

Panelists
John Brooks, Founder, Prism Ventureworks &, CEO, Reflectance Medical
Robert Farra, Vice President, Research & Development, MicroCHIPS Inc
Sridhar Iyengar, CTO, Agamatrix, Inc
Cory Kidd, CEO & Founder, Intuitive Automata Inc
Tom O Dwyer, Director, Healthcare, Analog Devices Inc
Rahul Sarpeshkar, Innovator & Associate Professor, MIT

Startup Showcase: Yogendra Jain, Senticare

Moderator
Anupendra Sharma, Investment Partner, Siemens Venture Capital

Presentations

Overview of Smart Medical Devices

Anupendra Smart Medical Devices Examples

View more presentations from Anupendra Sharma.

Regulation of Smart Medical Devices

Regulations Of Smart Devices

View more presentations from Anupendra Sharma.

Takeaways

1. Spend a lot of time with your customers. They will tell you about features you don’t even know you want (e.g. Sentillian - People like to remind you to feed their dogs)
2. It takes a long time to get insurance companies to reimburse for things.
3. Follow the money. Doctors need to see the advantage or get paid to try new things that are different or difficult.
4. Adoption presents challenges. It takes time to change behavior
5. Patients are not compliant. Find creative ways to make them (Microchips, Sentillian)
6. You can design it here, and build it in Asia
7. Some other countries will provide subsidies and tax credits (Hong Kong)

Opportunities
8. Obesity (Diabetes) and Aging (Elderly) are big themes
9. Cameras ($2), motors and accelerometers ($2.50) are very inexpensive basic components of many companies. You can find all these easily here in Boston (Analog)
10. Miniaturization is going to be a big opportunity
11. Mobile phones are more widespread and interesting than PCs; build on this platform
12. There are opportunities to develop smart algorithms to flag data
13. We’re going to be flooded with data. This could be a n opportunity

Technology
14. Getting iphone applications through Apple isn’t easy. They’re scrutiny can be tougher than the FDA
15. Perfect A/C current needed even with ultra low power in the body. DC is poison according to the FDA
16. Long-life, low-power batteries are going to be critical for invasive devices (lasting 25-30 years)

FDA/Regulatory
17. FDA is uncertain. There will be changes to the 510K process
18. 510Ks take 3 months; PMAs can take years. Acceptance rate is high but not 67%- 80%. Means companies will fail and investors will lose money. The risk is only increasing
19. Investors now want to know where you will fall from a classification standpoint (since the FDA is reassessing the 510k process today). Get a regulatory expert early and get an informal meeting with the FDA, walking them through the plan
20. To get approvals, first get it in South Africa. Then get a European CE Mark – it makes you more interesting to strategics. Finally go for the FDA

Marketing
21. If you get a clinician on board, think about compensation. If you give them equity, they cannot do trials in their facilities
22. When talking to doctors, overemphasize the clinical benefits, underemphasize the technology.
23. Reimbursement strategy is the way to go.
24. Try to avoid outcomes data if you can. However, its going to be tough. In the old days you could. Every hospital wants to see it in their own format. 45 patients could be sufficient.
25. With relationships these trials could be done here inexpensively. Someone in the audience is spending $10K to do such a trial

Funding
26. VCs won’t pay to get data. Get money from the Army, NASA, grants, SBIRs. Leave things in the university labs as long as possible

And finally

27. Everything Tom does is measured in terms of the price of Guinness in Ireland!

Siemens Equipment !

2010-04-08T11:01:00.000-04:00

Rich Roberts and Phil Sharp (Nobel Laureate Panel)

2010-03-31T14:06:00.002-04:00

Smart Medical Devices: Apri 1 in Waltham

2010-03-30T22:54:00.009-04:00

From 600-830PM on April 1 in Waltham, we promise to have a very interactive and entertaining session with short 5-6 minute presentations, and very cool product demos that include iphone apps, robots, sensors and even bionic ears. We will tell you how these devices and software are changing healthcare, and give you useful, actionable information and ideas about the things that should matter - technology, clinical trials, regulatory, marketing and reimbursement. For this we have an extraordinary panel of entrepreneurs, innovators, technologists, device experts and investors.

Panelists
John Brooks, Founder, Prism Ventureworks &, CEO, Reflectance Medical
Robert Farra, Vice President, Research & Development, MicroCHIPS Inc
Sridhar Iyengar, CTO, Agamatrix, Inc
Cory Kidd, CEO & Founder, Intuitive Automata Inc
Tom O Dwyer, Director, Healthcare, Analog Devices Inc
Rahul Sarpeshkar, Innovator & Associate Professor, MIT

Moderator
Anupendra Sharma, Partner, Siemens Venture Capital

You'll even learn how to find components, get them built, get them tested. If we have people with ideas in the audience, hey, maybe we can even build a startup at the event.

The event

The sign-up

PopSignal Mixer, HBS high fashion startups, and women entrepreneurs in Boston

2010-03-24T08:12:00.004-04:00

I was at the PopSignal Alumni Mixer last night. Great party and met several interesting people I have been meaning to meet for some time. Scott Friend (Bain and Founder, Profit Logic), Rich Miner (Google Ventures), Sim Simeonov (FastIGNITE and formerly of Polaris), Chris Sheehan (CommonAngels) (who I first met at Techstars last year - didn't realize they have an Angel group and two co-investment funds alongside it). They do 2-5 investments a year. Also met Scott Kirsner (Globe). Rob Go (Spark Ventures) was there, but I didn't get a chance to get introduced to him.

The party was organized by Jay Meattle (2010 Fellow and Founder of Shareaholic). Also met up with two Fellows, Vishy (VC at Longworth Ventures by day and Founder of Lamhe by night) and Siddh Goyal (Founder, Assured Labor), a Founder of a Techstars company from Syracuse, and TJ, founder of FlipKey, which is now controlled by Expedia/Tripadvisor.

Scott / Bain invested in RentTheRunway, an HBS startup that is the netflix for fashion dresses, and doing very well. Its interesting that a similar concept - the netflix for handbags never worked out as well. There were three reasons that that business didn't work out well. Firstly, people kept handbags for a long time, and there was a lot of wear and tear. Secondly, people rented the originals and returned the fakes, and it was hard to figure out one from the other. But dresses are harder to recreate in 4 days, and there's no wear and tear, so this should be a very interesting business. Thirdly, they were buying these purses retail - and these things cost $3-5000.

PopSignal is a great event, and I look forward to attending more in the future. Its amazing - these parties didn't exist four years ago. How long have we come in Boston....

One observation from this event. Not having been to a tech mixer event like this one before, where people simply meet up to talk about startups (though I go to pitches, competitions and talks all the time), I was surprised at how completely male dominated the event was. I think in a party of a 100, there may have been two women who showed up. I hope it was just happenstance. Lifesciences events have a much better gender balance. I wonder if women not interested in tech startups in Boston (this cannot be true), or do they simply not attend these events (and if so, why)? Since we spend so much time and effort at TLP on finding diversity, I found it a little surprising that the Boston tech community didn't reflect my presumed gender diversity in this town.

March Madness: Cornell in the last 16 !

2010-03-21T22:15:00.002-04:00

Cornell became the lowest seed to advance to the round of 16 in this year's tournament and the first Ivy League team to get that far since Penn 31 years ago. Go Big Red !

We can't wait

2010-03-12T04:51:00.001-05:00

Sometimes you have to forego what's popular...

2010-03-08T05:08:00.001-05:00

...in order to do what's right.

A simple but powerful sentence from the acceptance speech of Monique, winner of Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars yesterday. This is the stuff of revolutions...

The future of online video advertising

2010-02-28T20:10:00.003-05:00

See this on the original website. The way it synchs with the pages around it is pretty incredible. Click here

“And Then There Was Salsa” from Frito Lay Dips on Vimeo.

