In this article, Brian digests Morgan Stanley's latest series of reports on the Mobile Internet and pulls out some important conclusions.
Not surprisingly, some of the key forces driving the accelerated growth of the mobile internet include location based services, social networking (Facebook in particular) and the rapid rise of the iPhone/iPod Touch ecosystem.
He goes on to point out that "Morgan Stanley views Facebook and Apple driving independent yet overlapping platforms that are forcing innovation in social and mobile connectivity and communications. Essentially, they are driving growth and ingenuity for one another while setting the stage for a new era of social networking."
Not only will the velocity of this market expansion dwarf that of the Desktop Internet, it will open new opportunities for wealth creation. According to Solis, one of the other key takeaways from the Morgan Stanley report is that ...
"Material wealth creation / destruction should surpass earlier computing cycles. The mobile Internet cycle, the 5th cycle in 50 years, is just starting. Winners in each cycle often create more market capitalization than in the last. New winners emerge, some incumbents survive – or thrive – while many past winners falter."
Exciting times to be in mobile methinks.
First Round Capital Gives Entrepreneurs A Way To Get In On The Portfolio Action
I think this is a very interesting idea ...
First Round Capital is letting its entrepreneurs swap part of their equity for equity in the fund, thereby allowing them to diversify their risk a bit, and participate in the overall success of the fund.
Beyond the diversification strategy, this is potentially powerful stuff, especially for funds with synergistic investments ... i.e. where the entrepreneurs can benefit from supporting and/or cross-leveraging each others products.
Could this be the start of a trend? Dare I say, Venture 2.0?
Read the original TechCrunch article here
4 Sources of Sample VC Funding Docs
In the spirit of Open Source, a number of VC funding documents are popping up around the web. Here are four worth looking at (courtesy of @fredwilson):
- TechStars Model Seed Funding Documents (by Cooley)
- Y Combinator Series AA Equity Financing Documents (by WSGR)
- Founders Institute Plain Preferred Term Sheet (by WSGR)
- Series Seed Financing Documents (by Fenwick & West)
I'm not sure that the concept of "open source" funding documents will ever take off, but I have seen some pretty convoluted and arcane docs in my time, so at a minimum, I do like the idea of a repository of "best practice" or even "sample" documents being readily available, transparent and subject to open debate.
I do hope that better visibility and open discourse lead to improvements in the clarity and simplicity of these types of documents. Sometimes I am stunned at how poorly written funding documents are, as the institutional memory of all things that have gone bump in the night before gets cobbled together into the text like some sort of Dr. Seuss contraption.
Seeding the Future
I love this image of new life, and can't help but be reminded of how fragile and yet full of promise early stage startups can be.
This Scots Pine seedling might be a huge tree one day ... or, then again, it might not survive ... nonetheless, it's still going for it.
Reminds me of that great line from Lord of the Rings "Almost certain death, small chance of success ... what are we waiting for"!
Carpe Diem