'technology' Category
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The 3 broken arrows of growth capital in France
June 11, 2013The other day during a stimulating conversation with five of French tech’s movers and shakers, the subject came up about the challenges facing high-potential tech firms in need of growth capital. Setting aside the Yahoo/DailyMotion debacle for a moment (which I fear will carry disastrous long-term consequences for cross-border m&a, one of the three ‘arrows’), […]
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Governments’ bite of the Apple
May 28, 2013There has been a lot of gnashing of teeth recently about Apple’s alleged dodging of paying taxes on tens of billions of profits from 2009~2012. Incidentally, that’s merely what the U.S. government deems it forfeited. Apple of course pays a paltry tax bill in France, despite the fact the France remains the world’s third best […]
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The sun is rising again
May 21, 2013As I have crowed many times in this space before, Japan is demonstrating renewed energy and enthusiasm in the tech sector. Mobile gaming giants like Gree and DeNA, explosive social networks like Line, and e-commerce leaders like Rakuten, are inspiring success stories for France which recently began venturing abroad. Now Japan’s overall economy seems to […]
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More on the Zombie VC theme
May 14, 2013Exactly ten days ago the yearly ritual of ‘Woodstock for Capitalists’ took place. Also known as the annual shareholders meeting of Berkshire Hathaway, this may well represent the only public company’s shareholders meeting whose promise of attendance can be the sole reason for investors to purchase a share of its stock. Of course, another reason […]
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Quaero: Sorry No Results Found
April 2, 2013“Seek and ye shall find,” thundered Ed Harris from behind bars in a pitiful 1995 film called Just Cause that was a knock-off of Silence of the Lambs and In the Heat of the Night. Harris’ character, a wanna-be Hannibal Lecter, causing the whole movie theater to burst out laughing in ridicule at the over-the-top […]
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Silicon Valley’s secret sauce
March 19, 2013Over the past few weeks in this space, inspired by Fleur Pellerin’s current government initiative to replicate Silicon Valley, I’ve recapped some of the history of the region and reconsidered the wisdom of attempts to reproduce the Silicon Valley model elsewhere. I submit that trying to imitate Silicon Valley is futile. However, France’s government and […]
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Copying Silicon Valley
March 5, 2013A couple weeks ago I provided a very succinct recap of the Silicon Valley narrative. For a more in-depth review, A History of Silicon Valley by Piero Scaruffi and Arun Rao might well be the most comprehensive, and Robert Cringely’s Accidental Empires focuses on the pc industry empire-building during the pre-web era. Understanding the Silicon […]
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Why I’m enthusiastic about HTML5
February 26, 2013I find that my best venture investing tends to happen when I structure my thinking around investment themes or theses. One current thesis I hold is that HTML5 will usher in a democratizing force comparable to the advent of web itself. It almost sounds like I’m overstating the obvious when I think about it like […]
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The Valley of Heart’s Delight
February 19, 2013Spot quiz: What region is formerly known as the Valley of Heart’s Delight ? Here’s a hint: it’s not Blackstone Valley in Massachusetts, nor is it Berlin, East London, and especially not Saclay, France. A swathe of apple orchards and orange groves spanning Santa Clara County in Northern California is what gave Silicon Valley this […]
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The HTML5 guru speaks: now carrier grade
February 1, 2013CTO of Momac Alex Rutgers crafted a whitepaper years before HTML5 took the mobile world by storm on the technology’s compelling potential. It was thus with great enthusiasm that I learned that Alex found time to produce a sequel to his original paper laying out his vision for HTML5’s future evolution. One interesting conclusion is […]
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Vacances à volonté
January 22, 2013“Impossible, that would never work in France; don’t be so idealistic,” chided my friend with a dismissive wave of the hand. With a storied career rising through the ranks of a CAC40 firm and more recently a business owner, my friend knew a lot about managing people in a French workplace. We were discussing a […]
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Job trends: iOS vs Android vs Flash vs HTML5
January 5, 2013Another signal of the maturing nature of HTML5 (courtesy of Indeed.com): HTML5, flash, ios, android Job Trends Html5 jobs – Flash jobs – Ios jobs – Android jobs