July Hiatus: Andy Swan's "Make Some Noise"

While I'm on my July blogging hiatus, I'd thought I'd share with you a few posts from friends whose thought leadership I admire. Here's Andy Swan on "Make Some Noise":

Make some noise

When the facts are on your side, pound the facts. When the facts are against you, pound the table.

Some ideas don’t work.  The market isn’t ready for them or doesn’t want them.  You can tell when every “sale" is a grind.  The plow is just too heavy.

Admit it:  You’re already dead.

That’s when you get a little crazy.

1. Radical shift.  Not to the product (if you think it’s good)…but to the process.  Break the rules. Complete change of target, price or distribution system.
   
2. Make some noise.  Get loud.  Every piece of momentum gets a touchdown dance.  See who dances with you.
   
3. Lever up.  Put everything into the one thing that works.  Everything. 

There is no excuse for a startup dying quietly.  

That’s pride.  Newsflash— she isn’t gonna dance with the guy slinking off in the corner.

Put it all out there.

Die loudly.

Win.

My Next Step on the Path: Ernst & Young's Global Cleantech Center

The author ponders his path on Block Island.

A few years ago I announced the launch of my consultancy VerdeStrategy here on The Green Skeptic.

I've enjoyed working with some great clients in a consulting and advisory capacity for marketing, capital raising, and strategic positioning. I've helped some great companies and entrepreneurs navigate often stormy waters of the past few years. 

But I missed being a part of a team, part of an entity larger than myself and a few colleagues who came together on specific projects. I missed the camaraderie that comes from an enterprise of shared vision and objectives. 

So now I'm embarking on a different path. 

This week I joined Ernst & Young's Global Cleantech Center to direct their marketing strategy. I'm becoming a part of a great team of experts and thought leaders in the cleantech space, including Gil Forer, Scott Sarazen, and John De Yonge. You can read some of their writing on the cleantech opportunity in their Global Cleantech Insights and Trends Report for 2011.

With Ernst & Young, I'm joining an even larger global team of assurance, tax, transaction, and advisory professionals that share my values -- values that have been consistent throughout my career with The Nature Conservancy, Ashoka, and VerdeStrategy.

I'm excited about this new opportunity in my life and work. And I hope to be able to continue to share my sector insights through The Green Skeptic and my commentary on FOX Business and other media.

Meanwhile, a hearty thank you to my clients and friends for your support over the past few years. And apologies to my readers for the lack of posts over the past few weeks as I sorted out this transition.

Keep in touch and stay skeptical!

A Tale of Two Cleantech Companies: My Presentation from IMPACT 2011

Today I presented "A Tale of Two Cleantech Companies: A case study of what leads to a successful exit or a stunning failure" at the IMPACT 2011 Venture Summit Mid-Atlantic in Philadelphia, PA.

I told the stories of Solyndra and CPower and how they failed and succeeded, respectively.

Here are my slides from the presentation:

Scott Edward Anderson A Tale of Two Cleantech Companies

View more presentations from Scott Edward Anderson.

And here is a transcript of my notes/talking points on Scribd: A Tale of Two Cleantech Companies

How I Almost Created "The Disaster Channel"

This could have been a real disaster.

About 20 years ago, I was on the editorial staff at Viking Penguin, which as the name implies, was a merger of two venerable old publishing houses.

Our company had been bought by the international media company Pearson, which also bought the venerable old merger-house of E.P. Dutton and New American Library.  It was the early days of the consolidation of publishing.

Pearson decided to move us out of our West 23rd Street offices -- and our compatriots out of their Park Avenue location -- and into the Saatchi & Saatchi building in lower Manhattan.  It was a sleek, stark, almost sterile contrast to the rickety bookshelf-cluttered walls and creaky floors of our old building.
 
The editorial staff was starting to be trimmed and many of us could see the writing on the walls.  Of course, there were no bookshelves to clutter them up!

I started kicking around ideas with some friends about what to do next.  I felt stuck.  I had worked in publishing and printing for much of the 80s.  What else did I know?

I had a short stint as an assistant to a baker when I first moved to New York and loved baking bread.  My friend Howie said my bread was so good, I should open a bakery.  (I've told part of that story here.)

But I had another idea: "The Disaster Channel."

That's right, The Disaster Channel.  Nothing but disasters 24/7.  There was plenty of existing content (movies, documentaries, news footage) and there were new disasters all the time.  We could have "Disaster of the Week" specials, send people out with video cameras to chase tornadoes, think of the possibilities!

