About 300 Stanford business students showed up to listen to a guest lecture this week — even though it was the last week of the quarter and they had projects due.
But when the speaker is Skype Technologies co-founder turned venture capitalist Niklas Zennstrom talking about the long, hard process of building a company – well, schoolwork can wait.
Although he steered clear of discussing Skype’s IPO, which is expected later this year, Zennstrom did talk Tuesday about how Skype was a third attempt at building a company: Its free Internet phone service evolved first from a peer-to-peer file-sharing service called Kazaa that ran afoul of the music and film industries, and then from a distributed database company called Joltid that was running out of money and needed a way to make free phone calls.
“One day I said, ‘Hey, wait a minute – we’re pretty good at going through routers and firewalls,’” he said. “Also all the existing services were built by engineers for engineers – so let’s take advantage of our peer-to-peer technology and make it super easy to use.”
He talked about how hard it was to raise money for Skype in the wake of the dot-com crash. Bill Draper bet on Skype without knowing anything about the technology, but wanted another investor to match his funds, and finding that investor took a year.
And he talked about the difficulty of hiring the right people. “Many times I’ve seen that you hire someone who’s an MBA and has gone to the right companies, and it’s almost too perfect sometimes. This person is very bright, but also someone who’s afraid of taking risks. It’s great to try to do other things, to not just take the obvious choices – the most prestigious choices.”
As a venture capitalist – Zennstrom founded Atomico, which has offices in London, Sao Paulo and Hong Kong – he continues to seek out and back disruptive companies. He mentioned Memolane, which gathers your bits of social data and puts them in a timeline; and Fon, which crowdsources Wi-Fi networks – it enables users to get free roaming around the world when they travel, as long as they share access from home. This week, his firm announced it contributed to a $42 million round for Rovio Mobile Ltd., creator of mobile gaming sensation Angry Birds.
Here are his answers to some of the Stanford students’ questions.
On how not to start a company that everyone else would start:
Look for when the environment is changing — the big shift now is mobile Internet. It’s really happening big-time. The way you interact with services on a smart phone compared to the Web is quite different, so there’s a huge opportunity.
But the trick here is to try to figure out the thing that’s unexpected. When we started Skype, if you look at analyst reports, no one forecasted it as a big business. Also when Google started, it was not fashionable to be in search. It’s not trying to do the obvious – that’s the hard part. You have to figure out what it is – you have to stumble on it.
On the advantages – and disadvantages – of starting a company in Silicon Valley:
Most tech companies are U.S.-based, even Silicon Valley-based. So you have to partner, and if you’re not here you have to travel. Silicon Valley is the best place to start a tech company in so many ways.
But the disadvantage is if you hire good talent, you lose them to someone else who will hire them for a hotter start-up than you have, so there’s not the same retention. Also in Silicon Valley, so much is centered here that people lose sight of the rest of the world.
International markets are much bigger than the U.S. In Sweden we have 9 million inhabitants, and if you’re successful in Sweden, you’re not successful – it’s such a small market. Like Volvo and Ikea and others, we realized that we have to go outside our home market. We didn’t think about one market — the world is our market. You have to travel around to find the right partnerships and people, so we spent time in China, Brazil, Japan, the U.S. and Europe. If you’re in Europe, you can turn it to your advantage, but the disadvantage is your software developers are not all in one place.
(Skype is headquartered in Luxembourg and has offices all over the world).
On why Skype succeeded where others failed:
Timing is important. No one was interested in that space. AOL Instant Messenger, ICQ and Microsoft all had voice in their IMs, and it was all crap — push and pull, where you had to hold down a button. We managed to do a good job. We had groundbreaking technology and we knew no one would come out right away that could be compared with us. Everything was viral — we needed critical mass. Someone would download Skype and make a phone call to friends, and it would have better quality than the telephone. Then they’d tell their friend or their mother or sister or brother, get Skype. It took time for big companies to offer competing services. By 2005, we had critical mass.
Crocodile Dundee star Paul Hogan in Sydney. Picture: Alan Pryke Source: The Australian
Hogan repeatedly insulted members of the ATO, calling them “ego-tripping mongrels” and saying the level of public enmity against them was so high “I may as well have picked the Taliban to take on”.