30 most important innovations in Medicine

2010-02-02T23:03:00.002-05:00

The 30 innovations chosen on the basis of articles published in The Journal of the American Medical Association and the New England Journal of Medicine in the past 25 years. 225 physicians who graduated before 1980 were surveyed based on several factors. The ranking of the 30 medical innovations in the study are as follows:

1. MRI and CT
2. ACE inhibitors
3. Balloon angioplasty
4. Statins
5. Mammography
6. Coronary artery bypass graft
7. Proton pump inhibitors and H2 blockers
8. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and new non-SSRI antidepressants
9. Cataract extraction and lens implant
10. Hip and knee replacement
11. Ultrasonography and echocardiography
12. Gastrointestinal endoscopy
13. Inhaled steroids for asthma
14. Laparoscopic surgery
15. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and COX-2 inhibitors
16. Cardiac enzymes
17. Fluoroquinolones
18. New hypoglycemic agents
19. HIV testing and treatment
20. Tamoxifen
21. Prostate-specific antigen testing
22. Long-acting and local opioid anesthetics
23. Helicobacter pylori testing and treatment
24. Bone densitometry
25. Third-generation cephalosporins
26. Calcium channel blockers
27. Intravenous conscious sedation
28. Sildenafil (Viagra)
29. Nonsedating antihistamines
30. Bone marrow transplant

The Digital Music Industry isn't music to anyone's ears

2010-02-02T01:51:00.000-05:00

I just finished reading an interesting article about web-based models (Daily Deal). Thought I'd post the most important points here and my personal views

My predictions:

Give me easy ways to find stations. Pandora's hardware might do better than its software.

- The global music industry has gone from $31Bn to $18Bn
- Apple sells 25 percent of all US music, Walmart sells 14 percent
- It costs a penny to play a song (you can start your own co today) so the more successful you are, the more cash you burn (remember Netzero!)
- There are 350 digital music cos (good grief!) And $1 billion has been invested
- Pandora, which raised $50MM is profitable with $40 million in revenues but very few paying subscribers
- Spotify (Europe) also raised $50MM
- There have been 2 exits. MySpace acquired Imeem with 16 million listeners for $1 million; CBS paid $250MM for Last.fm but its reportedly not doing well
- Interesting models: Ecast (digiral jukeboxes for clubs and bars), Jamendo (selling rights-cleared music to businesses) and Rhapsody (first-mover streaming subscriber but only has 700,000 subscribers)
- 95 percent of digital music is still illegal.
- Getting label approval is a laborious process; nothing is standardized
- Venture units of both Sony Music and Universal Music have been dismantled

My predictions for the next 3 years

- First the obvious ones. Most of these cos will dissapear and most VCs won't make a dime
- Old musicians may be found bagging groceries as their retirement rapidly dries up. There will be many more tours, videos with product placements and merchandising so bands can milk the few good years (anyone remember Britney) - and more recent bands will play at Yahoo and Google !
- Labels will standardize distribution, even adopting common platforms (e g an Amazon equivalent for distributing all major labels might emerge and anyone will be able to contract from them and stream the music)
- Local radio advertising prices will drop off a cliff
- Cool hardware will have unpredictable success, but there will be a resurgence of cool radios in the home with retro designs but till the big consumer cos like Bose step in, these will be niche businesses with unpredictable sound quality
- Cable will go outside the box. They will l sell hardware that will pick up the Internet based stations from the set-top box and and give us more control. The radio on cable will finally get significantly better with more controls to users (though TV sounds won't hence the need for a wireless-enabled radio)
- The more lawyers a label hires and the longer it takes to strike deals with these 350 startups, the slower will they be to get online, and the less likely they are to survive.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Coupons for the Facebook crowd: 2010s hottest startup

2010-01-29T13:45:00.002-05:00

Shashi Tharoor: Why nations should pursue "soft" power | Video on TED.com

2009-12-13T09:08:00.000-05:00

Shashi Tharoor: Why nations should pursue "soft" power | Video on TED.com

Social Entreprneurship

2009-11-27T16:25:00.001-05:00

Finance II: Raj Melville

View more presentations from lpnoonan.

White House Banquet guests - interesting people !

2009-11-24T21:40:00.001-05:00

The President & First Lady Michelle Obama
Dr. Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister, India & Ms. Gursharan Kaur
Mr. Mukesh D Ambani
Mr. Deepak Chopra
Ms. Katie Couric
Mr. John Doerr
Mr. Thomas Friedman
Mr. Raj Gupta, CEO, Rohm & Haas
Mr. Rajat Gupta, Ex-CEO, McKinsey
Dr. Sanjay Gupta,
Mr. Farooq Kathwari, CEO, Ethan Allen
Mrs. Jhumpa Lahiri, Author
Ms. Kiran Mazumda-Shaw, CEO, Biocon
Mr. Sunil Bharti Mittal, CEO, Bharti
Kalpen Modi, Associate Director, Office of Public Engagement
Mr. Shantanu Narayen, CEO, Adobe
Ms. Indra Nooyi, CEO, Pepsi
Mr. Deepak Parekh, CEO, HDFC
Mr. Sam Pitroda
Ms. Preetha Reddy, Apollo
Mr. Parag Saxena, Invesco
Dr. Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate
Mr. M. Night Shyamalan, Director
Mr. Analjit Singh, CEO, Max
Mr. Ratan Tata, CEO, Tata
Mr. Fareed Zakaria

Good Question! The Eight Best Questions We Got While Raising Venture Capital

2009-11-18T18:16:00.001-05:00

Good Question! The Eight Best Questions We Got While Raising Venture Capital

I found four questions particularly interesting, so I am writing them out.

1. What are your unit economics?
For us, this meant explaining what Redfin made this summer on a single home purchase, with a per-transaction account of what we spent on marketing to get customers ($27), on local data ($153), on customer service ($2,906) and so on. We also calculated how much annual revenue we got for every monthly unique visitor. Knowing that the big number is how much we spend on our customer-service team refocused us on making sure we hired the right team and invested in its happiness.

4. What are the explanatory events?
What change in our business had caused revenues to shoot up? We found the real explanatory event was a change in our service a month before – unlimited home tours.

5. Why can’t you grow faster?
Redfin’s Sasha Aickin quietly pointed at the headcount line of our projections and said our rate-limiting factor is probably how quickly we can hire top-notch real estate agents. Everyone nodded. We got back from that meeting and began thinking about scaling agent hiring.

6. What are the accelerating effects?
What separates a potential colossus from other businesses is the capacity to keep growing at 300% rate in years four, five and beyond. For Amazon, the product reviews and personalization history it captured from its first users accelerated its second stage of growth. For Facebook and Twitter, the community itself constantly recruits new users. For companies like Zappos and hopefully Redfin, it’s word-of-mouth about our customer service.

YouTube - Social Media ROI: Socialnomics

2009-11-18T14:57:00.004-05:00

YouTube - Social Media ROI: Socialnomics

2009-11-18T14:57:00.000-05:00

YouTube - Social Media ROI: Socialnomics

Advice from Steve Rubel on Microblogging | Shareaholic Blog

2009-11-18T14:31:00.002-05:00

Advice from Steve Rubel on Microblogging | Shareaholic Blog: "Be relevant – think carefully about what kind of content your audience would care about. Are you adding value to their life?"

There is hope...

2009-10-25T16:31:00.001-04:00

Mint.com: Outstandingly canny presentation on the numbers behind Mint

2009-10-08T20:46:00.002-04:00

Mint Founder Institute Accounting

View more presentations from Andrei Marinescu.

Amazing packaging / design

2009-10-04T22:00:00.001-04:00

The Best Package Designs in the World!

View more presentations from Stratigo Stratigo.

2009-08-01T18:24:00.001-04:00

Disruption

View more presentations from fredwilson.

Nearly 100 visitors to The Leadership Program Information Sessions

2009-07-26T17:38:00.004-04:00

Thanks to the hard work of TLP Fellows, there has been excellent interest in the Class of 2010 program, with many more attendees than we expected. It also meant that we may not have been able to provide the most informative sessions to everyone, or answered all their questions. We'll follow up and hope that we're better organized for the next one to handle the crowds.

