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For All the Chips: Intel’s Rise to the Top
After signing a research contract with Sherman Fairchild’s Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corporation, the eight former employees of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory launched Fairchild Semiconductor. Each of the eight had invested $500 in the startup, while Fairchild put up over $1.3million. “That may not sound like much now,” Moore says, “but it was a month’s salary in 1957.”

The Men Behind MySpace: How Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson First Met
“It sounds crazy,” says Chris DeWolfe, “but even in the first plan that I wrote up, I mentioned AOL, Yahoo! and Hotmail, knowing we would be big. And it’s crazy to think that it happened.”

Larry Ellison Quotes
Larry Ellison Quotes

The Men Behind the Microchip: The Early Years of Intel Founders Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore

As self-described “accidental entrepreneurs,” Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore created what would become by far the foremost semiconductor maker in the world. They didn’t set out to create a billion dollar company or to transform an industry, but that is exactly what the pair did when they founded Intel in 1968. Though best known for its Pentium and Celeron microprocessors that can be found in more than three-quarters of the new PCs that come today, Intel also makes flash memories and embedded semiconductors. Now, with over $35 billion in revenue and annual growth standing at 13.5 percent, the legacy left by Noyce and Moore remains one of the strongest examples of innovation and entrepreneurship in the 21st century.

Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce Quotes
Gordon Moore and Robert Noyce Quotes

Zipping Forward: Musk Starts His First Company
It was 1995. Musk was getting ready to begin his doctorate at Stanford University, but it was not the academic world that was exciting him. Instead, it was the Internet craze that he found himself surrounded by in Silicon Valley. “I could either watch it happen, or be part of it,” he says.

Lesson #5: Discipline Yourself and Learn To Say No
“We were resolute to do what our users wanted,” says DeWolfe. “Having discipline and saying no is why we ended up being so successful.”

Doing it the HP Way: How Hewlett and Packard Rose to Success
The story of Hewlett and Packard has become legendary throughout Silicon Valley: two guys who started off in a small garage with just a few hundred dollars go on to create the largest IT company in the world. How did they do it? How did these two college buddies work their way out of the garage and into the homes and offices of consumers around the world?

Lesson #1: Practice Management the HP Way
“It is important to remember that both Dave and I were products of the Great Depression,” said Hewlett. “We had observed its effects on all sides, and it could not help but influence our decisions on how a company should be run.”

Riding the Wave: Yang and Filo Turn Surfing into a Success
“It was a really gradual thing, but we'd find ourselves spending more and more time on it,” says Yang of his and Filo’s newly created online directory. “It was getting to be a burden.”

Lesson #2: Sharpen Your Organization’s Goals
In 2007, Yahoo! was the setting for a major Silicon Valley shakeup. The company’s then CEO Terry Semel was ousted and replaced by its original co-founder, Yang. It was a tumultuous time for the company, which was suffering from much shareholder criticism in the face of rising competition from Google. But Yang was determined to rise to the challenge.

Silicon Valley is Like High School
The quote of the week (at least in my world) was from one of the CEO’s I work with regarding Silicon Valley.

How to Kick Silicon Valley\'s Butt

From the fjords of Norway to the sands of Israel to the ice of Alberta to the waves of Honolulu, many regions of the world have Silicon Valley Envy. They look at the Valley as a place where people start cool companies that generate billions of dollars of wealth (and tax revenue), create thousands of jobs, and yet does not pollute the environment (at least compared with a smokestack). The question I hear over and over is, “How can we create our own Silicon Valley?”

The Top Ten Things I Love Most About Woz
Woz and I did a one-on one-chat for the Commonwealth Club on November 16, 2006 as part of his iWoz book tour. It was one of the most enjoyable gigs that I’ve ever done. After the event, I compiled this list of the “Top Ten Things I Love Most About Woz.”

Getting Value From Experimental Technology

David Cohen (who I have done a few angel deals with – including ClickCaster and Solidware) recently spent a couple of weeks building a cool new tool called earFeeder. earFeeder scans your music collection and automatically creates a single RSS newsfeed containing news about your favorite artists including new releases on iTunes, concert dates and ticket availability, Rolling Stone articles, etc.

