Category Archives: Must watch or read

HBO’s Silicon Valley – episode 11: should you sell or should you die – or neither?

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I have to admit episode 10 was full of s…- I have never seen a VC stealing ideas neither a major corporation suing a start-up. Whatever SV is fun. So when you have the choice between sell or die, should you choose?
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or maybe do neither.
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– “You should pursue your dream, not for profit, not for valuation or material wealth but for the good of humanity”.
– “Easy to say when you are a billionaire”
– “Billionaires are people too.”
Here SV uses the strange real episode from Tom Perkins.
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“Do not do what you should do. Do what you want!”
(But our hero is not very gifted with Japanese food, or is he stressed?).
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Let us listen (in fact read here!) Monica: “Every successful company can look back at a defining moment early on where they would have died, had it not been for the courage and the tenacity and maybe the insanity of one visionary person who put it all on the line, even though it seemed like a huge mistake at the time, a moment where all the metrics and the numbers did not mean anything; it was all about the emotion, it was about belief, rational or irrational and I think, I hope, that I was just like that.”
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War is preparing though!
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HBO’s Silicon Valley – episode 10: don’t spend the money when you do not have it (yet)

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There is something well-known and little known at the same time in the start-up world: a deal is never guaranteed until the money is on your bank account. Our heroes will learn it the hard way. Now they are less arrogrant with the VCs…

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but then what about being stolen ideas during due diligence…

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and what about the cost of IP litigation. I will let you discover it…

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When Samwer was not Samwer yet but was writing a book – way before Rocket Internet and its clones

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I did not know much of the background of the Samwer brothers beyond the names associated with them: Alando, Jamba, the European Founders Fund, Zalando and Rocket Internet. So I was surprised to be mentioned (thanks Kevin!) a book by Oliver, one of three brothers, America’s Most Successful Startups.

America's Most Successful Startups: a thesis by Oliver Samwer and Max Finger (1998)

Even if now more than 15 years old, it is a good book at least from the first 30 pages I have read so far. It reminds me the advice from Steve Blank. Just one example about founders: “The first thing you have to make sure when you put tagether a team of founders is that all founders share the same vision and the same values. The group can be heterogeneous, but the founders cannot have a different vision or a different set of values, because they will probably be partners for many, many years. You absolutely need to make sure that the goals of the founders are all aligned. Each of the founder has to be very sensitive what each of the other founders’ objectives are. You have to recognize these and try to incorporate them, because otherwise you will have people from day one heading in fundamentally different directions. Only if you get a team of really great people together, who share the same vision, and work together well as a team, you will create a very strong foundation for the company. Because everything in the company originates from the founding team and will grow out of that”. [Page 30]

Additionnally, concerning their roles: “Fourthly, depending on the business model, a high-tech company should typically have at least three key people: It should have a market visionary, someone who understands the market, the customer and the problem the customer has. It also has to have a product or technology visionary, who understands the product and technology and how it might be applied, but does not necessarily understand all the problems that the market has. And it needs a business execution person, because the idea itself if worth zero. It is the execution of the idea.” [Page 31]

Another interesting comment about Equity sharing: “Last but not least, the founders should hold equal stakes in the company so that they are in every respect equal partners. No matter who the idea bad and who contributed what in the founding process, the founders should split the company equally among them. Otherwise some founders will feellike second-rate founders, which produces a flaw from the very beginning and which might have a strong negative effect on the way.” [Page 31]

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Marc, Oliver and Alexander Samwer

Finally, I also liked their point of view on what you should do when at school: “Also, you need to try actively to get an educational background and experience that supports the venture. This really has to be an active approach. You have to put yourself in a position where you get involved in startups, you have to go to the places where entrepreneurs are, you have to go to places where you can get inspired, you have to meet people of similar spirits and build a network. In school you might participate in the business plan competition, take the classes where you will write a business plan, and take the entrepreneurial track at business school. That is where the people who want to do it are. […] Through such activities you will be meeting partners and ideas incidentally.”