See the newly launched website here: http://www.startupleadership.com

Top 50 Management Thinkers (Times UK)

2009-07-26T17:38:00.001-04:00

The top 50 thinkers: (Times UK 2009)

1. C. K. Prahalad Indian management guru
2. Bill Gates Geek-turned-philanthropist
3. Alan Greenspan Ex-Federal Reserve chairman
4. Michael Porter Competitive strategy author
5. Gary Hamel Business strategist
6. W. Chan Kim & Renée Mauborgne INSEAD professors and authors of Blue Ocean Strategy
7. Tom Peters In Search of Excellence author
8. Jack Welch Former GE CEO-turned-columnist
9. Richard Branson Iconic British entrepreneur
10. Jim Collins Good to Great author
11. Philip Kotler Kellogg’s marketing guru
12. Robert Kaplan & David Norton The creators of the balanced scorecard
13. Kjell Nordstrom & Jonas Ridderstralle Funky Business duo from Sweden
14. Charles Handy The original portfolio worker
15. Stephen Covey The man with seven successful and highly effective habits
16. Henry Mintzberg Controverisal Canadian management expert
17. Thomas Stewart Editor of Harvard Business Review
18. Malcolm Gladwell Author of The Tipping Point and Blink
19. Lynda Gratton London Business School professor and author of Hot Spots
20. Donald Trump US Apprentice host
21. Scott Adams Creator of Dilbert
22. Ram Charan Co-author of Execution
23. Vijay Govindarajan A Tuck professor and GE’s new chief innovation consultant
24. Warren Bennis Veteran on leadership
25. Clayton Christensen Innovation expert
26. Thomas Friedman Author of The World is Flat
27. Kenichi Ohmae Globalisation guru
28. Rosabeth Moss Kanter Renowned Harvard academic and author
29. Steve Jobs Apple’s iconic business leader
30. John Kotter Leadership and change guru
31. Jeff Immelt Jack Welch’s successor at GE
32. Rob Goffee & Gareth Jones Authentic leaders at London Business School
33. Adrian Slywotsky Heavyweight modern strategist
34. Marshall Goldsmith Coach to the top executives
35. Bill George Another fan of authentic leadership
36. Larry Bossidy Co-author of Execution with Charan (22)
37. Daniel Goleman The father of social and emotional intelligence
38. Marcus Buckingham Top self-help guru
39. Howard Gardner Harvard’s creator of the multiple intelligence concept
40. Edward de Bono Supreme lateral thinker
41. Al Gore Climate change campaigner
42. David Ulrich Human resources expert
43. Seth Godin An insightful marketer
44. Costas Markides Charismatic strategist
45. Rakesh Khurana Harvard thinker
46. Richard D’Aveni Hyper-competition expert
47. Peter Senge Learning organisation guru
48. Chris Argyris The originator of the learning organisation concept
49. Jeffrey Pfeffer Stanford intellectual
50. Chris Zook Bain consultant-turned-author

Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO Acumen Fund

2009-07-15T01:35:00.000-04:00

My multicolored flag

2009-07-12T22:24:00.001-04:00

This was made at www.wearemulticolored.com to represent the three countries I have spent my formative years (UK, India and the USA)

Cool folding chairs from Flux Design

2009-07-12T20:45:00.002-04:00

Flux chair from flux chairs on Vimeo.

Kauffman and First Time Entrepreneurs: Statistics

2009-07-08T15:43:00.001-04:00

What Kauffman found… !
• The average age of company founders is 40
• Dropouts are rare. 95% have bachelor’s degrees. 47 percent have advanced degrees
• 52% ranked in the top 10% of their class
• Entrepreneurs are usually the 2nd child out of 3
• 70% of entrepreneurs were married when they first launched their company
• 5% were divorced, separated, or widowed
• 60% of respondents indicated they had at least one child when they launched their first business, and 43.5 percent had two or more children

Marc Andresson launches a new venture fund !

2009-07-06T07:48:00.004-04:00

Some interesting points he made (not sure how accurate they are but I'll mention them anyway)

1. Only 10-20 of 700 funds he knows deliver good returns

2. There are exits, just not enough: Data Domain : likely to sell for $2 billion, Pure Digital - Cisco; OpenTable IPO and LogMeIn filed for IPO recently

3. 15 tech companies launched per year can get to $100 million in revenues. They're responsible for 97% of VC returns

His model will be the Valley model. Give a small company money for up to 5 engineers. If they build a good product, give them $5-10 million. He will only invest in the Valley. He will only do tech/internet/infrastructure in the spaces he knows.

Marc founded Netscape, Ning and Opsware (earlier known as LoudCloud). He is a well known Valley angel investor with several bets that seem to be working (Twitter, Digg, Delicious). He has a great blog but I haven't visited it in a while after he stopped writing. He's also an enormously insightful panelist.

If...with Nadal and Federer

2009-07-04T16:32:00.005-04:00

This is my favorite poem. By Rudyard Kipling. Relevant to me personally because it has lessons for life. Also because I have a son. Voted the greatest poem in England. Narrated here by two of the world's greatest...who have filled each minute with sixty seconds of distance run. Watch it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is-JCJCUy18

An outstanding ad from Pfizer

2009-06-11T19:44:00.003-04:00

2009-06-10T23:01:00.002-04:00

VC Non Admissions

View more Microsoft Word documents from vcobserver.

Angel Investors in New England (From Xconomy)

2009-05-04T16:52:00.001-04:00

Angel Investors in New England
Thanks to XConomy.com

Angel Healthcare Investors
Newton, MA 617.630.0777
E-mail: info@hcangels.com
Does early-stage investments in healthcare services, biotechnology and life sciences,
and medical device companies

Angel Investor Forum
East Hartford, CT
Elizabeth Karter, Executive Director
E-mail: lkarter@kartercapital.com
Focused on seed-stage opportunities in Connecticut and the Northeast

Bay Angels
Cape Cod, MA
E-mail: cbyron@bayangels.net
Funds startups in Cape Cod and the Islands, Southeastern Massachusetts, and Rhode Island

Beacon Angels
Boston, MA
E-mail: candidates@beaconangels.com
Typically invests between $100,000 and $300,000 in small but fast-growing startups

Boston Harbor Angels
Boston, MA
E-mail: info@bostonharborangels.com
Invests in firms seeking to raise between $250,000 and $1.5 million. Portfolio includes medical devices, IT, consumer products, business products, specialty materials, Internet, aviation, and more.

Boynton Angels Worcester, MA
E-mail: plan@boyntonangels.com
Makes seed- and expansion-stage investments in firms within a two-hour radius of Worcester, MA. Target fields: life sciences, energy, transportation, communications, and software

Breakfast Club of New Hampshire
Nashua, NH
E-mail: investors@angelbreakfastclub.com
Invests between $250,000 and $1 million in seed- and early-stage New England firms in information technology, cleantech, software, services, and medical devices

Cherrystone Angel Group
Providence, RI
E-mail: info@cherrystoneangelgroup.com
Invests between $100,000 and $500,000 in companies within a two-hour drive of Providence.

CommonAngels
Lexington, MA
781.274.9124
James Geshwiler, managing director
E-mail: james@commonangels.com
Chris Sheehan, managing director
E-mail: chris@commonangels.com
Does early stage software and technology investing. Prefers to take part in Series A rounds of between $500,000 and $5 million

eCoast Angel Network
Portsmouth, NH
E-mail: ecoastangels@comcast.net
Invests in advanced technology, e-commerce, healthcare, and industrial products and services. Targets firms in the New Hampshire coastal region

ECS Angels Bar Harbor, ME 207-288-0428 or 513-265-1309 Charles Sidman E-mail: CSidman@EvolutionaryManagement.com Perhaps the newest angel fund in the region, it formed last year to invest in diverse fields and to invest nationally rather than regionally (web site, link above, was â€œcoming soonâ€� as of this writing)

Golden Seeds
Cos Cob, CT; Boston, MA
Stephanie Hanbury-Brown, managing director
E-mail: shb@goldenseeds.com
Invests in women-led ventures in tech and non-tech.

Granite State Angels
Hanover, NH
Fred Wainwright, executive director
E-mail: wainwright@granitestateangels.com
Provides funding of between $250,000 and $1.5 million in early and later-stage New England companies (Wainwright is executive director of the Center for Private Equity and Entrepreneurship at Dartmouthâ€™s Tuck School of Business)

Hub Angels
Brookline, MA
E-mail: info@hubangels.com
Maintains a diversified portfolio that includes investments in financial services, entertainment, retail, biotechnology, healthcare, water treatment, food technology, and digital audio.

Investors™ Circle
Brookline, MA
617.566.2600
This network of angels invests in energy and the environment, media and education, food and organics, health and wellness, and community and international development

Launchpad Venture Group Wellesley, MA
E-mail: info@launchpadventuregroup.com
Invests between $100,000 and $500,000 in wide variety of tech and life sciences firms

Maine Angels
Portland, ME
E-mail: info@maineangels.org
Makes small investments of between $50,000 and $250,000. Has a diversified portfolio in tech and non-tech areas.

Mass Medical Angels
Boston area
Richard Anders
E-mail: info@massmedangels.com
The group seeks investments in life sciences startups that are looking to raise between $250,000 and $3 million.

