Technology Should Enable Your Fun

September 29, 2008 by bbenedict Leave a Comment

I used a GPS on a recent trip to Costa Rica and it allowed me to really enjoy exploring the rural country side. I was the most relaxed I have ever been despite spending a weekend driving on roads with few road signs and even less pavement. This story will help you appreciate just how the GPS can transform global tourism and make traveling in exotic places really, really fun.

On my recent trip to Costa Rica for Costa Rica Insight 2008, I did something I have never done in my many trips to this amazing country. I rented a car alone and drove in the country.

I am definitely not a novice renting cars to explore at my own pace. I have driven back roads in Ireland, at high speed on the Autobahn, throughout the Loire valley in France and deep in the Louisiana bayou in a borrowed, beat up truck. But something about unmarked roads and inconsistent paving had made me hesitant to go out entirely on my own.

I have always, always, always wanted to see an active volcano in Costa Rica. I was determined this time to do it. Care to see the prize of this venture? Look here! Arenal is amazing. Check out the photo from my room that was right at the base of the mountain.

Getting there and back was the challenge, but my friend Mario who was born in Costa Rica convinced me that I could do the drive. It’s just a few turns and will take about 3 hours, or so he said.

Right.

At the conference, I shared my plan with my friends and the reactions I got ranged from “are you crazy?” to “of course Mario could do it!” Another friend originally from Argentina told me about his first experience driving to visit companies in Costa Rica. In his words, there are not street signs, addresses or mailboxes. Most directions are given based on reference points like a tree or blue house. After 300 meters, make a left at the tire and drive on the dirt road. I am not kidding you!

Maybe I should have started to worry???

This friend continued as I wondered about my decision. He recanted an experience where he was late to a meeting after getting completely lost. Over the phone, it took him 5 minutes just to explain where he was. After that, they told him to head down a road until he “smelled the cookies.” That’s right, the conversation as repeated back to me under the guise of rolling Argentinian r’s explained the key to the directions was the smell of a bakery making cookies.

Sure, no problem, just a few turns and you are there. Was I crazy or just insane?

Turns out, GPS has finally arrived in Costa Rica. Talk about a gift! In all my adventures, I never had a more relaxing drive as I did this time.

The route confirmed my original impressions that I would be forced to navigate random turns that could just as easily put you on a mountain path as in the center of town. Yes, I turned once and found myself on a dirt road heading up a mountain (turns out this was an optimization made by the GPS that took me off the main road). Yes, I turned another time and the freeway became a town (this was NOT an optimization). Throughout the day, with my handy Garmin GPS, I was actually able to enjoy these nuances that otherwise would have forced me to stop the car and check my map.

Did I say that everyone else was relieved that I had a GPS as well :)

I just love technology that enables and that is easy to use. I use my GPS from TomTom at home all the time. I rarely get lost looking for office buildings anymore and I always know if I am going to be on time. That’s the way software and the Internet should be as well, helpful in an unobtrusive way.

I figured my experience would make a great ad campaign for Garmin. My trip had everything including unpaved roads, towns in the middle of the main road, and a bridge that had been washed out. And so, I created this short photo album of the potential ad. Make sure you read the comments!

I went to the Garmin website and it turns out they have a form dedicated to testimonials. I guess the idea of unique GPS enabled experiences is not so unique. For me the experience was fan-tas-tic! I posted it anyways, links to photo album and all.

Oh, and I told a small fib at the beginning of this post. I actually rented a car in Costa Rica on my honeymoon in Punta Islita a few years back. Driving on the only road in town for just a few miles is not the same as a weekend journey to a volcano. No turns means no GPS required.

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Textbooks Make Great References (I Love Textbooks!)

September 8, 2008 by bbenedict 1 Comment

Textbooks make great references for technology because they focus as much on complete knowledge as they do on specific topics. Many of today’s reference books are helpful but lead us to learn only what we need to master right now. To be better engineers and technologists, we should strive to increase our total understanding along with achieving mastery of specific technologies. Let me explain what I mean.

The evolution of technology is both exciting and challenging. One year, your extensive knowledge of Java is an asset. The next year, if you can’t talk about AJAX or Ruby on Rails, you are a has been. Most people stay current in one or more of the following ways. First, they surf the Web (I know, obvious, but stay with me). They read blogs like TechCrunch, SlashDot, TheServerSide and subscribe to numerous RSS feeds. Second, they do pet projects. They code a widget or make a facebook application, or perhaps try something new like Flex.

And third, they read a book (still obvious, I know, but we’re almost there).

If you are like me, you probably have many books on your shelf with bright red covers, monochromatic animals or titles that include “Unleashed” or “Revealed”. Buried in my ever changing library are two textbooks, Software Engineering by Iam Sommerville and Computer Networking: A Top Down Approach Featuring the Internet by James F. Kurose and Keith W. Ross. By far, these are my two favorite books. Here’s why.

Textbooks are so very focused on learning. The content of a textbook presents the essence of the topic and then spends time reviewing different angles of that essence. The goal is for you to understand a philosophy, if you will, to enable you to apply your newly acquired knowledge toward many different situations.