HBO’s Silicon Valley – episode 9: The Term Sheet

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Time to see our old friends

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and the team fighting to be “Chiefs”

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Of course Silicon Valley is what it is… just have a look

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or read this: “I don’t want to live in a world where someone else makes the world a better place better than we do.“

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But reality is taking money can be dangerous: “You take money from the wrong dudes, you’ll get smoked as bad as I did.” But also never think you have the money until you have it in your bank account…

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America’s movie industry have always adapted the story when an actor disappears… then the fun begins. Negotiating with VCs can be hard. “There is a linear correlation between how intolerable I was and a higher valuation…”

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But then listen to Monica’s advice… A high valuation can be a very bad deal. Believe her…

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And the final minute is great…

A brilliant conversation about science between Gérard Berry and Etienne Klein

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Indeed a brilliant and “crazy” conversation between Etienne Klein, the physicist, and Gerard Berry, Gold Medal of the CNRS for his work in computer science on France Culture’s Conversation Scientifique. They speak about so many beautiful “provocative” things.

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On the serious side Berry talks about the difficulty of predicting and the danger of impossible promises, also about the courage in science. Physics talks about energy, computer science about information and so do the new generations, Berry claims. Berry also speaks of the machine and the human. The digital machine, the computer goes very fast, but not with much more intelligence than a steam engine. Except the computer is everywhere. But we, humans, are intuitive, there is no insight in a computer. We are very complementary. Again, I do not agree with transhumanists who believe that the machine will overtake us – in the short term at least. Berry is very annoyed by the notion of intelligence in computers. The performance is not intelligence, but there are many interesting things in AI such as learning, find people in a photo database fascinates Berry.

On the politics of science, Berry expresses great caution and wisdom. “Claiming that a research topic will happen right away is the best way to kill it.” He was answering a question about the quantum computer. “This was the case of artificial intelligence”. There are people willing to promise the moon and more people willing to believe them. They promise sensational things in interesting topics. One must look into these areas, but one should make no promise. Among the possible benefits, but unpredictable, there will be some interesting things.

He also talks about neuroscience. He is fascinated by the way children learn, which is difficult to understand; why the brain freezes after a while. His fascination is that the brain processes information, but we do not understand creativity, the brain is a huge machine which we do not understand. But again, it will be difficult, no doubt very difficult to understand how the brain works. Berry believes “no more than that” in our ability to build artificial neurons to simulate the brain mechanisms. We also discover that pleasure and boredom, motivation are essential to learning. Finally Berry started a short analysis on the current state of research. “Do not do anything new when you want to be successful. Or rather you have to fight.” (just as in any art).

I let you discover the last quarter of an hour which talks about the college of Pataphysique… but you need to understand French…

My top 10 (must-read) (business) books

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After reading a couple of top 10 and must-read list of books, here is an exercise I had never done. I went through my past readings and quickly built my own top 10 / must-read – business books. If you want an exhaustive list you could have a look at all the Must Watch or Read articles on this blog. here is my ranking:

#1: The Four Steps to the Epiphany by Steve Blank,
(subtitled Successful Strategies for Products that Win)

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Although it is rather painful to read because of the density of advice and check-list, it is the must read book for any entrepreneur who must understand the complex relations between building a product and service and selling to customers. Here is my post, dated November 2013.

#2: The Hard Thing about Hard Things by Ben Horowitz.
(Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers)

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A honest and toughest account about what entrepreneurship means. As the great Bill DAvidow was saying, “Being an entrepreneur is not for the faint of heart”. More about my account dated May 2014.

#3: Regional Advantage by AnnaLee Saxenian.
(Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley and Route 128)

Not a book about entrepreneurship but about high-tech clusters. Saxenian explained (already) in 1994 why Silicon Valley had won. It is the book to read to understand what start-ups really are and why they are important. A short indirect account dated October 2011.

#4: The Black Swan by Nassem Nicholas Taleb.
(The Impact of the Highly Improbable)

It is not directly related to innovation and entrepreneurship, but successful start-ups are highly improbable events with huge impact. A fascinating book I first talked about in July 2012 but I mention the concept and author so many times you could also check the tags Black Swan and Taleb.

#5: The Man Behind the Microchip by Leslie Berlin.
(Robert Noyce and the Invention of Silicon Valley)

The Man Behind the Microchip

The best (in fact nearly the only!) biography of an entrepreneur I read so far. It’s great, moving and full of information. You can read my short account dated February 2008 but you could also read more in The Tinkerings of Robert Noyce dated August 2012.

#6: Founders at Work by Jessica Livingston
(Stories of Startups’ Early Days)

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Great interviews of start-up founders with an account dated June 2008. I had read before and I read since many other books built with such interviews. No doubt this is the best one.