“They’re used to having people roll over,” Hogan told host Tracy Grimshaw.
“I’m not going to roll over, I may lose but I’m taking some of them with me.”
Hogan was referring to his ongoing five-year battle with the ATO and Australian Crime Commision (ACC) over unpaid taxes.
While the ACC dropped its criminal investigation into Hogan and friend John “Strop” Cornell, for alleged fraud and tax evasion in November last year the ATO is continuing its parallel investigation.
At least $150 million hangs in the balance and Hogan told The Australian he was being treated as "guilty until proven innocent" alleging the ATO had cut off his sources of income and imposed limits on his overseas travel.
Hogan said his anger comes after an alleged request to see detail surrounding his case was responded to with pages of blacked out documents.
Displaying the papers to Grimshaw he quipped he wasn't sure if they were an attempt at a joke or if the department was "flipping me the bird".
"Are they bad jokers or are they just treating me with contempt," he said.
He said he now felt he “must go public” because the ATO were “arrogant bullies” and he realised “you can’t talk with these people”.
“If I was Fred Smith and I was copping this treatment I wouldn’t be here talking to you I’d just be coppin’ it,” he said.
“It’s become very personal, I hate bullies – and that’s what these people are.”
Hogan said the five-year battle had destroyed his reputation.
"They've declared me a criminal all round the world," he said.
“It’s over, I used to be Hoges the funny man or Crocodile Dundee.
“But now I’m the tax man. Google it, they’ve turned me into the tax man and that never goes away.”
Hogan even showed some flashes of the humour and flair that made him a star.
He directly addressed the “front line troops” of the ATO and ACC assuring them he knew they were “decent, hardworking people” and it wasn’t their fault if “their boss was an ego-tripping mongrel”.
He followed this up by apologising to clowns everywhere for comparing them to the high-ranking bureaucrats of the ATO.
“Clowns may be creepy-looking but they’re just trying to give you a laugh,” he said.
“I’m sorry clowns for comparing you to these fools.”
It is ATO policy not to comment on individual taxpayer cases.
Ditto, the striking modular building material shown here, was designed explicitly for no-frills, recession-era architecture, but you’d never guess it by looking at the stuff.
Depending on how you arrange the modules, you can create anything from a screen reminiscent of shimmery fish scales to a tunnel that could’ve been carved out of a translucent honeycomb. Ditto is made out of 40% pre-consumer recycled resin, and the pieces snap together and apart in a jiffy, making them an ideal architectural flourish at a time when everyone in the building industry is desperate to save time and money. Well, almost everyone.
“When the recession hit, architects were saying, ‘There are less of us now doing just as much work. We have very limited hours,'" says Azar McMaster of 3form, Ditto's producer. "So the more you, the manufacturer, can do to help us, the better.’”
3form is known primarily for manufacturing large resin panels that architects customize for room dividers, artwork, and other features. The panels aren’t especially simple to install, though, and once they’re in, they’re there to stay; you can’t readily experiment with different permutations. With Ditto, you can. Say you throw together a bunch of modules to form a room divider in your office. Then you go and lay off half your employees and suddenly, the divider's completely superfluous. The modules can be rearranged into some sort of inspirational wall art -- lord knows what remains of your staff will need it.
Ditto is still relatively new, but McMaster says it’s already been specified for a few Burger Kings and BBC’s offices in New York. For more info, visit 3form's website.
"I was forced to enter this virtual world in which a computer does some of my living for me," he said onstage at the TED conference. "I felt--and I still feel--a lot of distance from the human mainstream. I become uncomfortable when I'm separated from my laptop."
Ebert, who lost his voice following surgeries for thyroid cancer, addressed audiences through "Alex," a computer voice available on his MacBook computer, as well as his wife, Chaz, and friends, Dean Ornish and John Hunter, who read his remarks. The writer described how his experience has made him realize how losing one's voice, which is so intimately connected with a person's identity, can give birth to a new self.