North Country Angels
Montpelier, VT
Fred Wainwright
E-mail: wainwright@northcountryangels.com
Invests $250,000 to $1.5 million in early and later-stage companies throughout New England

River Valley Investors
Hadley, MA
413-241-7285
Paul G. Silva, co-manager
E-mail: paul@rivervalleyinvestors.com
Typically invests between $250,000 and $1 million in both early and later-stage firms within two-hour drive of Springfield, MA.

Walnut Venture Associates
Wellesley Hills, MA
E-mail: info@walnutventures.com
Focuses on information technology companies. Investment target: $250,000 to $1 million

Gregory Petsko, Brandeis University: Alzheimer epidemic

2009-04-28T01:21:00.002-04:00

Biochemist Gregory Petsko of Brandeis University makes a convincing argument for the coming Alzheimer epidemic

Damien Hirst makes $200 million in one evening: The Tiger Woods of the art world

2009-04-21T20:35:00.022-04:00

Several years ago I registered emergingmarketart.com in anticipation of the coming art boom in India and China. Unfortunately life got in the way, so the domain name stayed shelved through the extraordinary art boom of the 90s.

While I still see emerging market art as an interesting investment play, this is a business where superstars generate the lion share of profits.

Damien Hirst first hit the limelight when I lived in London 15 years ago. Last September, he sold 233 works of art in a single evening and made $200 million.

Anish Kapoor, another Brit making waves with his mirrored steel exhibits may be headed in the same direction. Its incredible to imagine that a single artist could make more than a billion dollars in his or her own lifetime.

Unlike Tiger Woods, Damien doesn't even need to practice his craft himself. He can direct most of it and let a team do the hard work. Tiger is only as good as his coordination on the golf course.

Here's a video of Damien talking about his work.

Maldives: Will it last another 100 years ?

2009-04-21T20:35:00.021-04:00

Maldives has always been the exotic destination for Indian honeymooners and Bollywood movie song scenes. Over the last 10 years its also become one of the world's most sought after tourist destinations with 600,000 visitors.

Unfortunately it may dissapear. Most Maldives islands are 3 feet above water. As our ice shelf melts, the water table gets raised, and salt waters wash over these pristine islands, making life unlivable.

The current President of Maldives is so worried that he's setting up a soveriegn fund to buy land in case much of the islands dissapear by 2100 AD as expected.

Global warming is a reality and unfortunately as the earth warms up and the permafrost melts, unleashing trapped methane and CO2 this process will simply accelerate, breaking off ice shelfs like the massive recent one that suddenly broke away.

Is it only a matter of time ? Will Maldives replace polar bears as the poster-case of global warming ?

The Electronic Rubikscube !

2009-04-21T20:35:00.020-04:00

One of my 2009 resolutions (I have three) is to solve the Rubik's cube. I used to have to break it apart to solve it twenty years ago. Now the $150 rubik"s touchcube will save us the trouble of taking it apart. Wait till the Chinese electronics manufacturers take it apart. I'm predicting $50 in a year and $20 in year 3.

See it here. www.rubikstouchcube.com

Stroke: When in doubt, scan please !

2009-04-21T20:35:00.019-04:00

There are two types of strokes - ischemic and haemorrhagic. The first is the result of a clot that blocks supply of blood to the brain. The second is due to a burst vessel. Both cause permanent brain damage. Haemorragic stroke has no fixes - once the brain is damaged the only thing really one can do is remove the blood and hope the patient will regain function if the brain rewires. Thankfully haemorrhagic stroke occurs in 17 percent of cases.

700,000 Americans experience a stroke every year, ending up with paralysis or hemiparalysis in large proportions. 1.6 millions are paralyzed today due to stroke.

Mostly people experience a shut off of blood supply - ischemic stroke, a condition that is potentially fixable within a 3-hour timeframe if detected. Detection needs a CT scan. If one can get it done in 45 minutes, there's time to get to a interventional neurologist or administer tpa, a clot-busting medicine that works in a minority of cases

Looks like a very important standard continues to hang in balance. Its an issue that could potentially save thousands from debilitating paralysis. Meanwhile, companies like InTouch, that had a breakthrough communication device being used for remote consults on stroke (amongst other diseases) will continue to be critical to get neurospecialists in front of patients in remote locations that need the help.

Did the late Carmelo Scuderi change the gasoline engine ?

2009-04-21T20:35:00.000-04:00

Yesterday a new 4-piston gasoline engine was unveiled in Detroit. This engine is expected to convert 40% of gasoline into energy. Today's cars convert 33%. That may not seem like a lot, but it has the power to make gas-powered cars 25% more efficient. That does have a significant impact. Not surprising the industry is lining up to test and maybe build prototypes. We'll hear more in two years. Its a pity that Carmelo Scuderi announced his invention in 2001 but died a year later. It too another seven years to unveil the final product. Cars have so much incredible engineering and innovation packed into its steel frame, its hard for executives to get excited. This one's different.

Time for a new keyboard ?

2009-04-21T12:14:00.002-04:00

The QWERTY keyboard was invented in 1872 when the typewriter was mechanical. Through trial and error it was discovered to be the best way to put keys together so they did not jam when typing. Having grown up in the typewriter age, I have actually experienced this problem when two mechanical arms came together at the same time. But now word processors are electronic. Is there a better design ? Should we go back to laying them out alphabetically ? Are there mathematical algorithms that have been used to get us to a better keyboard layout that allows us to type faster ?

One argument may be that we cannot afford to go up against the installed base ? As I move to typing with one finger on our iPhones lest we drop them (as opposed to the much easier blackberry) , I believe there is room to rethink this keyboard because on the iPhone, for example we could choose our keyboard layouts.

In fact if no one has done it, I woud propose an iPhone app that has a customizable keyboard one can use. Let's "test" if there is a market.

PS: There is a good article on DVORAK keyboards on wikipedia. Click here.

The January Letter from Steve Jobs

2009-04-11T00:00:00.001-04:00

I was wondering about his health yesterday as I wandered around the world's largest apple store (its in Boston). I found this letter he wrote in January. Looks like he'll be ok, but we'll wait to see pictures of him having gained the weight.

January 5, 2009
Letter from Apple CEO Steve Jobs

Dear Apple Community,

For the first time in a decade, I’m getting to spend the holiday season with my family, rather than intensely preparing for a Macworld keynote.

Unfortunately, my decision to have Phil deliver the Macworld keynote set off another flurry of rumors about my health, with some even publishing stories of me on my deathbed.

I’ve decided to share something very personal with the Apple community so that we can all relax and enjoy the show tomorrow.

As many of you know, I have been losing weight throughout 2008. The reason has been a mystery to me and my doctors. A few weeks ago, I decided that getting to the root cause of this and reversing it needed to become my #1 priority.

Fortunately, after further testing, my doctors think they have found the cause—a hormone imbalance that has been “robbing” me of the proteins my body needs to be healthy. Sophisticated blood tests have confirmed this diagnosis.

The remedy for this nutritional problem is relatively simple and straightforward, and I’ve already begun treatment. But, just like I didn’t lose this much weight and body mass in a week or a month, my doctors expect it will take me until late this Spring to regain it. I will continue as Apple’s CEO during my recovery.

I have given more than my all to Apple for the past 11 years now. I will be the first one to step up and tell our Board of Directors if I can no longer continue to fulfill my duties as Apple’s CEO. I hope the Apple community will support me in my recovery and know that I will always put what is best for Apple first.

So now I’ve said more than I wanted to say, and all that I am going to say, about this.

Steve

Corporate VC: New Kids on the Block - Google and Merck (Germany)

2009-04-07T22:21:00.003-04:00

Two new VC firms are starting to make some waves. The news on Google Ventures isn't new, but with a new hire on the East Coast, they're back in the news. It would be interesting to see what Google invests in, but I am scratching my head as to why they would invest in the biotech industry. Its not like investing in lifesciences (outside of Healthcare IT) will teach them anything.

Merck of Germany is looking to enter the venture business with a new fund - Merck Serono Ventures. This firm is not to be confused with Merck Capital Ventures, which created a fund in 2000 to invest in tools and technologies outside, but not therapeutics. But Merck decided not to stay in the venture business. Instead, the Merck team is now raising a new fund at Pharma Capital Ventures after reportedly delivering top quartile returns at Merck.

Click here for Google Ventures
Click here for Merck Serono Ventures\

$250MM in Venture Capital

2009-03-30T15:20:00.003-04:00

An incredible sum was raised by online home renter HomeAway. The money is to be spent buying companies - so its not your traditional venture capital.