#7: I’M Feeling Lucky by Douglas Edwards
(Falling On My Feet in Silicon Valley)

I could not have a top 10 list without a book about Google! This is my favorite one (but close to #8). When a marketing expert is hired by two crazy founders and learns he does not kwow so much about marketing and many other things. And in addition, it is the funniest business book I have ever read. My account is dated December 2012.

#8: How Google Works by Eric Schmidt & Jonathan Rosenberg, with Alan Eagle.
(The rules for success in the Internet Century)

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I initially thought a book written by the chairman and former CEO of Google would not be very enlightening. I was totally wrong. great lessons. great advice. A recent account dated November 2014.

#9: The Art of Start by Guy Kawasaki.
(The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything)

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The best book about what you need to say with a powerpoint pitch or write in a business plan. A simple, direct to the point about launching any venture. One of my oldest (and shortest) posts, dated March 2008

#10: Against Intellectual Monopoly by Michele Boldrin and David K. Levine.

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An important analysis of the crisis of intellectual property: “It is common to argue that intellectual property in the form of copyright and patent is necessary for the innovation and creation of ideas and inventions such as machines, drugs, computer software, books, music, literature and movies. In fact intellectual property is a government grant of a costly and dangerous private monopoly over ideas. We show through theory and example that intellectual monopoly is not necessary for innovation and as a practical matter is damaging to growth, prosperity and liberty.” I wrote many posts about it, the latest being dated May 2013.

#11: Something Ventured

It is so difficult to build such lists, I cheat twice! First with the greatest ever video document about Silicon Valley. You must watch and listen to Sandy Lerner, the co-founder of Cisco. And it is freely available on youtube, so no excuse not to watch this fascinating movie. My account is dated February 2012.

#12: The Unfinished Debate about the Individual and the State between Peter Thiel and Mariano Mazzucato

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My second extension to the top 10 is made of two books! Peter Thiel is the author of Zero to One (notes on start-ups or how to to build the future). Mariana Mazzucato wrote The Entrepreneurial State (debunking public vs. private sector myths). But again, I produced so many posts on the topics they address you can also check the tags Mazzucato and Thiel. After the terrible events “Je Suis Charlie” which happened in Paris in early January 2015, these two books remind us about the complexity of analyzing how individuals and groups (societies, institutions, states) interact (with some tension) to create and innovate.

The Dark Net by Jamie Bartlett

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I did not think when I bought this intriguing book about the hidden faces of the Internet that I would relate it to my three previous posts. The world is dangerous, the physical world is dangerous as we all know and as it was confirmed in Paris last week (A tribute on Jan. 8, We are all sad on Jan. 7). It is also known that the online world may be dangerous as illustrated by Jamie Bartlett in The Dark Net. I am not sure that the authors of How The Web Was Born (Dec. 2) had envisioned such possibilities.

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Bartlett is not really pessimistic about the web. In his conclusion, he states: Technology is often described as “neutral”. But it could be more accurately described as power and freedom. […] The dark net is a world of power and freedom: of expression, of creativity, of information, of ideas. Power and freedom endow our creative and our destructive faculties. The dark net magnifies both, making it easier to explore every desire, to act on every dark impulse, to indulge every neurosis.[…] Each individual responds differently to the power and freedom that technology creates. It might make it easier to do bad things but it’s still a choice.

In his book Bartlett talks about the trolls (you may also want to read the recent MIT Tech Review article – The Troll Hunters), the lone wolves (such as Berwick), about Tor Hidden Services, about Bitcoin, about illegal sites selling drugs such as Silk Road, about online pornography and paedophilia, about self-harm and finally about transhumanists against anarcho-primitivists. Written this way, I am not sure I am doing a good marketing for the book, but the truth is that with the exception of terrorism, the author addresses many dark sides of the internet. It is a fair and good description of what the Internet hides (“close to its surface” [Page 238]).

These are important topics about freedom, about the evolution of our world, and I can only quote a famous French thinker: on France Culture, earlier this week, coming back about the Paris terrorist attacks, Regis Debray explained that the Western world is the primacy of the individual over the group. The Eastern world it is the reverse.” And I am not sure I understood if there was a value judgment or not, he added: “And the West today represents modernity.” I strongly believe in these values and I understand the risks linked to them, but I do not think we have much choice. You may want to read The Dark Net if these topics are of interest for you…