If I suggested a way for your clean energy startup to set-up shop near a bunch of companies involved in things like renewable technology and the smartgrid, what would you say? If I sweetened the deal and told you the list of companies included a few of the Fortune 500 and a slew of established mid-market companies, you’d probably say, “sign me up!”   So goes part of the argument for industry clusters, a term [...]

That’s not a catchy headline. That’s what Ethernet inventor and current UT innovation czar Bob Metcalfe told me at a recent Dell Entrepreneur event. And if you caught Metcalfe’s keynote at this year’s Clean Energy Venture Summit, you know he’d likely tell you to invest in a handful companies in the so-called “enertech” sector. “I’m waiting for all those tech and social networking investors and VCs to come over to energy,” he said. Jokingly taking [...]

I’ve pulled back on the use of infographics lately, but I spotted one over the weekend that warranted a second look. It visualizes data from the Startup Genome, a project that takes a scientific approach to cracking the “innovation code.” Teaming up with educators from Berkeley and Stanford, they looked at more than 3000 companies, analyzing the customer, product, team, business model and financials. One of the big findings amongst the data was that almost [...]

Technology trend watchers have some new data thanks to noted internet analyst Mary Meeker. Her latest presentation at the annual Web 2.0 Summit (below) in San Francisco covered everything from the rise of mobile and local ecommerce, to the the evolution of computing interfaces. A few things jumped out, particularly the stats on China’s internet growth. Clearly, we’re deep into the “it’s a global economy” mantra, especially for web businesses. The other notable elements underscore [...]

Image by George Dearing via Flickr   With dwindling resources and tight budgets, local governments might not be the first place to look if you’re a startup pitching clean technology. The data tells a different story, however. An April survey of almost 400 mayors in all 50 states, showed 75% of cities plan to increase cleantech deployments over the next five years. Some of the key findings paint a vivid picture of what’s motivating the [...]

It’s tough keeping up with the macro forces that can shape the strategy and execution of startups. Here’s a few things to keep an eye on as the talent wars continue and products and services are developed and refined. Software is still big. Software in the cloud is bigger.  It’s not realistic to think many startups will come out of the gate with enterprise software tools, but it’s a steady growth opportunity. And it’s not [...]

At Wednesday’s Capital Factory Demo Day, one of the major takeaways for me was that many of us don’t really know what a lean startup is, or how one is successfully managed. This idea was brought to my attention during Ash Maurya’s presentation called “How to Identify a Lean Startup”.

The February 17th meeting of the Austin chapter of Texchange will be a milestone in two ways. First, we will have three incredible CEO’s who have all recently had major financial events in their company. Secondly, this will be the first Texchange “crowdsourced” event agenda. If you are a Texchange member please register for the event. If you’re not a member, and you’re a technology executive or entrepreneur, please apply now (and let me know [...]