Prison Entrepreneurship Program

2009-03-30T15:19:00.006-04:00

Catherine Rohr, a private equity professional quit her job to start an incredible initiative to train prisoners to run their own small businesses. She's graduated 440 men, and 47 have launched companies. Five have companies that pay more than $100K per year. That's better than business school stats ! 105 have returned to prison. Maybe they can benefit from more classes.

Story from Inc Jan/Feb 2009.

$10MM a year for working 1 hour a day

2009-03-30T15:19:00.002-04:00

I just read an incredible story. Markus Frind is Founder and CEO of Plenty of Fish, a Canadian dating site that serves up 1.6 billion pages a year, far more than Match.com. Till recently the company had 1 employee. His site is so simplistic, he needs less than an hour a day to maintain it. He recently hired 3 employees. The website was set up to be maintenance free. "It runs itself" he told Inc. The site is intelligent, so one sees only a narrow group of potential mates and not the 10 million people that are there. The CEO believes he makes 800K connections a year.
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Stem Cell Research

2009-03-19T10:37:00.002-04:00

NIH has 120 days to come up with the guidelines for "responsible, scientifically worth human stem cell research, inclusing human embryonic stem cell research...". Geron is the only company with FDA approval for human testing.

Hello TechStars, Goodbye YCombinator

2009-02-20T01:22:00.002-05:00

YCombinator has pulled up its tent and moved permanently to the West Coast. Clearly our style of entreprneurship did not fit what they were trying to do. I would agree; what they are doing is largely Web 2.0, which is a West Coast business. I would advise most web-based startups to move West too. The entire ecosystem is in the valley.

Techstars is moving into Boston. This is a Boulder, Co based firm that operates like YCombinator. It is smaller, accepting 20 companies a year of which 10 will be in Boston. The company will give $18K in seed funding to web-based and software companies. Sorry - biotech and medtech entrepreneurs. TechStars prefers companies that have more than one founder.

Some grim statistics in The Scientist:

2009-02-09T21:24:00.003-05:00

These are distressing but worth discussing

• NIH budget has has declined by more than 10% in real terms over the past 5 years.
• Initial success rates for grants is less than 10%
• Average age of first NIH grant is mid-40s.
• New drugs approved by the FDA has fallen linearly from 53 in 1996 to 17 in 2007 (the same number as 1983). In 2008, 21 druges were approved including 3 that were “reconsidered” and 3 radiocontrast agents
• Pharma has lost 100,000 jobs over the past 5 years

The author lists solutions - my reactions are in (brackets):
• Restore funding to the NIH (Obama has a $10 billion increase so this is fixable)
• Have graded FDA drug approvals (not sure how this would work)
• Reward more personalized medicine (this is a path FDA is taking)
• Increase academia and FDA interactions (drug approvals take 10 years; I don't see how these interactions will improve approvals. Academia is upstream and not connected to drug trials)
• Spend on science in schools (a focus of this administration)

While drug approvals have dropped considerably, its not necessarily a bad thing. Yes, it means a lot of companies and investors have lost money. Scientists have spent lifetimes on products that ultimately weren't approved. But how many of these drugs should have gotten to the market in the first place ? Is there a cure for Alzheimers or Cancer waiting to be approved ? Or a drug that works in 80% of a selective population that was turned down.

I think the FDA needs to rethink approval processes of contrast agents and its diagnostics tests as well. These generally are safer with lesser side effects. The economics simply aren't in favor especially of developing contrast agents through the startup process. Similarly with diagnostics; there needs to be more of a focus on accelerating the approval processes. If we can find it early, we can cure it. Diagnostics tests and contrast agents can help us do that. And while it builds up industries, it will make a real difference for patients as well as the life sciences industry. Death rates are not going down because of better drugs. Its going down because of better screening and imaging.

Click here to read the article

What's in the Stimulus Package

2009-02-08T18:47:00.002-05:00

From NBC/FirstRead

Here is a breakdown of some of what's in the stimulus, by the numbers:
-- $825 billion total (as of 1/16/08)
-- $550 billion in new spending
-- $275 billion in tax relief ($1,000 tax cut for families, $500 tax cut for individuals through SS payroll deductions)
-- $ 90 billion for infrastructure
-- $ 87 billion Medicaid aid to states
-- $ 79 billion school districts/public colleges to prevent cutbacks
-- $ 54 billion to encourage energy production from renewable sources
-- $ 41 billion for additional school funding ($14 billion for school modernizations and repairs, $13 billion for Title I, $13 billion for IDEA special education funding, $1 billino for education technology)
-- $ 24 billion for "health information technology to prevent medical mistakes, provide better care to patients and introduce cost-saving efficiencies" and "to provide for preventative care and to evaluate the most effective healthcare treatments."
-- $ 16 billion for science/technology ($10 billion for science facilities, research, and instrumentation; $6 billion to expand broadband to rural areas)
-- $ 15 billion to increase Pell grants by $500
-- $ 6 billion for the ambiguous "higher education modernization."

Bill Gates: Malaria & Education @ TED

2009-02-07T15:58:00.001-05:00

An outstanding talk by Bill Gates at TED discussing two major world issues a) Malaria: The biggest cause of child deaths and b) How to make teachers great in America. Twenty useful minutes of your time.

How Do You Find Your Passion and How Do You Pursue It? Randy Komisar

2009-02-01T17:00:00.001-05:00

"My career makes no sense in the windshield. It only makes sense in the rear view mirror. That applies to lots and lots of people in their careers."

Sangeeta Bhatia: The Future of Cancer Diagnostics & Therapy at Davos

2009-01-31T18:41:00.002-05:00

Starbucks listens to Obama's Call to Volunteer

2009-01-23T00:10:00.000-05:00

I'm going to Starbucks to find out what the buzz is all about. Are you in ?

On MLKs Birthday: A Speech Worth Hearing

2009-01-19T23:01:00.002-05:00

Barack Obama spoke in Philadelphia on Race Relations. This remarkable speech should be heard by all.

Men or Women: Who's a better driver ? A better CEO?

2009-01-18T12:00:00.003-05:00

The verdict is in. Women are better drivers according to stats:

Women have less accidents
Women have less traffic violations (68% women have no traffic violations; 64% of men)
Women are less likely to get killed traveling over the same distance) (men are 77% more likely to die than women)

These stats do not account for average speed of travel and highway driving; there may be something in those numbers; people are less likely to die from car crashes in the suburbs than on highways. I wonder what the data shows if only highway driving is considered.

Insurance.com carried this article.

In the financial sector there are many high-profile women especially in money management. Women make excellent money managers maybe because they take more calculated risk/rewards; risk/reward is an important fundamental in driving returns. A UC Davis study of 1991-1997 showed that in households, men trade 45% more than women; trading instead of buy and hold subsequently lowered men's returns are lowered by 2.65 percentage points a year as opposed to 1.72 percentage points for women.

One thing is clear. There are no scandals involving a woman CEO that brought a company to the brink of financial ruin; certainly none that pushed a company over the edge. The list of male-run companies with boiler-room deal-driven cultures is significant (most of Wall Street; Enron, MCI-Worldcom, Tyco...)

I wonder how gender plays out in shareholder returns in running public companies and venture-backed startups? Is there is a correlation ? Is such a study even possible ?

NVCA Predictions 2009

2009-01-18T09:59:00.001-05:00

NVCA Predictions 2009

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Business 2009 prediction venture capita

Plastic Surgery: Started in 600 BC

2009-01-18T00:09:00.005-05:00

Sushruta, the Father of Surgery, wrote a famous book "Sushruta Samhita" in 600 BC. This detailed collection of manuscripts was the first and very impressive manual of surgery. It contained descriptions of 120 surgical instruments, as well as several surgeries for the first time including repair of cleft lips, disssection of cadvers, removing the prostrate, cataract lenses and abscess drains. The most detailed descriptions are of rhinoplasty (nose repair), which developed into a science.

Natural Orifice Surgery: A new development

2009-01-18T00:05:00.005-05:00

Natural orifice transluminal endoscopic surgery (NOTES) is a new method of surgery where a natural orifice (mouth, urethra, anus, etc.) is used as a point of entry for insertion of surgical instruments, thereby avoiding external incisions or scars. The incision is made in the wall of the orifice to enter the site of the surgery.

This surgery was performed in 2004 for the first time anywhere in the world in India on humans; it was an appendectomy through the mouth. Its still experimental, but it was named one of the Top 10 medical innovations of 2009. CIMIT received several millions in grants to study this field in greater detail. Credit for inventing the surgery goes to Anthony Kalloo of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and Venkat Rao and Nageshwar Reddy of the Asian Institute of Gastroenterology in Hyderabad, India..

