Let the Sparks Fly!

Banff Venture Forum

Last week, I had a chance to attend the Banff Venture Forum in Banff, Alberta.  This conference gives young technology companies the opportunity to present to early-stage investors.  The conference was well attended by Angel investor groups, university commercialization groups, as well as venture capital firms.  I also sat on a panel presentation which discussed commercialization strategies for innovations coming out of university labs.  Many feel that there is not enough early-stage private funding in the market to support the commercialization of university research.  Very often, universities spend significant provincial and federal government grants on years worth of research to develop new technologies.  This research is funded based on its academic merit as determined by the University and government professionals.    As this research "graduates" from the university lab and begins its search for outside investment, it far too frequently fails to gain private investor support.  Some investors complain that the innovations are too niche focused, while others argue that they see little market value or customer demand for the proposed solutions.  Regardless of the issue, the fact remains that universities are struggling with the commercialization process.

Rather than starting more government programs or funding more reports to assess this issue, perhaps we need a radical new way to jump start this commercialization process.  My suggestion would be to have universities partner with private investors much earlier in their process to determine which research to fund.  Venture investors have a strong understanding about industry dynamics and market needs.  They also have the ability to support emerging technologies with their venture dollars.  Why not partner these investors with the university groups to priortize university research focus?  Wouldn't it be better to understand which research is most relevant to market needs and which innovations will best be able to get external financing support? Perhaps government research dollars could be spent answering the investor's questions and concerns regarding commercialization viability? It seems to me that this would be a much more market-focused approach to funding technology research.  This way, Investors would also get a first chance to fund new and exciting innovations. By involving more partners and priortitizing their research dollars, perhaps universities can help build greater momentum for their innovations.        

Brightspark Podcast

I recently had a chance to conduct a Podcast with Sean Wise from Wise Mentor Capital.  Sean was interested to learn more about Brightspark's seed financing model and our experience with early stage ventures.  We also talked about my own adventures in the startup world including valuable lessons learned.  You can find the Podcast here.

Back to Techies Land

Entering into Fall (it sure feels like Fall with close to freezing point temperatures in Montreal last night), back from vacation with the kids, I am attending Fall VON in Boston this week. It is very busy, as one could guess and filled with new ideas, new technologies and energetic people. A great place to be for a VC, trying to figure out the benefits of the new telecom puzzle.
 
Yesterday, one of our portfolio companies launched an amazing new product called Vox.  You can visit their website at www.voxlib.com and download it for free. It gives you the ability the make a Skype call from any cell phone. We are very proud and happy about this launch. Everybody has been working extremely hard to get it right and make it happen. This first product truly demonstrates how the economics of telecommunications, as we traditionally know it, are completely transformed. This is not a new topic obviously but Voxlib brings it to another level. Judging from the level of downloads yesterday, people were quick to figure out the value of Vox. Congratulation to the team! 

On another note, I just listened to a presentation from a large VoIP provider at VON and it felt like being teleported back to 2000. Charts and graphs were presented on losses, slicing it every possible way, as a % of sales by category, tracking it over time etc. While I do understand the purpose and need of it, I can’t help having this awkward feeling. It reminds me of a few Board meetings of technology companies in the late 90s where some Board members were harassing the CEO because “you are not losing enough money, your competitors are losing faster!” However new or differently the growth an industry may be going through, this will never feel right to me.