Laurent Amar

Skype: the 2nd largest phone company worldwide

2009-03-31T20:08:00.003+02:00

I was amazed to read that Skype reached 450 million users. Only the Chinese phone company is bigger and I am not sure that’s the choice of their customers.

Most of us have had unpleasant dealings with phone companies because they feel safe behind their oligopolistic ways and bully consumers. Skype stood up and took the consumer’s side and it worked.

When consumers lack alternatives and think poorly of the service they get, there is opportunity for a great new business. Depending on whether the service can be delivered online or not, you may end up with Skype or EasyJet but in the end, consumers will see the real value.

Think about it,…

How does this work?

2009-01-30T12:31:00.000+01:00

Spain: In 2008 real estate prices went down:

- 3% (official number seen everywhere including the AHE)
- 31% when asking for a mortgage (according to Tinsa - aslo part of AHE

Is it just me?...

My blog is talking to me,…

2009-01-22T15:15:00.001+01:00

I have inserted the Google Video bar in my blog and it automatically puts the best rated videos that talk about “hipotecas”. So far nothing to write home about.

Today for the first time, I saw ranked in position 2 a video that is neither funny nor impressive nor well done. In fact, it’s just as boring as it gets. It’s a boring guy telling people “remember what to look for before you contract a mortgage” he indicates the importance of understanding commissions, insurances, etc….

People apparently watch it (at least YouTube viewers). My blog (YouTube) is telling me that we are on the right track!

Obama vs. Mandela

2009-01-22T10:39:00.004+01:00

Obama has generated a surge of hope in the US and abroad and, while I have no particular interest or knowledge in politics, I believe Mandela was the last (if not the only) country leader to have such a base of followers in recent history.

I can’t help to make the comparison because both leaders were mandated to bring change in trying times and the color of their skin was part of their promise for change.

I remember the hopes of South Africa in 1994. Years later, most people who cheered for Mandela abroad have forgotten these hopes and the South African people are still facing major challenges.

What we should learn from the Mandela experience:

Change comes from the people not only from the leader they elect, no matter how talented or inspirational they may be. Whether we talk about a country, a good sports team or a good startup :-), success lies in the people’s perseverance, stamina and ability to remember everyday their promise to themselves.

The real world…

2008-12-08T11:35:00.003+01:00

It seems the internet is getting better everyday as a mean to communicate values. This weekend, a friend of mine was telling me about “wherethehellismatt” and included in his e-mail “playingforchange” (a great concept and smart play on words for a donation-based business).

These are incredible stories because they show how the “physical world” is starting to mimic the internet.
• Initially the “real” world was translated into a “virtual world”
• Then the “virtual world” changed our activities in the “real world”
• Now the virtual world is changing our values and there is no boundary between “physical” and “virtual” worlds, just two parts of the real world

Matt, Kiva, Playingforchange and others are showing how we can live up to greater values through better transparency, communication and solidarity.

Zopa, (how the internet is deconstructing consumer finance)

2008-10-10T09:04:00.001+02:00

You may have heard of Zopa, a lead gen company in the consumer finance industry. They just announced that they would close their US operations because of the lack of access to credit in the US (where they had deals with 6 credit union).

Companies are born and die every day but in the case of Zopa, they will keep on operating in Italy and in the UK where their model is a P2P model rather than a lead gen.

I find this interesting for several reasons:

It seems that in the current market environment people are more reliable than banks when doing the very job banks are supposed to do: using the extra cash of someone to finance the needs of someone else.

It also shows that European markets, including southern ones, are ripe for consumer finance over the internet.

And, more importantly, that something fundamentally new is happening in consumer finance: Until now, intermediaries always depended on lenders to monetize their access to consumers. This is already no longer the case for less sophisticated products (such as consumer credit).

More than ever, gaining consumer reach and trust is where the value is.

Marketing Magic,… the sequel

2008-09-03T23:25:00.001+02:00

It turns out that Plaxo does not live up to its promise. In my last post I explained how I joined mainly because they seemed to have attracted great professionals but most people I see there are also on LinkedIn while the contrary is not true. So what?

Viral marketing only works if you deliver on your promise
Web 2.0 marketing is different from “old web marketing” because the companies do not control 100% of the quality of their products. They depend on the quality of their communities.
An interface is not a significant differentiation. I recruit on Infojobs which has a terrible interface because there are more and better candidates, I use LinkedIn because they have more and better professionals
1st mover’s advantage remains significant

Marketing magic…

2008-08-12T15:15:00.004+02:00

I just joined Plaxo,… why? Like many people, I had decided to use only 1 network (LinkedIn), so something about Plaxo’s marketing was different, and its not the logo...

Come to think of it, the main reason I joined was the people who invited me. I don't know what, if anything, Plaxo did to attract high quality people but they did and that gave them credibility.

