Startup companies that see the economic crisis as a scary time with capital in short supply may be missing the larger opportunities that arise when consumers, lenders and venture capitalists cut back. So says Theresa Lina Stevens (pictured), who heads marketing for the Stanford Technology Ventures Program at Stanford University and who works to promote entrepreneurialism in good times and bad.
"This can be a great time to start a business," says Stevens, who noted that many of the most prominent Web 2.0 companies of today were born out of the dust of the Web 1.0 collapse. "When everything else is down, that is the time to start. The pressure is off and you can still find early adopters and you have more room for a learning curve."
Stevens, who also is CEO of marketing consulting firm Lina Group Inc., says economic downturns create stealth-like environments for building new companies, so that by the time the economy rebounds the business is ready for prime time. One lesson from that period--that the Internet not only didn't crumble, but in fact became more refined, sophisticated and ubiquitous--is apt today, says Stevens.
While many of the startups drawing the most interest today are in the clean energy sector, Stevens says there's plenty of room for improvement in the Internet itself, particularly in adapting Web 2.0 capabilities for the enterprise. "In the Internet, you see people taking social networking capabilities into corporations," she says, suggesting that in hindsight the dot-com era was basically "an experimental phase."
"Certain consumers are willing guinea pigs," says Stevens, adding that the next wave for Web 2.0 would be the adoption of Internet technologies by corporations looking to drive costs out of their business. -- Andrea Orr
See June 16 story on prominent early-stage VCs from TheDeal.com
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