It wouldn't take much to start and it would certainly be a hit.  People love disasters.  It would be worth millions, billions even, I reckoned.

My friends were mortified.  "How could you live with yourself if you did that?"

"Well, if The Disaster Channel was a success, then I could do my other idea for a cable channel," I replied. "The Poetry Channel: an all-poetry cable network featuring poets and celebrities reading poems, poets being interviewed, and films about poets or based on poetry."

Call it my "Evil Plan."

Needless to say, I didn't pursue either idea.  Since that time, The Weather Channel has picked up the mantle of disaster coverage. (Someone has even done a spoof announcement of the concept here.)

Could I have sold to TWC or was my idea too early?  I'll never know.

The road is paved with ideas -- good, bad, and disastrous.

Top 10 Reasons Israel is a Cleantech Leader

David Buimovitch/AFP/Getty Images

Here at The Green Skeptic we've been following the progress of cleantech in Israel for some time.

There are many reasons Israel has been an innovator, including, in part, because it has to be. Now, Sustainable World Capital's Shawn Lesser highlights the history of innovation, access to capital, scarce resources and other factors propelling cleantech today in Israel.

Here are the Top 10 Reasons Israel is a cleantech leader:

1. Israel is the Silicon Valley of water. Relative to its small size, Israel has devoted more resources to the development of waste water treatment and reclamation than any other country in the world. Seventy percent of its waste water is recycled, three times the figure of number two: Spain. Israel is the birthplace and world leader in drip irrigation, which has literally turned deserts into farmlands. The Israeli firm Netafim, a $500 million high-tech drip-irrigation giant, is a world leader in smart irrigation technology and has been credited with starting the drip irrigation revolution. Israel Newtech, which promotes Israeli clean energy and water technologies, has identified hundreds of water companies. It’s estimated that Israel’s water industry was valued at $1.4 billion in 2008 and could reach $2.5 billion by 2011.

2. Brain trust. Israel has the highest ratio of university degrees to population in the world. Within its small borders is an enormous concentration of PhDs and engineers, bolstered in large part by the large immigration from the former Soviet Union. This concentration of minds in a relatively small geographical space creates a country-wide incubator where ideas are constantly tested in the coffee shops of Tel-Aviv and the hallways of universities. 

3. Necessity as the mother of innovation. Due to its location and terrain, Israel is a country that has had extremely limited natural resources since its inception. Israelis have therefore become experts at getting the most out of limited natural resources. Confronting adversity has trained Israelis to think outside of the box. “Israel is poor in natural resources and rich in brain capital. Clean energy bridges that gap. What Israel lacks in the ground it makes up with its people,” says David Anthony from 21 Ventures.

4. Leveraging tech expertise to cleantech. “Israel’s tech sector has flourished through the creation of core technology competencies that are world leading,” as Glen Schwaber, Partner at Israel Cleantech Ventures, wrote in his article “The Quest for Smarts.”

“Israel’s tech sector has flourished through the creation of core technology competencies that are world leading,” according to Schwaber. These include, but are not limited to digital printing, semiconductors, power electronics, optics and software. Over the last two decades, multiple billions of VC dollars have poured into Israeli companies in these sectors, market leaders have emerged, and many of the world’s largest multinationals have bought companies and set up shop in Israel as a result.” 

5. Capital. Just about every major US VC firm in Silicon Valley, from Battery Ventures to Greylock to USVP to Sequoia Capital, is prospecting across Israel for cleantech investments. All told, at least 40 venture funds, several of them American, manage more than $10 billion in Israel, with an increasing share of their allocations devoted to cleantech companies. 

6. The Better Place Factor. Better Place is Israel’s best known cleantech company, and it recently raised a further $350 million (see Better Place deal bested by Airtricity). Founded by Israeli entrepreneur Shai Agassi, the company is developing electric vehicle battery swapping infrastructure. 

7. The sun shines brightly over Israel. The solar radiation Israel receives is a driver of solar thermal companies. Siemens bought Israeli solar thermal pioneer Solel for $418 million, while BrightSource Energy has raised more than $160 million from investors, including U.S.-based VantagePoint Venture Partners, Google, BP’s investment arm, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan Chase. Other notable solar thermal companies include Heliofocus, ZenithSolar, and AORA. 