He recounted his experiments using different computer voices, from Apple's Alex, which Ebert said was "the best one I've heard," to "Sir Lawrence," which gave Ebert a British accent, to "Roger 2.0," a synthetic voice reconstructed from Ebert's filmed conversations.
Though he is able to "speak" by typing phrases that a read from a computer, Ebert lamented that the process is frustratingly slow and prevents him from participating as actively as he would like in conversations.
On the Internet, however, he can express himself without such limitations: Ebert said email, blogging, Twitter, and Facebook have given him "a way to speak"
"Online everybody speaks at the same speed," he observed. "My ability to think and write have not been affected and on the web my real voice finds expression."
Ebert said he has struggled with his appearance, as well. Noting that people have treated him differently since his medical procedures--avoiding eye contact and speaking more loudly, for example--Ebert also highlighted the web as a place where he could engage in conversations and communication without being judged for the way he looks.
"I look like the Phantom of the Opera," Ebert said, though his wife immediately interjected, "No, you don't."
"It is human nature to look away from illness. We don't enjoy a reminder of our fragile mortality," Ebert said. "That's why writing on the Internet has become a life-saver to me."
Ebert concluded by proposing a metric by which the verisimilitude of a computer voice should be judged: "The ultimate test of a computer voice is whether it can tell a joke like Henny Youngman," he explained.
Ebert gave it a shot.
"A guy goes into a psychiatrist," he said. "The psychiatrist says, 'You're crazy.' The guy says, 'I want a second opinion.' The psychiatrist says, 'Alright, you're ugly.'"
The audience erupted into laughter.
Yesterday morning at TED resembled an old-time faith-healing session--except instead of the Bible, the force was technology.
First Dennis Hong presented the results of his robotics lab RoMeLa's collaboration with the National Federation of the Blind. They equipped a car with an accelerometer, GPS, two cameras, and laser rangefinders, and then created a set of novel nonvisual interfaces--vibrating gloves and seat mats, and a brand-new screen called the AirPix that looks like a tiny air hockey table. It uses puffs of air like pixels to create an "image" of obstacles in the road ahead.
Mark Riccobono, blind since age 5, drove the specially outfitted Ford Escape around the track at Daytona one month ago, successfully dodging obstacles along the way. There are more than a few safety issues to be worked out before the legally blind can take the wheel but the interfaces their team developed have other possible applications as well.
Next, Eythor Bender took the stage. Dressed all in black and speaking in a German accent about exoskeletons, he recalled nothing more than a lost scene from Avatar. The sinister effect only increased when a burly soldier took the stage, wearing a set of mechanical extra legs that helped him easily shoulder a 200-lb pack. His company Berkeley Bionics has licensed the technology, HULC, to Lockheed Martin.
Finally, the big reveal. Amanda Boxtel, paralyzed from the pelvis down in a skiing accident 19 years ago, walked on to the stage wearing the eLegs with a gait only slightly halting. The legs are artificially intelligent and battery-powered, with a small battery pack worn on the back. She said that adaptive technologies had enabled her to ski, cycle, and climb, but "Nothing has been invented that has enabled me to walk--until now."
[Images: TED Conference on Flickr]
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James Yang Alex Stavros, a second-year student at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, had been pitching an eco-tourism luxury resort idea to potential investors for months, but wasn't getting any bites.
He noticed that investors lost interest after the first few minutes of his presentation, and were slow to reply to emails. So Mr. Stavros enlisted the help of one of Stanford's writing coaches for six weeks to help streamline his pitch. After the instruction, his pitch was whittled down to 64 words from 113, and he dropped three unnecessary bullet points.
"During my consulting career, each slide was a quantitative data dump with numbers and graphs, which I thought proved I had done the work," he says. "Now, my presentations are simpler, but more effective."
While M.B.A. students' quantitative skills are prized by employers, their writing and presentation skills have been a perennial complaint. Employers and writing coaches say business-school graduates tend to ramble, use pretentious vocabulary or pen too-casual emails.
Meanwhile, the Graduate Management Admission Council, which administers the Graduate Management Admission Test, says average essay scores on the GMAT fell to 4.4 out of 6 in 2010, from 4.7 out of 6 in 2007.
