The Founder Factory: Where Phillypreneurs Came Together

I attended a very cool event today called Founder Factory at the World Cafe Live in Philadelphia.

Hosted by Philly Startup Leaders and the MAC Alliance, the Founder Factory was a sold-out, one-day conference where wisdom from Philadelphia-area business leaders was shared with other Phillypreneurs.


Highlights from the presentations included successful area entrepreneurs such as Lucinda Holt, Steve Goodman, and Josh Kopelman.

Steve Goodman, the legendary lawyer from Morgan Lewis, offered an historical perspective of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the Philadelphia area since he arrived in 1969, much of which he helped foster. Goodman did for Philly what Fred Wilson did for New York in his keynote at Web 2.0 in September.

Josh Kopelman, founder of Half.com and First Round Capital, assayed the current financial situation and looked forward to mid-2010, when he feels the logjam in venture funding will have to be deployed and things may start flowing again. He also used the example of some great world monuments many of which, including the Eiffel Tower and Golden Gate Bridge, were being built during earlier recessions.

His conclusion? Great things happen in the face of adversity. Just what many of us who are starting things now needed to hear.

Serial entrepreneur Lucinda Duncalfe Holt offered 5 things every entrepreneur needs to think about, focusing especially on people, flexibility, and execution. (Lucinda and Josh also had the best slide decks I've seen in a long time. The key: pictures, not a lot of text -- oh, and it doesn't hurt to have a liberal dose of Hugh Macleod cartoons.)

In addition to the stories shared by these and other entrepreneurs, they also offered feedback to three Philly-based startups in a "Fishbowl" setting, including search engine DuckDuckGo, DropCard, and GoBYO.com.

A fantastic event that, along with DreamIt Ventures, IgnitePhilly, and other recent events, demonstrates that there is something percolating in Philly.

More On What's Next for the New Green Economy

I've been thinking more about last week's panel discussion, "What's Next for the Green Economy?"

A few of the questions made me think about President-elect Obama and what he'll be facing when he takes office in January.

So I thought I'd try to answer some of the questions here and, in a future post, I'll offer my two cents to Mr. Obama.

Will a Green Economy rebound faster from financial turmoil?

I think it will, if only because the concerns that are driving the green wave are not going away anytime soon: dependence on foreign oil, stemming climate change, and high fuel prices.

(On the last point, while price per barrel is down in the mid-60s today; it averages out around $109 per barrel for the year. As energy analyst Gregor MacDonald points out in this post, the average price over time is more important for commodities like oil.)

Will consumers stick with Green during tough times?

Tough one. Depends upon how hard hit they are where they keep their wallets. The good news is, companies like Wal-Mart have already made commitments to go green and are making money at it.

It will be tough to maintain momentum if the costs of greener goods don't come down or if manufacturers stick to luxury green items. Overall, however, there are gains in green stuff like organic foods and some consumer goods, such as Energy Star-rated appliances. (TVs should see a bump-up, with the changes coming in the new year concerning the switch to digital signals.)

What is the next administration really facing that's not being talked about in the media?

How to pay for the huge transformation from old, dying economy to new green economy. You can't nickel and dime your way there, but with the War in Iraq (and Afghanistan) still going on and $700B bailout of banks and potentially more for automakers. Where ya gonna get the money?

Does America need a energy technology bubble just like the information technology bubble?

Yes. Bubbles can be good. As author of Pop! Why Bubbles Are Great for the Economy, has written, "the excitement of a new technology interacts with some of the more unstable components of America's character—boundless optimism, a tendency toward entrepreneurship, a tolerance of creative destruction, and greed—to produce a kind of mania."

We could use a little of that boundless optimism today. Dontcha' think?

When the bubble bursts, we'll be left with a new green infrastructure that will keep the new green economy going.

And it may just save our assets.

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What's Next for the Green Economy?

On Tuesday, I had the pleasure of participating in a panel discussing “What’s next for the green economy?” Hosted by the Eco Investment Club of San Diego, it was a lively discussion of great questions from an engaged audience.

With the financial markets in a tailspin (although they were getting an anticipatory boost that day) and crude oil prices also dipping to lows we haven't seen in some time, it was no surprise that "what's next?" was a question on everyone's mind.

My fellow panelists included Glenn Croston, author of 75 Green Businesses You Can Start to Make Money and Make a Difference, Oren Jaffe, co-founder of EcoTuesday, Jan Schalkwijk, CFA and Principal of JPS Global Investments, Ron Robins, founder of Investing for the Soul and author of the blog, Enlightened Economics, and Dave Iverson, a noted economist and environmentalist.

The questions ranged from investing to energy prices to the impact of the next administration on both. Here is a sampling of some of the questions:

Will a Green Economy rebound faster from financial turmoil?

Will consumers stick with Green during tough times?

What is the next administration really facing that's not being talked about in the media?

Does America need a energy technology bubble just like the information technology bubble?

###

Fuzzy Math? Some See Unrealistic Numbers in Obama 5M Green Jobs Promise

President-elect Obama has an ambitious plan to create 5 M "green jobs" with an investment of 150 B over the next ten years.

Under the current definition, green jobs include insulation and solar panel installers, wind-turbine manufacturers and green building construction workers, as well as infrastructure jobs such as those associated with the electrical grid and rail mass transit.

But some, according to the Wall Street Journal, are questioning the numbers in the plan.

And as Congress considers an additional economic stimulus package that may include green jobs, there could be even more debate -- especially from those most influenced by traditional energy lobbies.