NOTES is attracting some criticism. Its not surprising. Every new development has people who takes sides. I remember when airbags first came out, Lee Iacocca argued against the technology in his book, saying airbags would go off without warning, creating more dangers than if we had them. Medical developments tend to attract greater sceptics.

Time will tell if NOTES goes mainstream or if it finds selected killer applications:

Robert Oliver

A US News article talked about a patient who had pain after the procedure in her mouth. See here

Cleveland Clinic: Top 10 Innovations of 2009`

2009-01-18T00:03:00.002-05:00

Top 10 Medical Innovations for 2009 (reproduced from Cleveland Clinic)

1. Use of Circulating Tumor Cell Technology:
Use of new technology to measure circulating tumor cells as a predictor of success of chemotherapy.

2. Warm Organ Perfusion Device:
Warm organ perfusion device to preserve organs for transplantation during transplant.

3. Diaphragm Pacing System:
Use of a diaphragm (phrenic nerve) stimulator to enable paralyzed patients to breath without the assistance of a mechanical ventilator.

4. Multi-Spectral Imaging Systems:
Improvements in multi-spectral image analysis to assess multiple protein pathway configuration in a single sample/cell.

5. Percutaneous Mitral Valve Regurgitation Repair:
Use of a special clip to percutaneously repair mitral valve regurgitation (MVR).

6. New Strategies for Creating Vaccines for Avian Flu:
Use of new strategies for creating vaccines for avian flu, including genetically-engineered virus-like particles (VLPs) as the basis for vaccines.

7. LESS and NOTES Applications:
Laparoendoscopic single-site surgery (LESS) and Natural Orifice Transluminal Endoscopy (NOTES) for nephrectomy, cystectomy, prostatectomy, colon resection, and other applications.

8. Integration of Diffusion Tensor Imaging (Tractography):
Integration of diffusion tensor imaging (tractography) with surgical navigation of the brain to minimize damage to fiber tracts during brain surgery.

9. Doppler-Guided Uterine Artery Occlusion:
Doppler-guided non-invasive transvaginal uterine artery occlusion for treatment of symptomatic uterine fibroids.

10. Private Sector National Health Information Exchange:
Use of a common exchange standard among participants to enable access through the Internet regardless of provider source.

PWC and the Satyam Scandal

2009-01-14T12:32:00.000-05:00

I'm still scratching my head about the Satyamin cash in the bank and were reporting $1.1 billion. The easiest thing to find out in auditing is cash on hand. In fact it is the first thing one is taught in auditing.

All one has to do is get all the original bank statements, look at the end-of-year balance, add it up and that's what you have. There is no excuse to miss this number, least of all misreport it by $950 million.

India rightfully came down harshly on banks who were involved in the securities scandal in India many years ago. Credit Suisse lost its license. Its important to do a full investigation into PWCs role.

Only by threatening the survival of an auditing firm can we ensure they will comply by the law and do what they are paid for.

PWC needs to either show that it was not negligent or like the banks, it should get its India license revoked. This is the only way to send a message that the nation is serious, to improve transparency and ensure that auditors do their jobs properly and protect the interests of shareholders above the interests of the company at all times.
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The price of cigarettes and the cost of saving a smokers life

2009-01-11T23:49:00.000-05:00

New England Journal of Medicine published a study after following 30,000 smokers for 12 years.

484 suspected cancers were found.

375 patients opted for surgery.

92 percent lived 10 years or more.

Lung cancer is generally aggressive with extremely low survival rates because it moves so quickly.

The question is - what would it cost to save a smoker ? If a CT scan costs $500, in this study it would have cost $500K for each life saved. We realize that every life is priceless and precious. But let's suspend that theory for a second and talk about pure economics. The economic value of an American is approx. $40K per year (per capita GDP). Over 15-16 years this cost would be paid back so its beneficial to the US to do this.

However since lung cancer is mostly "self-inflicted" with 90 percent deaths to smokers, let's presume we have to recover this cost through a "scan tax". For an annual scan of $500, and assuming an individual consumes 20 cigarettes a day, that works out to 6 cents per cigarette in tax, or an additional $1.36.

This analysis doesn't take into account the complications of radiation.

There are some other interesting lung cancer tests coming that could stratify who should be scanned.

But price-wise, I don't see why smokers won't be willing to pay less than a buck fifty to smoke while vastly improving their chances of survival.
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The Future of Cancer: Detection or Cure ?

2009-01-11T23:25:00.000-05:00

On the flight over th JPMorgan I read a Wired Magazine article titled the Truth about Cancer.

If you can find cancer early, 90 percent of the time it can be cured through a combination of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. Detect it late and the chances of survival are 10 percent. These statistics are somewhat of a generalization for all cancers but its generally true.

One in three people will get cancer in their lifetime. If we could find it early we would fix it for most people. Yet the money isn't going in this direction yet. Only 8 percent of NIH funding ($300MM) is going towards detection.
A cure for cancer is so much more exciting than complex tests for detection. The venture industry is geared up, and has lost a lot of money funding these cures.

Siemens has invested in diagnostics. SVC has invested in three diagnostics companies, and every week we come across interesting biomarkers for cancer that are being converted into tests. Its early days of some fascinating developments that should really start to make an impact on survival in the next decade.
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A Kiva Fellow's Journey

2009-01-10T14:51:00.000-05:00

A Fistful Of Dollars: The Story of a Kiva.org Loan from Kieran Ball on Vimeo.

Kiva: Loosening my Social Entrepreneurship Credit Today

2009-01-10T14:45:00.000-05:00

I read a week of Wall Street Journals today. Lots of articles about worsening credit. The only lending I do is through ww.kiva.org so I've doubled the money I've channeled into the system.

Kiva is creating an impact. This week alone Kiva lent out nearly $800,000, and 7000 more people started lending. The default rate is 2.85 percent and the delinquency rate is 2.21 percent. Incredible.

Mohammed Yunus said that credit should be everyone's birthright. Not the kind of credit that got Wall Street and Main Street in trouble but enough to feed, clothe and shelter one's family. Its a powerful thought. Kiva is empowering those who are lending, to give these people a chance to do exactly that.

I looked at some interesting benchmarks. The average Kiva lender has lent $134 to date and received $75 back through 3.6 loans. This isn't the total amount lent out. It includes all the loans through money that was recycled. $59 is still in the system and in June there are 400,000 lenders, which means Kiva has $24MM in the system right now.

One billionnaire could increase that amount 50 times. Even at a 2-3 percent delinquency rate, that is a 25 percent better return than the Nasdaq. The personal social return is priceless.
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Jefferies: Medtech comparisons from 2007 to 2008

2009-01-05T17:01:00.002-05:00

This just in from Jefferies:

1) The Medical Device Public Company Universe traded at 3.0 times LTM Revenue, 27.5 times LTM Earnings and 21.6 times one year forward Earnings, versus trading at 1.6 times LTM Revenue, 17.0 times LTM Earnings and 14.5 times one year forward Earnings today.

2) Thirteen companies were in registration to go public (three ultimately were successful), versus three in registration today.

3) The IPO Class of 2007 was trading in positive territory (up 1.8%), versus the IPO Class of 2008 trading off 33.2% as of today.

4) Thirteen industry sub-sectors were trading in positive territory, versus none today.

5) Five industry sub-sectors (Hearing, Analytical Equip, Orthopedics, Diagnostics and Diversified) out-performed the broader index for the year, versus four (Components, Safety/Sterilization, Diversified, Home Care/Respiratory) today.

6) The average M&A multiple for the prior twelve months was 2.9 times (LTM Revenue), versus 2.8 times (LTM Revenue) today!

Gary the Snowman Christmas Card

2009-01-04T19:53:00.003-05:00

This first hit in 2006. It made me laugh. Happy new year and thanks to Blueprint Ventures for keeping us smiling !

The tough life of a VC - watch more funny videos

Yahoo's Open Source Mail

2008-12-31T12:29:00.002-05:00

A big announcement from Yahoo that most people won't really understand till it happens in mid-2009. This is a big chance for Yahoo to make email the killer app again, and take back the lead it has lost to social networks. I predict that (if Yahoo does it right), we'll be spending far more time inside our email than inside Facebook and Myspace. Lets hope I'm right. Email is broken and Yahoo is finally taking steps to fix it. This is going to be the most exciting internet development of 2009.