Writing quality is difficult to measure and it's unclear why it may be slipping. According to a GMAC spokesman, the drop in test scores may be partly attributable to an influx of international applicants taking the exam. In the 2009-2010 testing year, 136,918 international students took the GMAT, up 35% from 2007, GMAC says.
Sharon Washington, executive director of the National Writing Project in Berkeley, Calif., says U.S. high schools and undergraduate programs have de-emphasized writing instruction, and constant digital communication may be eroding writing skills. "The good news about texting is that at least people are writing more," Ms. Washington says.
At employers' urging, many schools are taking steps to try to improve their students' writing. The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania plans to double its communication coursework to 12 classes starting in 2012. Last fall, all first-year students competed in a mandatory writing competition, which asked students to write short pieces in response to prompts. It will become a fixture in the new curriculum.
The University of Rochester's Simon Graduate School of Business hired two writing coaches last fall after employers complained about graduates' writing skills, says dean Mark Zupan.
And Northeastern University's College of Business Administration also ramped up its focus on writing instruction last fall: Many students' papers are now double-graded by the professor and the writing coach.
Former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Arthur Levitt, long an advocate of "plain English" in business and government, says business writing is usually incomprehensible to readers. "It lacks color and nuance, and it's not terribly interesting to read," he says.
M.B.A. students often have to unlearn bad behavior, such as using complicated words over simple ones, says Carter Daniel, business communication programs director at Rutgers Business School. Students might use the word "edifice" instead of "building," for example.
One of the shortest writing assignments at Northeastern is one of the most frequently bungled. For the Marketing and Customer Value class students must write, in fewer than 150 words, a compelling email convincing executives to implement a marketing and pricing strategy.
Students rarely get to the point, says Bruce Clark, writing coordinator for the M.B.A. program. "The first sentence should begin with, 'The single most important issue here is.' You'd be amazed how few students do that," he says.
Writing affects students after they graduate, too. According to managers at packaged food company General Mills Inc., which hires roughly 50 M.B.A. graduates a year, business-school graduates are data-savvy but don't always communicate marketing research effectively.
New M.B.A. hires "tend to talk about their analytical methods to show they are good at their jobs," says Angela Rassi, a marketing manager on General Mills' recruiting team. "What we really want to talk about are the implications of the research."
M.B.A. students are often challenged when they have to adapt their writing for multiple audiences, says Keisha Smith, global head of recruiting for investment bank Morgan Stanley. Research associates are encouraged to develop their own voice when writing opinionated recommendations on stocks, but they sometimes have trouble presenting information in emails to clients. Some tend to write long emails when only a short list is needed, she says. At Morgan Stanley, managers look over new hires' emails before they're sent out to clients, she says.
Writing is also closely monitored at consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton Inc., where new hires fresh out of business school aren't permitted to work on a written proposal alone until they have perfected the craft, says Chris Carlson, senior associate for university recruiting. And while new M.B.A. hires exchange upwards of 200 emails a day, he still spots some that read like text messages. "They're not in complete sentences," he says.
At Rochester, the writing classes are not given grades. Students are given either a passing or failing mark. "I have mixed feelings about the fact that it's pass or fail," says Rochester student Jonathan Han. "On one hand, it eases the stress of having to do perfectly on every assignment, but it reduces the incentive to take it as seriously."
Not all students view writing coaching as important. When Cornell University's Johnson Graduate School of Management offered a choice of electives to its executive M.B.A. students, it offered a writing class, as well as an oral communication class. While students jumped at the speech class, not enough students signed up for the writing class for the school to offer it, says Douglas Stayman, associate dean for M.B.A. programs.
Write to Diana Middleton at diana.middleton@wsj.com
Kim Kardashian went on Ryan Seacrest's radio show today to premiere her new song, “Jam (Turn It Up).” If the title didn't already give it away, then allow us: It's bad. But simply referring to the dance track as "bad" would be doing a disservice to other bad things, like James Franco at the Oscars or Charlie Sheen. At least they strive to be bad. If anything, Kardashian's song is just lazy, from the vocals, to the production, all the way through to the lyrics. Especially the lyrics. Even if the song sounded good (it doesn't), or was catchy (it's not), it would have been difficult to appreciate those things with lyrics this dumb. After the jump, the ten laziest lines. digg 1. “Turn me up, turn me up, turn me turn me turn me up/Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah.”