8. Kibbutz Pioneers. The foundation of Israel’s cleantech industry was laid with the beginning of the kibbutz (collective communities) movement at the start of the 20th century (see Israel’s cleantech kibbutzim pioneers). At that time, the land was mostly semi-arid, with a scarcity of water and pockmarked by mosquito infested swamps, so principles of sustainability and self-sufficiency were adopted from the outset so as to “make the desert bloom”. 

9. Home grown Israeli VC community. Israel has a vibrant local VC community which includes Israel Cleantech Ventures, AquaAgro and Terra Ventures—three firms dedicated to investing in Israel’s cleantech sector. Having a vibrant local VC community also draws foreign money.

10. Momentum. Israel is fast becoming the cleantech incubator to the world. In proportion to its population, it now has the largest number of startup companies than any other country in the world except the U.S., with 3,500 companies, mostly in hi-tech. Exciting new cleantech startups to keep an eye on, in our opinion, that haven’t been mentioned already include Bio Pure Technology, BioPetroClean, CellEra, Emefcy, Enstorage, Greenlet Technologies, GreenRoad, GreenSun Energy, IQ Wind, Linum, Panoramic Power, Phoebus Energy, SolarEdge, Takadu, Technospin, Transalgae and Variable Wind Solutions.

As Al Gore siad in a recent visit to Israel, “the people of Israel can lead the way to renewable energy. With its unique geographical position, and cleantech know how, Israel is a natural leader in the field.”

Cleantech could well become Israel’s biggest export market. Other countries should take note.

Andy Swan's "Elite Eight for Entrepreneurship"

As I head out on vacation, I leave you with Andy Swan's

"Elite Eight for Entrepreneurship"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do you have what it takes to make the Final Four?  To win it all?

Good Company Ventures: A Virtual Incubator for Social Sector Companies Launches in Philly

Social enterprise needs access to the same sort of support as the for profit sector. Organizations like Ashoka, Skoll, Echoing Green, Acumen Fund, and Endeavor provide a kind of venture capital infrastructure for emerging and growing social entrepreneurs. L3C and B Corp are beginning to build a framework for a new kind of corporate structure, one that blends social good with profit. And conferences like this week's Skoll World Forum and the Global Philanthropy Forum provide a platform for both recognition and exchanging ideas.

Now, with GoodCompany Ventures, there is a business incubator targeting entrepreneurs with innovative solutions to unmet social needs.

A "virtual incubator," along the lines of TechStars and DreamIt Ventures, GoodCompany Ventures will provide facilities, mentoring, and access to a network of capital sources to qualified entrepreneurs whose business models offer investors an attractive mix of financial return and social impact.

"The program is the first of its kind in the social sector, repurposing a proven venture strategy in this emerging sector", said Jacob Gray, partner with Murex Investments in a press release today. "Unlike conventional venture incubators, GoodCompany Ventures doesn't extract an equity commitment from entrepreneurs, but expects a commitment of time and creativity toward building a community of social entrepreneurship."

Garret Melby, founder of Iolite Social Capital, and a partner in GoodCompany Ventures, suggested that "just as Xerox Parc, Idea Lab and other technology incubators helped create the foundation of the information economy, GoodCompany Ventures will support entrepreneurs seeking to build a socially and environmentally sustainable economy."

Applicants will be recruited nationally via venture capital, social finance, and academic networks. A pool of 8 – 12 candidates will be selected to participate in the 2009 incubator program starting this June.

The program has been developed jointly by Resources for Human Development, Inc. (RHD), an innovator in social finance with a successful track record in social enterprises, and Murex Investments, a "double bottom line" equity fund backed by leading financial institutions.

Applications to the Program are now being accepted online at GoodCompanyVentures.org. The deadline for applying is April 20, 2009.

More information is available at GoodCompanyVentures.org or via email at info@GoodCompanyVentures.com.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Venture Capital to invest in Indian rural technology (indolac.wordpress.com)
• Tough Times Call for New Entrepreneurship Efforts (gigaom.com)
• VC Model Is Not Broken: Insights from Brad Feld of TechStars and Foundry Group (xconomy.com)
• Startup Incubator Adds New Mentors, Calls for Companies to Join (austinist.com)
• Venture Capital for Long Tail Entrepreneurs at SXSW (unstructuredventures.com)
• Echoing Green's Spark Social Change T-Shirt Contest (osocio.org)