Mary Meeker's Internet Presentation

2008-12-31T12:28:00.002-05:00

Mary Meeker Web 2.0 Presentation

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Failure rates in Pharma trials

2008-12-18T16:41:00.001-05:00

Thought I'd paste this. Preclinical and Phase I failure rates should have been much higher. Or maybe we have to change trial design in both these phases. Then we'd be able to optimize venture financing and significantly improve venture returns. Phase II and III for Oncology are typically higher than for other drugs which is is equally unfortunate.

Preclinical: 65%
Phase I: 30%
Phase 2: 55%
Phase 3: 40%
Phase 4: 20%

Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

Great startups in the 1930s

2008-12-18T16:26:00.002-05:00

McKinsey article today mentioned two great companies started in the worst economic times. HP and Polaroid started in 1930. Microsoft and Ebay also started in tough economic conditions. What equivalents of HP and Ebay will 2009 bring us ?

WebNotes: Loving It! (A snapshot from my browser)

2008-12-13T17:45:00.005-05:00

At the MIT PEVC conference, I came across a simple startup last week that will make researching so much easier. Click here for the website.

Webnotes allows you to annotate web pages, highlight sections, and store items from your internet travels in online folders. An integrated button in my firefox toolbar makes it simple to point and shoot (the tool appears in my browser in the picture above). If you like to save interesting items on the web, I'd recommend everyone to try it. If you're intensely researching something on the net, it savings having to download or print pages and pages of information. Everything you highlight will show up along with your notes neatly in a pdf that you can print or mail to anyone. I can now save useful information with a couple of clicks and remember why I saved it in the first place.

Startup CEO Compensation

2008-12-11T22:30:00.004-05:00

The returns are falling...the salaries are rising. Go figure. Here is an extract from the XConomy story

The annual studies are conducted by the J. Robert Scott executive search agency, law firm WilmerHale, Ernst & Young, and academics at Harvard Business School.

CEO Cash Compensation (base salary and bonus) By Business Segment:

Life sciences—$410,000
Medical devices—$371,000
Content, information provider—$364,000
Software—$350,000
Services, consulting, integration—$336
Communications—$328,000
Clean technology—$321,000
Hardware, semiconductors, electronics—$315,000

2008 CEO Cash Compensation (base salary and bonus) by Geography

Life sciences/medical devices

New England—$422,000
California—$404,000
Mid-Atlantic—$376,000
South—$337,000
Midwest—$247,000
West—(sample size too small)

Technology

Midwest—$358,000
South—$351,000
California—$345,000
New England—$343,000
Mid-Atlantic—$327,000
West—$322,000

As for next year’s compensation data, let’s keep our fingers crossed for positive results.

Imagine...

2008-12-11T22:28:00.002-05:00

Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. — Jimmy Wales, Founder of Wikipedia

I just made a small donation to Wikipedia. They're raising $6MM, and are 60% of the way there. I encourage you to donate.

Please click here to donate. They deserve the cash.

A New Blog

2008-12-11T22:10:00.000-05:00

I put out a new blog. Its called A Startup Idea. Since I am surrounded by startup ideas (both mine and from those around me), I thought I should start documenting the ones that we'd like to see but those that we don't want to start ourselves. Hopefully someone will take up these ideas and create the products that we want.

If you want to add your own ideas, email me. Read this blog...

http://astartupidea.blogspot.com

Dec 4: Boston Candlelight Vigil

2008-12-04T10:47:00.002-05:00

Candlelight vigil for Mumbai victims on City Hall Plaza today. Please join in a Candlelight Vigil being planned for today (Thursday, December 4 at 6 PM) at Boston City Hall Plaza, Worcester City Hall steps and the Rhode Island State House steps.

This is to share our solidarity with all the civilized, caring peoples of India and the United States and to express our outrage and sorrow at the terrorist attacks last week in Mumbai.Please come in large numbers. Ask everyone to bring a candle or a flashlight if they can and let's have many thousand points of lights!

An amazing story of survival: Michael & Anjali Pollack at the Taj

2008-12-04T10:35:00.002-05:00

The Full Video Here
__________________

Heroes At The Taj
Michael Pollack 12.01.08, 7:40 PM ET
From Forbes.com

My story begins innocuously, with a dinner reservation in a world-class hotel. It ends 12 hours later after the Indian army freed us.

My point is not to sensationalize events. It is to express my gratitude and pay tribute to the staff of the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai, who sacrificed their lives so that we could survive. They, along with the Indian army, are the true heroes that emerged from this tragedy.

My wife, Anjali, and I were married in the Taj's Crystal Ballroom. Her parents were married there, too, and so were Shiv and Reshma, the couple with whom we had dinner plans. In fact, my wife and Reshma, both Bombay girls, grew up hanging out and partying the night away there and at the Oberoi Hotel, another terrorist target.

The four of us arrived at the Taj around 9:30 p.m. for dinner at the Golden Dragon, one of the better Chinese restaurants in Mumbai. We were a little early, and our table wasn't ready. So we walked next door to the Harbour Bar and had barely begun to enjoy our beers when the host told us our table was ready. We decided to stay and finish our drinks.

Thirty seconds later, we heard what sounded like a heavy tray smashing to the ground. This was followed by 20 or 30 similar sounds and then absolute silence. We crouched behind a table just feet away from what we now knew were gunmen. Terrorists had stormed the lobby and were firing indiscriminately.

We tried to break the glass window in front of us with a chair, but it wouldn't budge. The Harbour Bar's hostess, who had remained at her post, motioned to us that it was safe to make a run for the stairwell. She mentioned, in passing, that there was a dead body right outside in the corridor. We believe this courageous woman was murdered after we ran away.

(We later learned that minutes after we climbed the stairs, terrorists came into the Harbour Bar, shot everyone who was there and executed those next door at the Golden Dragon. The staff there was equally brave, locking their patrons into a basement wine cellar to protect them. But the terrorists managed to break through and lob in grenades that killed everyone in the basement.)

We took refuge in the small office of the kitchen of another restaurant, Wasabi, on the second floor. Its chef and staff served the four of us food and drink and even apologized for the inconvenience we were suffering.

Through text messaging, e-mail on BlackBerrys and a small TV in the office, we realized the full extent of the terrorist attack on Mumbai. We figured we were in a secure place for the moment. There was also no way out.

At around 11:30 p.m., the kitchen went silent. We took a massive wooden table and pushed it up against the door, turned off all the lights and hid. All of the kitchen workers remained outside; not one staff member had run.

The terrorists repeatedly slammed against our door. We heard them ask the chef in Hindi if anyone was inside the office. He responded calmly: "No one is in there. It's empty." That is the second time the Taj staff saved our lives.

After about 20 minutes, other staff members escorted us down a corridor to an area called The Chambers, a members-only area of the hotel. There were about 250 people in six rooms. Inside, the staff was serving sandwiches and alcohol. People were nervous, but cautiously optimistic. We were told The Chambers was the safest place we could be because the army was now guarding its two entrances and the streets were still dangerous. There had been attacks at a major railway station and a hospital.

But then, a member of parliament phoned into a live newscast and let the world know that hundreds of people--including CEOs, foreigners and members of parliament--were "secure and safe in The Chambers together." Adding to the escalating tension and chaos was the fact that, via text and cellphone, we knew that the dome of the Taj was on fire and that it could move downward.

At around 2 a.m., the staff attempted an evacuation. We all lined up to head down a dark fire escape exit. But after five minutes, grenade blasts and automatic weapon fire pierced the air. A mad stampede ensued to get out of the stairwell and take cover back inside The Chambers.

After that near-miss, my wife and I decided we should hide in different rooms. While we hoped to be together at the end, our primary obligation was to our children. We wanted to keep one parent alive. Because I am American and my wife is Indian, and news reports said the terrorists were targeting U.S. and U.K. nationals, I believed I would further endanger her life if we were together in a hostage situation.

So when we ran back to The Chambers I hid in a toilet stall with a floor-to-ceiling door and my wife stayed with our friends, who fled to a large room across the hall.

For the next seven hours, I lay in the fetal position, keeping in touch with Anjali via BlackBerry. I was joined in the stall by Joe, a Nigerian national with a U.S. green card. I managed to get in touch with the FBI, and several agents gave me status updates throughout the night.

I cannot even begin to explain the level of adrenaline running through my system at this point. It was this hyper-aware state where every sound, every smell, every piece of information was ultra-acute, analyzed and processed so that we could make the best decisions and maximize the odds of survival.

