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Archive for the ‘Board Of Intellectual Capital’ Category

Are You Ready for the New Peer-to-Peer Economy?

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 12, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Article from GigaOm.

“Unless you really don’t give two hoots about the world of technology, it’s highly unlikely you would have missed the big brouhaha between San Francisco-based startup Square and VeriFone, a payment processing services provider. VeriFone accused Jack Dorsey’s product of not being secure and being easily hackable. Dorsey denied.

This week’s dust-up makes me wonder if VeriFone quite understands its own business. To me, they are a company that provides payment-processing services to big retail outlets, fast food chains and other large transaction volume establishments. That’s what really makes them a good company. Square isn’t going after those customers. It’s going after people who would rather not be VeriFone’s customers. Earlier this year, in a conversation, Square COO Keith Rabois told me that

“Most of our competitors (including the likes of VeriFone and Intuit) focused on 7 million merchants who have the ability to get merchant accounts from say Visa or MasterCard. We are going after 26 million folks who are not merchants in a classic sense.”

When I look at Square, I see a company that’s all about helping payment processing for a different class of customers: you, me and the guy selling apricots at Sunday’s Farmer’s Market. Square is about transactions that are more peer-to-peer in nature. These kinds of transactions are mere crumbs on trail to a much bigger economic trend.

The New Peer-to-Peer Economy

For the lack of a better term, let’s call this trend a peer-to-peer economy. Here, transactions happen between individuals or a group of individuals and not between corporations and individuals.

Just look at AirBnB, a perfect example of a peer-to-peer economy company. It offers a platform for folks to rent rooms (or villas) from other folks. The company takes a piece of the action for making the connection between the buyer and seller — who more often than not, are individuals. Typically, this would be an economic transaction between a traveller and an hotelier. Several other iterations of this basic idea have emerged; for instance, OneFineStay is doing peer-to-peer vacation rentals. RelayRides is another startup that allows you to share cars.

One of the companies I am absolutely fascinated by is New York-based Kickstarter, which I think is less a company and more a socio-economic movement.

KickStarter is a simple site that marries patronage and commerce. Artists come and list their projects and get in touch with friends and supporters, who pledge their money. If the money needed by a project is pledged, the artists get to work. If not, it’s back to the drawing board for them.

In less than two years, Kickstarter has come out of nowhere and is now helping projects raise as much a million dollars a week — from individuals like you and me. It helped raise a lot of money for open-source Facebook rival Diaspora and the iPod watchbands TikTok and LunaTik.

The Network Is the Dollar

This peer-to-peer economy is a throwback to an older way of life, where folks used to barter for goods. It was a different kind of economic transaction, but still it was an economic transaction.

The onset of industrialization brought in mass production and mass consumption into our societies. The Internet and by extension, mobile is going to help change that.

One of the things the Internet enables is our ability to connect with each other very quickly. These connections can go beyond sharing of tweets, photos and links.

The network is a springboard for services and platforms that enable one-on-one (or one-to-many) interactions. The easy to use tools — web and mobile — make it easier for like-minded people to congregate and engage in commerce.

I wouldn’t be surprised if we see more companies try to tap into the shift to the peer-to-peer economy. The winners will be those with big platforms and the likes of Square who provide enablement services. Perhaps next time, VeriFone needs to remember that.”

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Foursquare Grows Up and Beyond the Check-In

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, tagged , , , , , , , , , on March 9, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Article from GigaOm.

“Originally, Foursquare was designed with the goal of “making cities easier to use.” But along the way, it became synonymous with check-ins and the game mechanics behind it. That was a good thing when it was new, unique and fun. But the world has moved on, and so have location competitors, who are looking beyond simple games to expanded deals, bigger competition and recommendations of places. Foursquare is now taking a big leap ahead in its story with version 3.0 as it matures into a much more complete and polished location-based service capable of tackling its original vision.