"The green-jobs argument," WSJ reports, "rests on the notion that big capital investments in new-energy technology today will be more than offset by savings in reduced fossil-fuel costs. Though oil prices have fallen, the International Energy Agencyy predicted Thursday that once the economy picks up again, they will resume climbing, potentially topping $200 a barrel by 2030. The IEA called the current energy system 'patently unsustainable' and called for 'radical action by governments.'"

Some argue that 5 M is not a net number; that, in fact, some of these green jobs will merely supplant other jobs in the traditional energy economy or that green job gains will be "more than offset" by job losses elsewhere in the economy.

But whether we're talking 1, 2, 3 or 5 million jobs seems to miss the point.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, "private sector payroll employment has fallen by 1,825,000, or 1.6%, since October 2000, the month when unemployment began to rise." This is, according to EPI, "a slightly greater decline than in the 'jobless recovery' of the early 1990s."

The point is an influx of capital into potential job creation in a new and emerging sector is going to be a better stimulus than rescuing failed banks and promoting business as usual. And certainly a better idea than rewarding auto-manufacturers for their failed vision by bailing them out too.

"The added allure of clean-energy spending as economic stimulus is that the industry is relatively young and growing fast," writes Jeffrey Ball in WSJ. "Unlike the fossil-fuel industry, which has matured over decades, it is just starting to build its basic infrastructure -- wind turbines, solar panels and a more-sophisticated electric-transmission grid."

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Mr. President-Elect, Bring On the New Green Economy, But Be Practical

Now that the election is over and Americans have selected Barack Obama as our next president, it is time to get back to work.

I'm not going to dwell on the historical heft of this event; many people have and will.

Suffice it to say that, regardless of your politics, you had to be proud to be an American last night. We are truly the land of promise and opportunity.

And it is opportunity that I hope President Obama will focus on when he takes office in January.

Now is the opportunity to transform our economy from one based upon greed, deception, and pollution to one of green, transparency, and solutions.

We heard a lot from both candidates about the new green economy, a new energy economy, during the campaign. Much of it was aspirational and not entirely pragmatic.

As he moves forward with his plans, I'd like Mr. Obama to live up to this statement from his speech last night:

"I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree"

It is time for us to get a realistic path forward for the new green economy, which is the best way to turn this economy around and move America forward again.

But it is important to take pragmatic steps within the limitations of the current economic climate.

We need real answers about how Mr. Obama plans to move this economy toward its green future. The goals he outlined in the campaign -- 5 million jobs and $150 Bn -- may not be realistic in the short term.

But in tempering his ambitious goals, I hope Mr. Obama will stick to his guns on going green.

It is important to our future that we have realistic, measurable goals and strong leadership at this time -- now more than ever -- especially on alternative energy, climate change, and overhauling the financial sector.

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Review: Investing in Renewable Energy by Jeff Siegel of Green Chip Stocks

Book cover via AmazonInvesting books are almost as tough to time as investments. Books are time-bound. What's happening when you write it will no doubt change by the time the book is published. The market may peak or collapse. Or the stock you recommend may tank. The company you featrue, as happened with VeraSun (VSE) this week, may go bankrupt.

Better to stick to the web for real-time recommendations and commentary (see my StockTwits post from a few weeks ago).

And investing books in an emerging sector in a volatile market are even tougher to time.

2007 was a banner year for alternative energy. The clean tech sector garnered more than $117 billion in new investments that year.

By January 2008, alt-energy stocks were imploding and pundits were crowing about the bursting of the next bubble.

Then all hell broke loose, the credit and mortgage crisis hit, the economy tanked, and the price of oil plummeted from its all-time highs.

October 2008 will go down in history as one of the blackest months on Wall Street.

What a time to launch a book, let alone a book about alternative energy investing.

But that's exactly what happened with Jeff Siegel, who, along with Chris Nelder and Nick Hodge, have just released Investing in Renewable Energy: Making Money on Green Chip Stocks (Wiley, 2008).

The good news is the authors run an investment advisory service that focuses exclusively on renewable energy and the organic and natural foods markets. You can subscribe to his service and e-newsletter at GreenChipStocks.com.

To their credit, they do print a disclaimer about the relevancy of printed media in an age of instant analysis, and suggest you don't take investment advice from the book without doing your own research.

That said, there is enough worthy and relevant information in this book to make it worth having on your shelf along with last year's The Clean Tech Revolution, by Ron Pernick and Clint Wilder, if only for the insights into the sector and the general knowledge about what to look for. (See my review of Clean Tech Revolution here.)

Messrs Siegel, Nelder, and Hodge do know the sector well and have thoroughly researched the various technologies, from solar and wind to geothermal and efficiency. They don't spend as much time visiting with companies as Pernick and Wilder did, but they do offer insights into the benefits and drawbacks of some well-known and some lesser known publicly traded stocks in the sector.

Their overall premise is that "green chip" investing will pay off in ways that blue chip investing once did. Recent Green Chip newsletters indicate they are still bullish on the sector, albeit with tempered enthusiasm over the short term.

"There is little doubt that the companies operating within this industry today," write the authors, "will ultimately become the dominant players int he overall energy generation and transportation mix of tomorrow."

Why? Because "our insatiable energy consumption and lack of conventional supplies to meet our growing demand," the authors write, "this is probably one of the safest long-term bets you can make."

I'd emphasize the LONG term in that sentence and, if you buy this book, make sure you subscribe to Green Chip Stocks as well to keep up on market conditions that will affect the overall profitability of renewable energy.

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