It’s extremely hard for a small research team to compete against huge labs. It’s a question of network effects; the huge labs have the critical mass of funding, collaborators, momentum, and publication pull to attract the best talent, whether the brightest PhD students or the best post-docs. The rest are left with the “scraps”. Seems cold to say so, but…
Grassblade model of startup acquisition = an incumbent is waiting until an upstart rival exceeds a KPI threshold x (e.g., 1 million users). Observations: ‘x’ needs to be defined so that it is big enough to prove the momentum, yet small enough to give a decent valuation — let the startup grow long enough, it can a serious competitor the…
Remora’s curse takes place when startup attaches itself to a large platform in the attempt to solve the chicken-and-egg problem of getting users. The large platform then exercises its greater power to void the investments made by the startup into the platform, essentially causing more or less deadly delays and needs for re-design. The idea originates from Don Dodge who…
We had an interesting week with the Qatar Science and Technology Park (QSTP) that had invited several high-profile entrepreneurs from the US to evaluate the technologies of Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI). Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend all the sessions, but from what I saw I picked up a few pointers for due diligence work done by investors when…
Introduction The purpose of the strategy algorithm is to present a simple, parsimonius, and proven method for successful creation of a corporate strategy. In corporations, the problems usually do not relate to lack of resources or options, but to complexity of having in fact too many choices. This can lead to illusion of superiority which is not a short-term problem…
Introduction This post is about startup thinking. In my dissertation about startup dilemmas [1], I argued that startups can exhibit what I call as ‘reference point bias’. My evidence was emerging from the failure narratives of startup founders, where they reported having experienced this condition. The reference point bias is a false analogy where the founder compares their startup with…
Introduction During the research period for my dissertation based on startup failures, I realized there are multiple layers of failure factors associated with any given company (or, in reverse, success factors). These are: generic business problems (e.g., cash-flow) individual-level problems (e.g., personal chemistry) company type problems (e.g., lack of funding for startups) business model problems (e.g., chicken-and-egg for platforms) Only…
Introduction A few years back I was considering of buying a website. In the end, I didn’t end up making the offer, largely because I couldn’t figure out how to calculate the offer price in a plausible way. Since then I’ve had a bit more experience in estimating figures in other contexts, as well as participating in some M&A discussions…
Introduction Too often, marketing is thought of being advertising and nothing more. However, already Levitt (1960) and Kotler (1970) established that marketing is a strategic priority. Many organizations, perhaps due to lack of marketers in their executive boards, have since forgotten this imperative. Another reason for decreased importance of marketing is due to marketing scholars pushing the idea that “everything…
