Posts tagged SMBs
The new risk capital reality: What now?
Feb 18th
By Francis Moran and Leo Valiquette
In our previous post, we explored the massive changes that have occurred in North America and Europe that have led to a contraction of traditional venture capital investment.
These long-term trends have left early-stage companies in a tight spot. They must become increasingly creative to shorten time to market, become more capital efficient and generally figure out how to do more with less. The cash-burn of years past is no longer an option, if it ever was.
Rise of the super angels
All is not bleak, however. While traditional VCs may have become easily spooked by the prospect of sinking cash into an unproven startup, many angel organizations have stepped up to fill the void. Ronald Weissman, chair of the Software Special Industry Group at one of Silicon Valley’s oldest angel organization, Band of Angels, said many angel organizations have come to act like early-stage VCs. Read the rest of this entry »
The new risk capital reality: What’s happened to VC?
Feb 11th
By Francis Moran and Leo Valiquette
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Sean Parker, the entrepreneur behind Napster and Facebook and himself a venture capital investor, provided a rather gloomy assessment of the VC industry and the future of U.S. innovation in general.
“The risk-reward doesn’t work out in favor of putting money into venture capital anymore,” he said.
And yes, again, to confirm, Parker is himself a VC investor. He went on to say that the contraction of the U.S. venture capital (VC) market means that “innovation could gradually grind to a halt or at least become less effective,” a trend that could serve to erode the ambition and vision of entrepreneurs.
“Ten years ago, venture capitalists would ask the question: Do you want to build a company and flip it or do you want to build a company and IPO it? It’s a trick question. The correct answer was always, ‘I want to build an incredibly valuable stand-alone business and maybe we get bought, maybe we go public but we’re going to build an incredibly valuable company,’” Parker said. “Now it’s actually not clear that that’s the right answer. There’s a lot of venture firms that are clearly interested in building something and selling it either to Facebook, Google, Microsoft.” Read the rest of this entry »
Social game revenues still 30 times less than console games
Jan 25th
Nestor Arellano
Last week, Vancouver-based game studio Propaganda Games laid-off 70 workers after the firm was shut down by parent Disney Interactive Studios. Prior to this, Propaganda already had to let go of 100 people last October when Disney decided to abandon development of a new console game based on its Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Increasingly, big studios have began focusing attention on social games which in the last two years have emerged as yet another segment of online gaming that threatens the reign of packaged and console based entertainment.
The two main factors that make social games attractive to investors, publishers and game developers is their relatively low cost of development and gigantic potential user base. Read the rest of this entry »
A case for ditching cell phone contracts
Dec 7th
The most detested words in the cell phone industry are “cell phone contract”. The word contract conjures up feelings of confinement, frustration and anger to name a few. 
So what do your choices look like if you don’t want to sign your business up on a new contract, should that contract be detested or does it make good financial sense to sign one?
First of all, we need to realize that today’s cell phones or smart phones are more powerful than computers of a few decades ago.
As a result, they aren’t cheap. I once heard my barber refer to buying a big screen TV or a smart phone and somehow the example just put things in perspective. Spending $600 or more to purchase a smart phone out right is a lot of money and if you are purchasing a fleet of devices for your company, certainly a sizable financial investment. Read the rest of this entry »
How professional service firms can become more valuable
Sep 7th
What is your firm’s value proposition? To effectively answer this question, begin by identifying where your firm falls on your industry’s value chain. To understand the changing dynamics of the value chain concept, observe what’s happened to the music business.
Tim Williams
Consumers are still spending roughly the same amount of money on music, but the money isn’t going to the record companies and music stores; it’s going to iTunes. The money in the music business value chain is still there—it just moved.
The same is happening in other rapidly evolving industries. Companies are spending, but they’re spending in new and different areas of the value chain.
Sneak peek: Burstn pics, mobile style
Aug 25th
Picture this: you’ve just snapped some great pictures on your smartphone and want to share them instantly with friends, colleagues, customers, or with your social networks on Twitter and/or Facebook. What’s the fastest and easiest way to do this? Try Burstn them.
Krista Napier
Toronto-based Burstn has launched an app that allows iPhone users (and hopefully soon, at least for my sake, BlackBerry and Android users), the ability to share photos in real time without any hassles around uploading or posting them to a website.
I had a chance to chat with Josh Davey and Dave Senior from Burstn recently. Here’s a sneak peak into our chat: Read the rest of this entry »
A review of Rogers’ new Chatr discount wireless plan
Aug 23rd
The wireless market in Canada is heating up with some competitive cell phone plans.
Top mobile service provider Rogers recently decided to fight wireless newcomers in their own game by introducing its own Chatr discount brand aimed at the same customers as Mobilicity, Wind and Public Mobile. And the wireless incumbent launched despite a threat from Mobilicity’s Chairman about taking Rogers to court if they proceeded with the launch – I guess we will have to see what happens. Meanwhile, here’s my take on Rogers’ new discount brand. Read the rest of this entry »
5 important things to know about Canadian cell phone plans
Aug 5th
The Canadian cell phone industry is confusing and difficult to understand. When comparing plans you have to deal with calling circle plans, specified evenings and weekend minutes, “anytime” minutes – it’s all so confusing. Well here are 5 items that you may not be aware of that you should know while you compare cell phone plans:
1. Long distance isn’t quite long distance
I always thought that if you were on a 100 min long distance plan that these minutes were in addition to my other minutes as I am paying extra for them. But what long distance plans do is to convert your regular minutes to long distance minutes. In other words, 100 of your 200 min plan is allocated for long distance usage as opposed to 200 regular mins plus 100 additional for long distance. Read the rest of this entry »
How to get the best wireless phone plan for your business
Aug 3rd
The battle for wireless customers in Canada has been sizzling hot this summer with new entrants such Wind Mobile enticing cell phone users with anything from hot deals to hotdogs. Meanwhile, incumbent Rogers Communication has amped the discussion decibels with it own bargain basement brand Chatr, causing startup Mobilitcity to threaten legal action.
If consumers are confused over which mobile service provider to go with you can bet not a few small and medium sized businesses eager to cut expenses are in the same quandary.
Nestor Arellano
There are numerous free to low cost services that offer to help consumers and businesses compare wireless plans and prices.
One firm I checked out, MyCELLmyTERMS.com recently launched an SMB-specific service that takes a novel approach to the problem of getting the best cell phone plan for its clients.
Rather than simply help clients find an existing plan that will suit their needs, MyCELL helps cell phone users negotiate the best price, packages, phones and perks with the independent dealers for the mobile service companies. Read the rest of this entry »
Should your business be on eBay?
Jul 28th
Lately a lot’s being said about businesses needing to stake their claim on the social media arena.
But does your business need to have presence on an online auction site such as eBay as well?
Nestor Arellano
If you’re selling something or looking to buy something, the answer could be yes. eBay is no longer just a place where kids hock their tired Nikes of adventurous souls like Canadian Kyle MacDonald try to trade up a single red paperclip for a house.
Over the years, start-ups and big businesses alike have found buying and selling on eBay both profitable and affordable.
Imagine the potential market. Canadians now buy more than $1 billion worth of goods on eBay every year and sell more than one million items each month on the site, according to the company. Read the rest of this entry »