Founder and CEO Dennis Crowley said in a blog post that the service is now closing in on 7.5 million users after adding about 7 million since last year’s annual South By Southwest event. Users checked in almost half a billion times in the last year. That’s a lot of check-ins, but Crowley rightly understands that the check-in is just a starting place. Now with Foursquare 3.0, available tonight on iPhone and Android, the company has made strides on a number of fronts that should keep it at the front of the location pack.

Interestingly, many of the updates put the focus back on check-ins, but infuse the action with much more meaning. Now users have more reasons to check in to places, instead of just broadcasting their location. Here’s a look at the improvements:

Discovery. Foursquare has been talking about offering recommendation services, just like many competitors, and now with a new Explore tab, users can get suggestions on where to go. The recommendations factor in a bunch of signals, from the places a user and their friends visit and favorite, to the categories and types of places they frequent. Interestingly, Foursquare said it will also tailor suggestions based on the day of the week or time of day. Crowley said the recommendation engine will shine with both basic and quirky inquiries. This is likely why the company was casting about for a data scientist a little while back: so it could build a recommendation engine that made use of all of its data. The Explore feature brings Foursquare up to par with many competitors, though as we’re learning, there are many ways to do recommendations. The Explore feature also puts more emphasis on the check-in, because it helps provide Foursquare with more data to build its recommendations.

Rewards. Foursquare was out early with its game mechanics, but the system has become stale for some time. Now, Foursquare is revamping its leaderboard, awarding points for a wider range of activities. Users can get points for trying a new type of restaurant, visiting a new place, traveling to new cities, getting friends together and many other actions. The leaderboard is now limited to the last seven days. This again re-emphasizes check-ins, because the system rewards a lot of different activities. And the week-long time frame encourages people to keep trying out new things and remaining active. There are still mayorships, which are increasingly hard to get. But with a revamped leaderboard, users have more ways to compete and get recognized for their efforts.

Loyalty. Keeping users engaged is paramount for a service like Foursquare, which can burn through new users if it doesn’t give them a reason to stick around. Now the site is expanding its specials deals for mayors to more sets of people, enabling merchants to engage with customers in a lot more ways. Merchants can now extend specials to swarms, groups of friends, regular visitors, new customers, mayors or to everyone. This is an important element, because it gives people some tangible benefits of participating. Points and mayorships only work for more motivated users, but deals are always attractive.

Foursquare got out early in the location game, but in many ways, it was in need of improvements befitting its status. Crowley said many upgrades didn’t take place as fast as he’d like, because the company had to deal with a lot of internal growth as it increased its headcount to about 40 people. Now, finally, Foursquare’s larger vision is starting to take shape, and it’s a good thing. The company is showing no signs of slowing growth, but the name of the game is engagement, not just downloads. I have no insight into Foursquare’s churn, but it’s a definite concern for any app with a large following like this. Now with some key improvements, Foursquare has a chance to keep those users engaged and grow into something more useful than a real-world game.

UPDATE: Foursquare has provided more information about its updated specials program, which now allows merchants to instantly set up special deals at multiple locations for users and get additional insight into user engagement through a new dashboard. Early partners include Sports Authority, Applebee’s, Radio Shack, Barnes & Noble, Chili’s, Whole Foods, Toys R Us and others.”

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Secrets of Success – an excerpt from “ Good Guys Wear BLACK” – the Life and Times of a Crisis Manager “

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, Ethics & Integrity, Gerbsman Partners on March 1, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Secrets of Success – an excerpt from “ Good Guys Wear BLACK” – the Life and Times of a Crisis Manager “

Over the past 40 years, I have learned and hopefully executed the characteristics for success, outlined below, in good and turbulent times. They are tried and true.

1.  Have Ethics and Integrity – Be Dependable and Responsible

2.  Attitude – Always, Always be Positive

3.  Desire – Have the desire to do the Best You Can

4.  Consistency – Be consistent in good times and challenging times

5.  Ability – Keep on learning- develop new skills – continue your education – listen and most important, it is OK to say “I don’t know” and “I need help”.

