I’m not going to call out any of the companies that presented at TC 50 or DEMO, but a lot of them didn’t seem to be companies at all. In fact, a lot of them were just applications or features. I suppose this is what Ms. Estrin is talking about in her new book, “Closing the Innovation Gap.” Now I’m not saying that some of these features or applications weren’t cool little things to play around with, but for these guys to go for funding and call themselves companies, just doesn’t seem right to me.
A lot of what I have seen revolves around creating new communities in different areas, for example a birdwatching community, a community for the recently deceased (don’t ask), etc. When asked about how they make money, many of the companies on stage stammered and said they weren’t sure yet but they are looking into it. Is that an answer? When I think of a business or a company I think of a self sufficient entity that is generating some sort of income.
What’s even more interesting is that Jason and Arrington selected these companies and it really made me wonder why? I’m not trying to question anyone’s judgement (yes I am) but when I see a company that wins the TC 50 that is an exact copy of twitter but with “groups,” it makes me wonder. Why did those 52 companies get selected and why did that “one” company win?
This bring me to the main point of this post which is do you need to actually be a company to go for funding? It seems to me that we aren’t funding companies anymore we are funding features and applications. We are funding bells and whistles in the hopes that they will one day actually become a part of a company. I don’t want to say that all of the companies at TC 50 or DEMO were garbage because they weren’t, in fact there were some amazing technologies presented (like Swype).
What’s your overall impression with what we are funding? Are you seeing more applications and features as opposed to actual sustainable businessess?
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