2. “I’m going out tonight, it’s going down/Headed straight to the front of the line, on the fly/On the floor I can’t stand still/And I’m goin’ to work like I’m paying my bills.”
3. “My whole click’s on the floor/We gon’ party, then party some more.”
4. “Rosé up in the air/Feeling good, feeling great, just got paid.”
5. “Turn it up, so I can rock the night away.”
6. “I’m burn it out tonight, it’s goin down/By live via satellite.”
7. “And all I see is angels in my eyes/Buzz got me way up in the sky.”
8. “DJ here I am/Feeling good, feeling great, just got paid.”
9. “Girls in the building/Fellas in the club/Boys spending money/Girls looking good.”
10. “Celebrate like it’s my birthday/5 more shots of tequila/I’m thirsty.”
So basically, the whole song. Afterwards, Ryan Seacrest said, “I want to be in a convertible right now with that cranked up!” Strange how he left out the whole “driving off a cliff” part.
PARIS — The French fashion house Christian Dior said Tuesday that it had started procedures to dismiss its chief designer, John Galliano, following accusations that Mr. Galliano made anti-Semitic outbursts at a Paris bar.
In a brief statement, Sidney Toledano, Dior Couture’s chief executive, said he condemned “in the strongest terms” the words and actions of Mr. Galliano, “which are in total contradiction with the essential values that have always been defended by the Christian Dior house.”
Dior said it had “immediately suspended relations” with Mr. Galliano and that it had “initiated dismissal procedures.” It cited the “particularly odious comments” contained in a video published Monday.
The video, posted on the Web site of the British tabloid The Sun, appears to show Mr. Galliano taunting other patrons at the bar, La Perle, declaring in a slurred voice that “I love Hitler” and that “people like you would be dead,” and “your mothers, your forefathers” would all be “gassed.” It was unclear when the video was recorded.
Late Monday, the actress Natalie Portman, who recently signed an endorsement deal with Dior for its Miss Dior Chérie perfume, strongly condemned Mr. Galliano. In a statement, she said: “I am deeply shocked and disgusted by the video of John Galliano’s comments that surfaced today. In light of this video, and as an individual who is proud to be Jewish, I will not be associated with Mr. Galliano in any way.”
Mr. Galliano was initially questioned by the police last Thursday after a separate incident at the bar, in the Marais district of Paris. He was accused by two other clients of making an anti-Semitic slur.
Mr. Galliano was suspended Friday by Dior. The fashion house, which is owned by LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, cited its “unequivocal zero-tolerance policy regarding anti-Semitism and racism,” after the initial incident was reported.
A police spokeswoman declined to comment Tuesday, except to say that witnesses, including Mr. Galliano, had been questioned again Monday and then released. She referred all questions to the Paris prosecutor, who did not immediately return calls seeking comment.
According to French media reports, the police questioned the owner of La Perle, which Mr. Galliano frequents, the bar’s security staff and other clients.
Mr. Galliano’s lawyer, Stéphane Zerbib, was not available for comment Tuesday. He has previously contested the accusations of anti-Semitism against his client.
The Dior statement did not mention the effect that the resignation would have on its upcoming fashion show. The fashion house is scheduled to present its fall-winter 2011-2012 ready-to-wear show on Friday as part of Paris fashion week.
Called fashion’s “bad boy” for his flamboyant and provocative style, Mr. Galliano helped to energize Dior after he joined it in 1996 as creative director, increasing sales and making it a jewel of the LVMH luxury empire run by the French billionaire Bernard Arnault.
French law makes it a crime to incite racial hatred; the statute has been used in the past to punish anti-Semitic remarks.
The French advocacy group SOS Racisme said Monday that it would support legal proceedings if the accusations were confirmed. “Mr. Galliano has added to the ignominy of his words with the cowardice of a denial,” it said.