Ten Questions with Marti Nyman

Marti Nyman is “director of global innovation networks” for Best Buy. This means that his job is to find leading-edge, cool stuff for Best Buy—and yes, he gets paid to do this. Marti has held a diverse array of positions in strategic alliances, business development, mergers and acquisitions, business-unit leadership, sales and marketing, manufacturing, and international market development at a number of companies including General Electric, Ericsson, and ADC Telecommunications.

How to Write a Business Plan: Ten Questions with Tim Berry

I work in the surreal world of Silicon Valley where venture capitalists fund companies based on PowerPoint pitches and executive summaries. My friend Tim Berry rightfully pointed that business plans still serve an important role in "the rest of the world." He's right, and he should know because he's the president of Palo Alto Software, the principal creator of Business Plan Pro, and the author of a blog called Planning, Startups, Stories. He was recently named the US Association of Small Business & Entrepreneurship (USASBE) Corporate Entrepreneur of the Year for 2007.

On the Other Hand: The Flip Side of Entrepreneurship by Glenn Kelman
This is a guest posting by Glenn Kelman, CEO of Redfin, a company that enables people to buy homes online. He offers a counterpoint to my posting about how easy it is to make millions of dollars with "user-generated, long-tail, Web 2.0, social-networking, open-source content."

Tip of the week - It's never too early to start connecting
In the latest tip of the week, I shared some passages from young entrepreneur and connector (and Never Eat Alone fan) Ben Casnocha's new book

Parallel Universes
I’ve been in a few parallel universes recently and am noticing it happening more and more. I like parallel universes – it always smells like opportunity to me (plus I get to see how another “species” lives.)

Weekend Books
I've been in a reading slump lately - I just haven't felt like reading. This happens sometimes and whenever I break my "at least two books a week" rhythm, I just roll with it until it changes.

New Research and a Dirty Truth: Read This Before Chasing the Dollar
“You’re nobody here at $10 million,” said Gary Kremen, the 43-year old founder of Match.com, of Silicon Valley.

Ten Questions with Fred Greguras of Fenwick and West

Fred Greguras is a partner at the Silicon Valley law firm of Fenwick and West. He is also a buddy of mine, and I asked him to answer the most common questions of newbie entrepreneurs. His clients have included BioMarker Pharmaceuticals, Excite, Kintana, and Speedera Networks. It’s very important to make the right decisions in these areas at the start of a company, so I hope you’ll heed his answers.

"How to Spend It"

I will stack my practical credentials as "avowed capitalist pig" up to anybody's; say, Steve Forbes. Among other things, how could one have lived in Palo Alto-Silicon Valley for three decades without "turning rabid capitalist," even if one had not been before? Likewise, today, capitalism unleashed in India and China is, I am quite certain, good for the world's prospects for some modicum of peace—and is enhancing the welfare of additional millions by the month.

How to Get George Bush or the CEO of Google on the Phone
The below article, titled “Fail Better” and written by Adam Gottesfeld, explores how I teach Princeton students to connect with luminary-level business mentors and celebrities of various types. I’ve edited it to be shorter and clearer in a few places.

Another Career Option Bites the Dust
I guess I can never be a Supreme Court justice.

Entrepreneurialism
Last week in the Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal there was an article on James Gutierrez. Gutierrez is the co-founder of Progreso Financiero, which he started in 2005. His company has brought in $26 million in venture funding, has partnered with Sears and has made 20,000 loans from 24 locations throughout California.

Why Grow? and Other Wisdom from 37Signals
I’ve known the guys at 37Signals for a little while. I first met Jason Fried at SXSW in 2008, and I then got to know David Heinemeier Hansson (DHH) over e-mail and in person last year. On a fundamental level, I think, our philosophies just mesh well

The Secret of Silicon Valley's Magic with Technology and Innovation
Silicon Valley is a special place. Why is it so entrepreneurial? Why do start-ups sprout like weeds? Many have tried to copy this cradle of innovation and its success, and yet no one has been able to duplicate it. What makes Silicon Valley different?

Building Entrepreneurial Communities is a 20 year journey

During the Tahoe Tech Talk three hour Q&A segment with the panelists, someone in the audience asked about how to create a stronger entrepreneurial community in their city so that it could be “more like Silicon Valley.” After a little banter, Chris Sacca and Dave Morin called me up onto stage to do a short riff on what we’ve done in Boulder and what makes it special. Damon Clinkscales recorded it on his iPhone – the three minute video is embedded below.