More over, textbooks utilize learning processes more effectively than most topical books to reinforce knowledge absorption. There are exercises at the end of each chapter to practice and validate what you read. Chapters include introductions for what you will learn and summaries for what you have learned. The overall approach of a textbook is not so much what is important today, but what is important to learn.

Don’t get me wrong. Books by O’Reilly, Wrox and others are excellent and also essential to staying current. But I have to admit, when I read these books, I usually just scan for the specific knowledge I think I need. I’ll bet many of you do as well. For example, do I really need to understand how MySQL clusters while working on my database schema. I spend less time learning the entire subject front-to-back with these types of books about specific technologies.

That is why I love textbooks so much. Not only do they present information in a way conducive to learning, but the overall approach motivates me to learn more as well!

The next time you feel the need to expand your knowledge, try taking a broader, more holistic approach. Look for a textbook that gives you the big picture along with the details. You just may be surprised how much of that knowledge is applicable throughout your career. But you better pick up the red or animal book too. I am sure something is due on Monday.

In case you are looking for some good textbooks to read, I created an an Amazon list with books intended to create a solid foundation in computer science and software engineering. Reading these should improve your knowledge of technology and you skills as an architectural coder. Is there anything else in from the textbook genre that should be in my Amazon list? Post a comment and let us all know about it!

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Seed Investment Choices Impact Your Company

September 2, 2008 by bbenedict 1 Comment

The other day I read an informative article classifying different ways to fund a new company. The article, Angel, Venture Capital, or Bootstrap? by Ananda Rajamaran provides an excellent explanation of what different funders are searching for. I thought I would augment this article with my experience on how these different investor types impact the company based on actual experience.

For reference, I have been an executive or individual contributor at several VC funded startups, one of which went public. I was at another startup that was entirely angel funded. And finally, both Open Mountain and our development partner Avantica are bootstrapped efforts. We have clients in all 3 categories as well.

Here are my observations:

Venture funded

  • Venture funded companies have more knowledgeable and powerful people associated with the company. The board tends to be loaded with people who have deep knowledge and/or wide connections in the industry. The knowledge helps to guide the company while the connections help the company become known.
  • Venture funded companies do more faster and spend more faster over time. Even the young companies feel more mature since job offers may be more competitive thanks to the larger bank account. The venture dollars provide for bigger salaries and the name behind the company gives the impression the stock is already more valuable.
  • The one down side is that venture funded companies have more pressure to have better success faster (not always, but for the most part). The investors are definitely looking for the big hockey stick to show up sooner.
  • For clients who have big ideas and a strong possibility for the home run, this is definitely the way to go!

Angel funded

  • Angel funded companies can have knowledgeable advisers and boards but some times do not have the big names found in venture companies. This means you get good advice, but you may have to add advisers with connections or have to work harder to become known.
  • Your investors may be very good or may just be someone who joined the right startup at the right time. You generally need to be a bit more careful when selecting from your angels who will have active participation within the company.
  • Angles often invest for interest along with profit. This takes some of the short term pressure away. If you are self-motivated, which you most certainly are if you are starting a company, this is probably a good thing for you.
  • The pressure comes back in terms of cash management. You will most likely have less to start when using angel funding. If you start to run out of cash, you’ll probably need to find new investors. VC’s tend to work harder to preserve their initial investment than angels do.
  • In the end, leadership teams from angel funded companies feel more empowered and more in control of their destiny. That’s because they are! But if the company starts to fail, you don’t have the larger institution behind you.

Bootstrap

  • The plus side is easy here. You own it all and have complete control. You can make all the decisions because you have not taken any money from anyone.
  • Many bootstrap efforts fail because they run out of cash. Sometimes, it is worth it to give a little ownership in the company away for security and help. Plus, with cash, you can hire more people and produce results faster. This means you just might not miss your window of opportunity.

So back to Open Mountain, we’re bootstrapped because services businesses take a long time to grow and require a great deal of effort to carve out their niche’. We wanted to take the time to do it right and without the influence of external investment. That’s not to say we don’t speak with advisers and industry experts. It’s just that, after 20 years in the business, the mission of what we are trying to do is crystallized in our heads and we like marching to that drum beat.

The good news is that we’re over the hump and have healthy and profitable growth. We have found that we can provide better service to our customers because our mission remains controlled by us as defined when we started the company. That may change some day. But for now, I can say bootstrapping the company feels like it was the right choice for us.

That said, if I were starting a product company, I would create a prototype, project some revenues and then definitely start calling every VC I know with knowledge and interest in the market. My experience is that product companies require money and backing to succeed. I recommend the backing of a venture company with strong expertise, funding and passion for the industry where your product will thrive. A key data point is how many portfolio companies they have within the same or similar industries, or with the same or similar business models.

All of these models can work. It’s a matter of defining what you want to do and putting together a plan to get their business. Then, crank up Excel and a budget and that should tell you what type of investment you will need.

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