Mr. Galliano’s lawyer, Stéphane Zerbib, declined to comment Monday about the video. But he raised questions about a second complaint that surfaced Saturday, when another woman went to the police and accused Mr. Galliano of hurling anti-Semitic insults at her in October at the same restaurant.
“When you are a victim of an act of anti-Semitism, you don’t wait four months” to come forward, Mr. Zerbib told Reuters.
The clash last week involved Mr. Galliano and two other customers, Geraldine Bloch, 35, and Philippe Virgitti, 41. The video posted Monday appeared to involve a third clash. It is not clear from the video what prompted Mr. Galliano to erupt in English, although a female voice is heard countering the insults by saying, “Do you have a problem?”
Mr. Zerbib has denied that Mr. Galliano made any anti-Semitic comments in the incident last week, submitting four testimonials of support from employees and witnesses at the bar as part of defamation complaints filed against Ms. Bloch and Mr. Virgitti.
The neighborhood in which the restaurant lies is a historical Jewish center and home to one of the city’s largest gay communities. La Perle has evolved over the years from a quiet neighborhood cafe to a late-night hot spot, overflowing with stylish patrons.
The last few decades have seen many brands fade away, only to have a number of them make a comeback in recent years.
Many people used to believe that brands follow a predictable life cycle, growing, maturing, declining, and dying, but this is no longer the case. Some brands fade away as a result of shifting consumer needs, technological redundancy, competition, the economy, or just simply poor judgment from executive management. But in the last few years, a number of brands that were thought to be dead have had a resurgence and are now being given a new life in a new opportunity space.
There have never been so many brands up for sale.
The idea of rolling viable brands into larger portfolios has been commonplace for decades. Just look at the businesses of fast moving consumer goods such as Procter & Gamble, Kraft, Unilever and others to appreciate the continued economic and global reach of such strategies. These global consumer product brands have become masters of brand management, gobbling up businesses and expanding their multi-billion-dollar brand empires. This strategy is based on careful valuation of the viability of a brand now and in the future, on a global scale and across cultures.
At the other end of the scale, private equity firms and liquidation specialists are also seeking products that have a strategic fit with their growing brand portfolios, looking to pick up once-relevant brands. This can be a good strategy because it allows a smaller company to launch a product with existing brand equity, which can be polished and strengthened following acquisition.
But what is driving this? Perhaps it's simply because there have never been so many brands up for sale. The recent recession resulted in millions of Americans struggling financially, negatively affecting the retail landscape and consumer product manufacturers alike. The resulting fire sales created an opportunity for liquidators who have bundled together a myriad of once well-known brands into portfolios that include a diverse range of products, such as household products, consumer electronics, and technology.
How much do consumers really care or know about brand authenticity?
Companies such as Hilco Consumer Capital are betting that brands such as Polaroid, the Sharper Image, and Halston will once again resonate with consumers. Similarly Imation, a 3M spin-off, is betting on the re-launch of '80s consumer media brands Memorex and TDK.
Creating brand equity from scratch is an extremely expensive undertaking, so the opportunity to re-frame a brand that still has emotional relevance with consumers seems, on the face of it, to be a very good bet. In fact, in a strange irony, the same low-cost manufacturing economies that contributed to the demise of many well-known brands is now the key source for these same brands' revival. These countries with low-cost manufacturing can provide access to low-cost technologies, products, and manufacturing expertise, which is then used to physically embody these “new old” brands, quickly and cost-effectively, something that was simply not possible a decade ago.
Ultimately, I like to think that authenticity will play the key role in determining long-term viability. However, with the seemingly endless re-introduction of old brands, it makes me wonder how much consumers really care or know about brand authenticity. Modern consumers are very fickle and more informed than ever, so it would seem that only the brands that feel authentic and that are able to make a real connection with consumers will succeed, yet consumers seem to be eating up the re-introduction of old brands, with little concern about choosing genuine authenticity over a manufactured authenticity. We will have to wait to see how these new old brands are doing in a few years before we can judge how consumers have responded to these old favorites.