There's a Hole in the World
The world lost a great man and leader last week. Mike Fields was one of the most amazing man I ever knew. He was bigger than life, conquering barrier after barrier to rise from a very humble beginning to become one of the most powerful Afro-American leaders in the Silicon Valley.

Housewide Storage -- Better Safe than Sorry But…

Imagine being able to access any file in the house -- wired or wireless. Yes a safe haven where you can store, protect, enjoy, share the family content and other stuff. All it takes is Plug and Play NAS. PnP sounds so friendly, so nice, so easy, so fun. NAS sounds like...gawd we don't know. But home networking, good home networking has been promised for years. All you need is a techie who just loves to help you, a few evenings and a long weekend and hey there's nothing to it. Face it...your sanity and keeping your blood pressure under control is worth something right?

Lesson #5: “It was fun for me”
Before he invented the Apple computer, Wozniak created the first ever dial-a-joke service. He took calls live from his small kitchen, or while lying on the mattress in his bedroom. They called; he would make them laugh. For an admittedly shy guy, this was a significant feat.

Lesson #3: “There is something healthy about friendly competition”
“There’s a lot we can learn from smart people out in the world,” says Stone. “One of the things I like so much about President Obama is his global vision that it’s not a zero-sum game, where one country is going to win the game of earth. We have to work together.”

Innovation, Mainstream on Different Time Schedules

CES is always great to see and immerse yourself in all of the new toys, the new potential...the fresh start! It takes us awhile to look closely (behind the curtain) as to what the year and next five years have to hold. But this past year everyone was bemoaning the fact that the U.S. was behind the curve, lost the recipe for success and the future. Look at the CES stuff and where did it come from? Everywhere! We (and we mean all we) multitask, work virtually without borders pulling the best ideas, the best talent from EVERYWHERE to create solutions, solve problems. Only governments want "bragging rights." Companies and all of the wes want products, services, capabilities to sell.

It’s Time for Content, Communication Course Correction

The financial shell game finally caught up with Wall Street. The US auto industry suddenly realized their bloated infrastructure and their views of what people should buy didn't match up with what customers were asking for. The two industries knew how to solve the problems they created...go where they print money. The content creation/sharing/showing/enjoying players pulled back as they have in every downturn and turned their attention to tightening up their organizations, reducing profit margins and focusing on products, technology, services that satisfy consumers. Suddenly we're doing more with less and placing renewed emphasis on listening and talking with folks about exactly what they want and need from us.

Diamonds in the Rough
Developing an idea takes strategy, research, commitment and money. Likewise, someone with raw talent must invest in training, preparation, industry savvy and networking before she is likely to get noticed.

Overcoming Writer's Block. How to unleash the writer inside of you.
A simple formula you can use to quickly and easily write an article in less than 90 minutes.

Netbooks…The Easy Way to Sell More Service

It sounds almost too good to be true -- a cheap computer you can use/carry everywhere, never have to upgrade the operating system or your apps, with a battery that lasts for ... well a long, long time. Sounds great except we end up leaving all of our work in the beautiful white clouds. The clouds move. We forget which cloud has our stuff and how we get in. Worse, there's a **** storm in the cloud just as we want to get in. Yeah...who knew what grandpa taught our little Miss Sunshine while we were out of the room?? Guess we may end up with yet another device to take along... convenience sure is getting heavy!!!

Don’t bet on an Apple netbook—but an ‘iPod HD,’ well, that’s more likely
Yesterday it was reported that Taiwan-based Wintek will supply touch panels for a new Apple netbook (or perhaps an “iPod HD”) and shipments will start in the third quarter this year. Don’t look for a netbook per se, but a bigger iPod is what I’m betting my money on.

You Can Never Be Too Good Looking, Too Slim, Have Too Much Storage

If you were one of the fortunate few who got his/her iPad 2 lord it over the other folks who are waiting for ...something else. Of course they and you also carry around your smartphone, notebook, other mobile devices. They're too important not to be without...and the information they hold. Good thing is all that data, content you're creating doesn't make the things weigh any more except when you have to get a few external hard drives to carry it all. Who knew you just had to have 8-10 four drawer filing cabinets of stuff with you but...you do. Could put all the content at home but that's getting pretty full. Could put it in the cloud but that's a little scarey. All storage people can say is thank you for creating, storing, sharing.

