Meeting with Nova Spivack from Twine

Nous
avons été très bien reçus dans cette startup basée non pas dans le sud de la baie mais à San Francisco même. Twine a bien d'autres points dedifférenciation par rapport aux autres start-up web que l'on peut
trouver à l'heure actuelle dans la baie.

Tout d'abord son CEO, Nova Spivack n'est pas un jeune aux dents longues tout fraichement sorti de Stanford, mais un pionnier du web, qui en 1994 fonda la première agence web au monde: EarthWeb. Son introduction en
bourse en 1998 fut la première IPO dans l'histoire d'Internet pour une entreprise B-to-B. Lors de la première cotation elle fut aussi la 6ème plus grosse croissance de l'histoire du NASDAQ (+247%). Ce bouddhiste
trentenaire est définitivement un CEO atypique dans la Silicon Valley. Ingénieur spécialisé dans l'intelligence artificielle, diplômé de philosophie, chercheur autour des technologies du web sémantique, diplômé de l'International Space University, école appartenant a la NASA, il a déjà voyagé dans l'espace. Depuis Nova Spivack est redescendu
sur terre pour créer Twine et blogger à ses heures perdues.

Le CEO est un élément très important dans le succès d'une startup mais son équipe et son business aussi. Mais alors qu'est ce que fait Twine de si génial? Et bien c'est très simple, Twine centralise des informations, les lie entre elles, les catégorise, trouve des concepts communs, bref enrichie l'information, la rend plus intelligente. Sans
rentrer dans toutes les fonctionnalités que Nova nous a présenté, ce qu'on peut dire de ce produit c'est que ses possibilités d'évolution sont très très ouvertes. Une information plus intelligente signifie aussi des
publicitées plus ciblées et on le voit aujourd'hui avec Google, le contrôle de la pub sur internet est un métier qui paye très bien. Nous avons eu le droit à une démo en live de Twine avec la création du
premier Twine en langue française, le logiciel a très bien répondu même si le "module FR" n'a pas encore été activé et ne devrait l'être que dans 1 an.

En plus de la démo live de Twine, Nova Spivack nous a aussi offert une visite des locaux de Radar Networks. Ils comportent tous les éléments indispensables à toute start-up de la Silicon Valley qui se respecte :bonbons dans la salle de réunion, tableaux Velleda remplis de toutes sortes de pensées d'employés, salle de jeux garnie et Wii et autres Playstations, et bien sur employés souriants et motivés, apparemment enthousiasmés de travailler sur un projet si attrayant. Il faut dire que le charisme de Nova Spivack n'y est pas étranger : le temps de notre visite, il a su nous communiquer sa passion et sa vision, et même les moins informaticiens des étudiants ont su apprécier et comprendre les enjeux qui se cachent derrière ce que le futur du Web nous réserve.

Visit of Apple

We went to Apple campus and we were well entertained with a brunch and a visit of the Apple Store. We were disappointed by the conference. They gave us only a presentation of their products (computers, ipod, iphone etc) and the second half of the conference was questions and answers.

It was the first time since our arrival in the Sillicon Valley that the working atmosphere was so tense. Apple looks like a company where employees didn't looks like radiant. The security was maximal and people we met look anxious.

We are entrepreneur and we noticed that employees didn't be consulted for innovations and that everybody works on projects they don't know all of it. To illustrate this situation, we can take as example the answer given when we asked about the Apple strategy: "Our strategy is Steve Jobs".

The competition in this line of business can maybe explain their behaviours. One explanation of the atmosphere may be the Mac World happening on the same day.

Meeting with Cynthia Wagner Weick

University of pacific, Stockton, California

The talk was gathering multiple datas from international sources to target what are the main focus to look at, to encourage and finance innovation; to make it successful in a country, and profitable in a world orientated point of view.
The crux is to understand that innovation is a notion in the middle of three main elements: science and engineering, markets and fundings.
Markets opportunities come from the fact that the world is facing currently numerous kinds of challenges as health, food, climate change, energy supply...
Problems arising from these issues can be solved progressively with the improvements the science is likely to bring with its new discoveries going faster and faster within the frame of NICT.
Then, funds are necessary to finance research, and to help new ideas to raise money for investing in new potential developments.
That is why companies, private investors as well as public authorities have all to encourage as much as possible at their level Research, by helping it to become concrete.
One of the main issues in the future would be the capacity of bringing as much patents as possible into application. The trend/expansion of a national economy is drastically linked to the number of patent applications it can issue.
Collaboration and co-authoring is a positive attitude considering the results of such a behavior.
Design has an important place as well to distinguish products and bring an innovation faster to markets.


DAVIER Paul-Etienne, Niamkey Diane
Specialised Master Innovation and Enterpreneurship
ESCP-EAP

Planning du Voyage

Planning du voyage susceptible d'être modifié jusqu'à la dernière minute

Planning San Francisco.xls

Denis Coleman

Denis Coleman Denis Coleman, Entrepreneur, Angel investor and Mentor to early stage companies Denis Coleman is founder, investor, and Mentor of numerous technology and software start-ups in Silicon Valley. In the Biotech sector Coleman is currently the Chairman and President of Solus Biosystems, a startup with a hardware/software platform to accelerate drug discovery by measuring the interactions of proteins and drugs. In the mobile and handheld marketplace, Coleman is Director of Moonstorm (www.moonstorm.com).

Moonstorm is at the nexus of consumer marketing to-the-hand. In Internet marketing, Coleman Founded Claria Corporation (www.claria.com) in 1998, and served as it’s Chairman until 2004. Claria is the leader in online behavioral marketing, serving over 42 million consumers and 900 Advertisers. Coleman Co-Founded Symantec Corporation (NASDAQ: SYMC) in 1983, and served there through 1988 as VP of R&D. Coleman’s other companies include DCL, Wealthcycle (acquired by Loan City), C Level Design Corporation (a EDA company), Financial Engines, Neoforma (NASDAQ: NEOF), Visioneer Communications (merged to form SSFT), and Cognitive Technology Corporation. Coleman has served these companies in many roles including Director, Founder, and Investor.

Denis Coleman holds a BS and an MS in Mechanical Engineering and a MS in Management, all from M.I.T., and a Ph.D. in Management from Stanford University. Coleman has taught on the faculty of Stanford University, and is credited with 14 academic publications and one book.

Introduction

Hello,

Welcome on the blog of the specialised master in Innovation and Entrepreneurship of the business school ESCP-EAP. Our master is dedicated to help students in the starting of their own company.

This year, we are a group of 23 students coming from various schools: management, engineering and chemistry.

The purpose of our 2 study trips is discovering Silicon Valleys of the world.

Our first trip will take place in the Silicon Valley of San Francisco at the beginning of January. We are going to meet famous investors, amazing companies and great entrepreneurs.

The second trip will take place in Israel Valley at the end of March. We are going to study how this country managed to reach the highest rate of start-ups per habitants worldwide.

We hope that you will enjoy our experience through this blog.