6. Take Action and Risks – Don’t be afraid to make mistakes- that is how you learn, that is how you grow

7. Communicate – Communicate – Communicate – People will tell you when to stop communicating and more important, keep interested parties in the loop and you will be respected by all.

8. Listen – one of the hardest things to do, however we all learn something and grow when we listen

9. Always focus on #1 above, nothing else matters.  Have ETHICS and INTEGRITY. Be DEPENDABLE and take RESPONSIBILITY for your actions.

Interestingly, when I lecture at various MBA programs this topic is well received by students.  Comments range from “I am glad this is being discussed” to “Its good to know these values are still important to success”.

In today’s Turbulent Times, hopefully the guidance above will provide a road to success, performance and happiness.

Best

Steve Gerbsman

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Apple, Google’s mobile rivals must play catch-up

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, Business models, FaceBook, google, internet, Investments, Java, Market research, Microsoft, Mobile, mobile 2.0, Mobile Phone Usage, Social Networks, Strategy, Technology, Venture Capital, Web 2.0, Wireless, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Article from SFGate.

“It’s been a big couple of weeks in mobile. Verizon Wireless finally got the iPhone. Hewlett-Packard unveiled the first fruits of its Palm purchase last year. Nokia, the world’s biggest maker of handsets, abandoned its once-dominant Symbian mobile software system and demoted itself to a kind of glorified contract manufacturer of Microsoft-powered devices.

The struggle for mobile dominance has entered a new phase. Why would Nokia throw out Symbian, with its 37 percent market share, in favor of software with less than one-seventh of that? Because recently hired Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop is convinced that Microsoft has better odds of going up against the four other mobile powers – Apple, Google, Research In Motion, and HP – and making its new Windows Phone 7 software a center of gravity for the world’s programmers, manufacturers, and consumers.

“The game has changed from a battle of devices to a war of ecosystems,” Elop told investors at a recent London news conference.

Actually, it’s the same game that created the most valuable franchises in tech history, from IBM to Microsoft to Facebook. All successfully established themselves as “platforms,” in which countless entrepreneurs and programmers developed products and applications that gave value to customers and profitability to shareholders – sucking oxygen away from rivals all the while.

Platform leaders

In the 1960s, IBM trounced Sperry and other mainframe manufacturers by creating a soup-to-nuts stack of hardware, software and services.

In PCs, Microsoft erased Apple’s early lead by signing up hardwaremakers to create cheap machines, and software companies to develop Windows versions of everything from word processors to Tetris.

Facebook vanquished social networks such as MySpace by repositioning itself as a platform – a decision that led to the creation of gamemaker Zynga and other app companies that keep Facebook’s 500 million users hanging around.

What’s different this time is scale.

“Mobile is the biggest platform war ever,” said Bill Whyman, an analyst with International Strategy & Investment. More smart phones were sold than PCs in the fourth quarter, and sales should reach $120 billion this year. That doesn’t count billions more in mobile services, ads, and e-commerce.

This war will probably last for some time, too. Unlike with PCs, where the unquestioned victor – Microsoft – quickly emerged and enjoyed years of near monopoly, no one has a divine right to dominance in mobile. Microsoft crushed its competition by forcing people to make a choice. There were far more software applications for PCs, and most didn’t work on Macs. The more Microsoft-powered machines out there, the more people wrote software for them, the more people bought them, and the bigger the whole system became. Economists have a name for that phenomenon: “network effects.”

Appealing products

All cell phones can talk to each other and handle the same websites and e-mail systems, so winning means making products that function more effectively and appealingly. That sums up Apple’s success.

Steve Jobs figured out long ago that when people spend their own money, they’ll pay for something a lot nicer than the unsexy gear the cheapskates in corporate procurement choose. While others competed on price, Apple focused on making its products reliable and easy to use. Once customers buy an iPhone and start investing in iTunes songs and apps, they tend to stick with the system and keep buying – even though there’s no proprietary lock on the proverbial door.