Schwarzenegger May Be Lifting the Heaviest Weight of His Life: The Burgeoning Deficit of California!
The former body builder is about to lift the heaviest weight of his life: The deficit of California

Coming Out of the Trough -- It’s Time for a Content, Communication Course Correction

Moving Forward -- It’s Time for a Content, Communication Course Correction
The downturn we are experiencing today provides an excellent opportunity for entrepreneurs to move forward as aggressively as they can to gain ground over the competition. While many firms are run by managers who only have minimum "skin in the game," the firms are more cautious and pull back more aggressively. Entrepreneurs can make the physical and fiscal moves that gain sales and marketshare.

The Last Bastion for Free Thought
Current trends point to a reduction in entrepreneurial start ups in the brick and mortar small business world. For the Entrepreneur, all roads point to the Internet for expansion including sales and marketing. Read on and find out if free enterprise is in jeopardy for the Entrepreneur, or is the choice Internet expansion.

In Prosperous Periods Promote Tactically, In Down Times Promote Strategically
The chaos of the financial community has proven that the fallacy of their house of cards and smoke/mirrors has finally caught up with them. But that shouldn't depress the entrepreneur who has an idea, drive and ... at least some money!

Team Performance and Emotional Intelligence: Emotional Intelligence Training
Team Performance and Emotional Intelligence: Emotional Intelligence Training.

Building Sales Creatively
When you don't feel like you "Have to" make the sale, the sales process is much more enjoyable. When you are confident and relaxed you can be more creative, which makes the sales process more enjoyable for your customer, which makes it easier for them to buy and not be sold.

Lesson #3 Know The Game Part I
Lesson #3 of Chris Golis's talk 5000 Business plan, 50 deals, 25 write-offs lessons learned from 25 years as a venture capitalist. It is 1986. I had been a VC for two years in Sydney and was making my first visit to Silicon Valley. How I finally learned the game.

Publicity is Priceless!

How do newspapers, magazines, television and radio stations get their news? How can they possibly know about Silicon Valley’s latest product; the promotion of Bob Smith at the Acme Company; the results of experiments conducted at Rutgers; a new book published by an unknown author or the date of the local Rotary Club’s pancake breakfast? Obviously, they don’t have reporters everywhere, all of the time. They rely on individuals, companies or the government to send them a Press Release.

Bringing Association Teams Together - One Game At a Time!
In this article published in the Canadian Society of Association Executives Association Magazine details tips and techniques for getting teams to work together more efficiently.

Bringing Teams Together - One Game at a time
Using natural group dynamics to accelerate group learning.

Social Divide…When a Tree Falls in the Forest

Businesses are investing heavily in social media. It's where all of the action is. But is it where all the money is at? Research continually shows that boomers are "not quite" as social media active as millenials. The solution is that we'll just ignore them. Who cares if there are over 1.5 billion of them around the globe? Who cares if they have a greater proportion of the population's disposable income? After all social media isn't about producing sales, profits. It's about being social. Right? If their numbers are growing we may need to determine how we're going to reach, inform, educate, influence them or not. But if they have the money....

Africa needs a technology bubble

According to the WSJ, silicon valley is on the brink of another technology bubble bust like what was witnessed in 1999. According to the article the emergence of "strange" website names such as Orgoo and businesses whose sole purpose is to sell t-shirts bearing the logos of internet companies(check out Startup Schwag) is evidence of a bubble and its eminent bust. I cannot even pretend to understand the dynamics of silicon valley, so I won't even argue with the writer of the article, but I'm left wondering when will Africa expereience it's own technology bubble?

10 Steps to the Perfect Napa Valley Day
Growing up and now living in the Napa Valley and experiencing all that the Valley has to offer I am often asked for suggestions from friends and clients when visiting Napa Valley. I decided to share one of my top 10 itineraries with you.

Free Online Term Sheet Generator
If I didn’t see it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe it, but Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich, and Rosati, one of Silicon Valley’s dominant law firms (as in Apple, HP, etc), has created a free, online term sheet generator. This is the site’s description of the tool:

How to Raise Prices
Bob Goedjen, guest blogger at Cisco Innovators Forum says that if 90% of entrepreneurs have under-priced themselves, plus many businesses have cut prices during the recession, how do you raise prices now that the economy is picking up again? I asked Bob Goedjen of Silicon Valley SCORE to give us his insights.

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