Was the fire above us life-threatening? What floor was it on? Were the commandos near us, or were they terrorists? Why is it so quiet? Did the commandos survive? If the terrorists come into the bathroom and to the door, when they fire in, how can I make my body as small as possible? If Joe gets killed before me in this situation, how can I throw his body on mine to barricade the door? If the Indian commandos liberate the rest in the other room, how will they know where I am? Do the terrorists have suicide vests? Will the roof stand? How can I make sure the FBI knows where Anjali and I are? When is it safe to stand up and attempt to urinate?

Meanwhile, Anjali and the others were across the corridor in a mass of people lying on the floor and clinging to each other. People barely moved for seven hours, and for the last three hours they felt it was too unsafe to even text. While I was tucked behind a couple walls of marble and granite in my toilet stall, she was feet from bullets flying back and forth. After our failed evacuation, most of the people in the fire escape stairwell and many staff members who attempted to protect the guests were shot and killed.

The 10 minutes around 2:30 a.m. were the most frightening. Rather than the back-and-forth of gunfire, we just heard single, punctuated shots. We later learned that the terrorists went along a different corridor of The Chambers, room by room, and systematically executed everyone: women, elderly, Muslims, Hindus, foreigners. A group huddled next to Anjali was devout Bori Muslims who would have been slaughtered just like everyone else, had the terrorists gone into their room. Everyone was in deep prayer and most, Anjali included, had accepted that their lives were likely over. It was terrorism in its purest form. No one was spared.

The next five hours were filled with the sounds of an intense grenade/gun battle between the Indian commandos and the terrorists. It was fought in darkness; each side was trying to outflank the other.

By the time dawn broke, the commandos had successfully secured our corridor. A young commando led out the people packed into Anjali's room. When one woman asked whether it was safe to leave, the commando replied: "Don't worry, you have nothing to fear. The first bullets have to go through me."

The corridor was laced with broken glass and bullet casings. Every table was turned over or destroyed. The ceilings and walls were littered with hundreds of bullet holes. Blood stains were everywhere, though, fortunately, there were no dead bodies to be seen.

A few minutes after Anjali had vacated, Joe and I peeked out of our stall. We saw multiple commandos and smiled widely. I had lost my right shoe while sprinting to the toilet so I grabbed a sheet from the floor, wrapped it around my foot and proceeded to walk over the debris to the hotel lobby.

Anjali and I embraced for the first time in seven hours in the Taj's ground floor entrance. I didn't know whether she was dead or injured because we hadn't been able to text for the past three hours.

I wanted to take a picture of us on my BlackBerry, but Anjali wanted us to get out of there before doing anything.

She was right--our ordeal wasn't completely over. A large bus pulled up in front of the Taj to collect us and, just about as it was fully loaded, gunfire erupted again. The terrorists were still alive and firing automatic weapons at the bus. Anjali was the last to get on the bus, and she eventually escaped in our friend's car. I ducked under some concrete barriers for cover and wound up the subject of photos that were later splashed across the media. Shortly thereafter, an ambulance came and drove a few of us to safety. An hour later, Anjali and I were again reunited at her parents' home. Our Thanksgiving had just gained a lot more meaning.

Some may say our survival was due to random luck, others might credit divine intervention. But 72 hours removed from these events, I can assure you only one thing: Far fewer people would have survived if it weren't for the extreme selflessness shown by the Taj staff, who organized us, catered to us and then, in the end, literally died for us.

They complemented the extreme bravery and courage of the Indian commandos, who, in a pitch-black setting and unfamiliar, tightly packed terrain, valiantly held the terrorists at bay.

It is also amazing that, out of our entire group, not one person screamed or panicked. There was an eerie but quiet calm that pervaded--one more thing that got us all out alive. Even people in adjacent rooms, who were being executed, kept silent.

It is much easier to destroy than to build, yet somehow humanity has managed to build far more than it has ever destroyed. Likewise, in a period of crisis, it is much easier to find faults and failings rather than to celebrate the good deeds. It is now time to commemorate our heroes.

Michael Pollack is a general partner of Glenhill Capital, a firm he co-founded in 2001.

BITSAA 30 under 30 Awards 2005

2008-11-30T10:03:00.000-05:00

Bitsaa30under30 Awards

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SVC Healthcare Presentation

2008-11-29T20:14:00.001-05:00

Siemens Venture Capital Healthcare 2009

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A quote worth discussing over Thanksgiving

2008-11-29T15:01:00.003-05:00

I cannot believe that the purpose of life is to be happy. I think the purpose of life is to be useful, to be responsible, to be compassionate. It is, above all to matter, to count, to stand for something, to have made some difference that you lived at all.

Leo Rosten 1908-1997

_____________________

I'd never heard of Leo till I came across this quote recently in one of my rare web-surfings (who has so much time?). Turns out he was a Russian teacher, academic and humorist who lived and died in New York City. His other interesting quotes are:

"Truth is stranger than fiction; fiction has to make sense,"

"We see things as we are, not as they are"

Maybe I'll find time to read his works.

Corporate VC Performance: (my rebuttal to a Wharton academic)

2008-11-28T00:27:00.001-05:00

I read this article today titled "Want to Crank Up Corporate Venture Capital Performance? Consider Matching Independent VC Pay Packages" that was published in the Knowledge at Wharton. I'm always in favor of being paid more, but I wanted to comment on this article because it has so many fallacies that it was worth mentioning.

Here one: The article states that "Independent VCs take big risks and, when they bet right, they reap big rewards. Google, eBay and Amazon all started with venture backing. Independent VCs also receive a big piece of the profits that they generate for their investors. Because of this argument, Corporate VCs should take big risks to improve returns."

This is based on an incorrect assumption that corporate VCs exist to provide big returns. Corporate VCs are not in the business of taking big risks to get big returns. These VCs exist to push investments or accelerate the growth of markets or technologies in areas that may be of interest to the Corporation while providing a good return to the firm. So there is a mix of financial and strategic goals and one cannot be sacrificed for the other.

Corporations typically become interested in segments, products or areas that are no more than four or five years out, for these to be meaningful in terms of top or bottom-line impact. Beyond that, it becomes an R&D initiative that can be developed in-house. Big companies don't have the bandwidth or resources to tackle something that is rapidly approaching themselves. By investing in these spaces of interest, they create some sort of a hedge or place-holder for the corporation to be actively involved. While these investments are at arms-length and any deals struck between the corporation and the startup are commercial and stand on their own merit, these relationships can help the corporation learn about the space and get to know the players, and help grow the startup faster.

Due to this role and stage of investing, corporate VCs are unlikely to invest in paradigm-shifting companies that no one has contemplated yet (the risky ones that the author talks about). Corporate VCs need to be follow-on investors (or Series B-type investors) where the financial firms or "risky investors" have already committted capital and got the company going. These VC firms won't stay in business if they were'nt later stage. The money is not to swing for the fences so the partners get rich - its to put highly educated bets in industries, act as validators and catalysts and get to the end result faster - on sectors that are already being setup.

None of the Corporate VCs I have met are looking to invest in startups where the technology and market risk is not taken out. In fact I am increasingly finding it hard to find financial VCs willing to take market and technology risks (but that is another point). Corporate VC firms bring significant assistance in terms of technical and management know-how, access to channels and international market, potential to provide or accelerate development. This means that product has to be more developed - or even shipping, for them to act significant value to the startup in ways that no financial firm can do so.

There is the other odd argument from the author - pay VCs more and they'll take more risks. This is counter-intuitive because VC pay structures encourage asset gathering and payouts through management fees alone that are significantly attractive. If management fees were significantly reduced, VCs would have to become far riskier than they are today. Since a lot of risk-taking VC firms are barely returning the principle back - so the only way they're getting paid is through management fees, the incentive is not aligned with risk taking anymore. VCs don't want to lose these management fees, and are therefore taking less and less risk as a result. If the Professor talked to entrepreneurs who are on the frontlines every day, he'll find out - a lot of the "venture" has gone out of venture capital investing.

Corporate VC syndicates also tend to be larger because they come in when the need for capital is larger. This is simply a function of deal size. Later deals have more VCs plus the returning VCs in the syndicate.

A last point on personnel. Corporate VCs attract people from within the firm. While not everyone from within the business unit would make a good investor, these internal relations are critical. However, as long as these corporate VC firms balance themselves out by attracting outstanding people from the outside (at a reasonable compensation), they'll do as well, if not better than the financial VCs - who are unfortunately struggling with market conditions and a regulatory environment that is simply stacked against the industry.

Click here to read the article from Wharton...definitely needs a rebuttal