Apple’s huge sales volume makes carriers and suppliers more likely to agree to its terms. The software that powers everything Apple makes – all variations of the Mac operating system OS X – is as intuitive to developers as Angry Birds is to app shoppers.

The result is economic leverage of staggering power. To create a blockbuster, Apple doesn’t need to spend billions on a start-from-scratch moon-shot of a development project. It just needs to tweak a previous hit.

Take the iPad, which is in many ways a large iPod touch. Apple won’t say how much the iPad cost to develop. Consider these numbers, though: In the year that ended Sept. 30, during which Apple introduced the iPad and the iPhone 4, the company spent $1.8 billion on research and development. Over the same period, Apple’s revenue increased by $22.3 billion. Nokia spent three times as much as Apple on R&D – $5.86 billion – and increased revenue by just $1.5 billion. No wonder that Apple, whose share of total global mobile-phone sales is only 4.2 percent, gets more than half the profit generated by the industry, according to research firm Asymco.

Fast-growing Android

Even Google, Apple’s mightiest rival, got only a $5 billion increase in sales on its $3.4 billion R&D budget. It does have plenty to show for its efforts, though: Its Android platform is growing at a blistering pace. In the fourth quarter, according to research firm Canalys, twice as many Android devices shipped as iPhones.

“Google is being far more aggressive in building its platform than Microsoft ever was,” says Bill Gurley, a partner at Benchmark Capital.

Barring big surprises, the other contenders – RIM, HP, and Microsoft – are in for a slog: too dependent on mobile devices to give up, yet lacking the tools to make much progress. All lost market share in 2010 and have far fewer apps available for their devices.”

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Successful “Date Certain M&A” of Medical Device companies, its Assets and Intellectual Property

Posted in Board Of Intellectual Capital, boic, Distressed Intellectual Property, Distressed IP, Gerbsman Partners, Inetellectual Property, Life Science, LinkedIn, Medical Device, National Venture Capital Association, Venture Capital, Venturebeat on February 22, 2011| Leave a Comment »

San Francisco, February, 2011

Successful “Date Certain M&A” of Medical Device companies, its Assets and Intellectual Property

Steven R. Gerbsman, Principal of Gerbsman Partners, Kenneth Hardesty, James Skelton, James McHugh and Dennis Sholl, members of Gerbsman Partners Board of Intellectual Capital, announced today their success in maximizing stakeholder value for two venture capital backed, medical device companies. These companies were in the obesity and cardiac mitral regurgitation spaces.

Gerbsman Partners provided Crisis Management and Investment Banking leadership, facilitated the sale of the business unit’s assets and its associated Intellectual Property. Due to market conditions, the board of directors made the strategic decision to maximize the value of the business unit and Intellectual Property. Gerbsman Partners provided leadership to the company with:

1,  Crisis Management and medical device domain expertise in developing the strategic action plans for maximizing value of the business unit, Intellectual Property and assets;
2.  Proven domain expertise in maximizing the value of the business unit and Intellectual Property through a Gerbsman Partners targeted and proprietary “Date Certain M&A Process”;
3.  The ability to “Manage the Process” among potential Acquirers, Lawyers, Creditors Management and Advisors;
4.  The proven ability to “Drive” toward successful closure for all parties at interest.

About Gerbsman Partners

Gerbsman Partners focuses on maximizing enterprise value for stakeholders and shareholders in under-performing, under-capitalized and under-valued companies and their Intellectual Property. Since 2001, Gerbsman Partners has been involved in maximizing value for 67 Technology, Life Science and Medical Device companies and their Intellectual Property and has restructured/terminated over $795 million of real estate executory contracts and equipment lease/sub-debt obligations. Since inception in 1980, Gerbsman Partners has been involved in over $2.3 billion of financings, restructurings and M&A transactions.

Gerbsman Partners has offices and strategic alliances in San Francisco, Boston, New York, Washington, DC, Alexandria, VA, Europe and Israel.

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