Secondary, yet important factors in which Plaxo certainly played an active role:
- Incredibly easy to use and intuitive
- They do the work for you (a list of nine people “I may know” was on their home page, and I knew 4 of them)
- The feel is different, faster pace and more fun but without reducing their credibility

So what?
- Invest in good viral marketing especially if you have many competitors: The value of recommendation increases as service offering gets commoditized
- Many startups invest most of their funds in technology,… don’t!: Of course, you need outstanding technology in order to even “play” but it is not enough to succeed and make the difference
- Service is key but comes far behind recommendation: The country manager of Viadeo Spain actually spent time on the phone with me and provided as good a service as one can, yet, while I intended to, I never developed my Viadeo network

If any of you knows where to find good insight on how to manage “word of mouth”, “recommendation” or “viral marketing” let me know…

Embrace the change,…

2008-06-18T18:37:00.006+02:00

Robert Redford +Isabella Rossellini+ green movement = Kama Sutra for insects on YouTube

If you wonder how this marvel of modern math became a reason for me to resume my blogging activity, it’s simple: Given my startup I try to understand advertising.

Now that I really confused my (few) readers, let me explain...

I can’t pretend I understand showbiz but, regardless of the actual message or entertainment quality of the 8 clips done by Rossellini for the Sundance institute, I found a business lesson behind that story:

First, I think it is a brilliant use of buzz words: the movies are titled “Green Porno” How perfect is that? Two powerful words that sell on their own and intrigue when put together.

Secondly, it’s about embracing the change: Just like music stars have done it with video clips, Redford and Rossellini are using the internet to strengthen their “personal brand equity”. Ink flows and links are exchanged, all putting their name in the spot light.

These “ads for Sundancechannel.com”, get some traffic and press coverage but how all this generates more “green” (money or minds) is still unclear to me. Maybe that’s not what’s important after all, maybe what is important is the recognition that Youtube has more traffic than TV and that, therefore, it is a better advertising channel…

Now that this truly extraordinary event has confirmed that internet is the place to advertise (and shown the current limitation of traffic monetization), I have even more reasons to go back to my start up and see if I too can get people to embrace the change…

Taking a break

2008-05-17T10:01:00.002+02:00

I have not had so much time to blog lately but I found this video fun... (Thanks Horaci)

Acceleration

2008-04-11T11:01:00.003+02:00

The Spanish mortgage market has seen a shift toward intermediation and toward more complex products over the last few years. Given the current liquidity environment, one might think that it will revert back to traditional products sold through branches but it’s not the case.

In fact, what we see more and more are new and more complex products, introduced by lenders in partnership with large brokers as in this example (and there are many more).

This tells me two things:

Like in the US since August, lenders understand the need to manage the current borrower’s base in the long term and that closing the door to consumers in difficulty will only increase default and reduce the value of real estate (thus of the lender’s collateral)
The “consulting” part of the sales process becomes increasingly valuable to consumers because choosing the right product is no longer about the lowest rate or monthly payment.

The market is getting "smarter / more mature” but progress is still needed. If you read the article, did you pick up on how the product is presented as a solution against the risk of a rising Euribor when, in reality, even if Euribor stayed flat, the product requires increasing payments over time?

Law 2.0

2008-04-10T20:33:00.005+02:00

Let’s start with 2 facts:

Web 2.0 is proving the power of user generated content. We see a faster shift of power toward consumer and, while all the content is not good quality, some great new content would probably never have seen the day of light without it.
Laws, while necessary, are often ineffective. Banks spent billions complying with numerous and complex regulations, dealing with governance and anti-predatory lending laws etc and we have… a subprime crisis.

I am putting these two facts side by side because a recent ruling from the US court indicates that there might be a significant change to the legal framework of Internet coming and that the broad legal shields used so far may, in fact, not be deemed sufficient in the future.

My worry is that introducing more regulations in internet may slow down the pace of development without (like in banking) providing real consumer protection.

I believe the courts would provide more value by judging the ethic of the businesses that are brought in front of them and consumers need more effective advocacy, not necessarily more legal constraints they will end up paying for.

Though of the day: The (not just) American Dream

2008-03-30T14:24:00.005+02:00

“You arrive poor, you work hard and you die rich” that’s what’s called the American dream. Today this well known phrase could change to: “you start from 0, you work hard, you help change the world (and become rich in the process)”.

The internet has created a world where opportunities are a function of your mindset, talent and drive, not of geography. Location helps but the era of Sinatra is over and you no longer have to “make it there”

save the developpers... (from themselves?)

2008-03-27T17:05:00.004+01:00

I just found out about an initiative that I thought was smart: “Save the developers”. Basically, developers who are tired of compatibility issues between IE6 and the other browsers (IE7 or FireFox) have created a small code that detects if the user uses IE6 and proposes to upgrade to 7 or Firefox.

Personally I don’t think it removes the need for developers to make the site work for IE6 because you may suggest to a user to change their browser so they can benefit from the wonders of your site but the reality is that it is your site that has to adapt to the browser of your audience. It is still good to suggest and hopefully get to a point where IE6 users are a minority that could be ignored.

I wanted to see what the suggestion looked like for a user so I went to the website of the initiative. It was so typical of developers that I could not “not blog it”. Don’t get me wrong, I love developers but guys, when you get a good idea think about your audience and how the end product comes across.

This is what I got the first time I tried to connect

The second time, after waiting for quite some time I got one of the ugliest “naked” web page I have seen in years. I am sure it works in 100% of browsers but no one really wants to look at it.

Smart Tata...

2008-03-26T17:12:00.009+01:00

A thought that is neither web 2.0, nor finance…

Regardless of the price paid and of whether Jaguar is back to what it used to be or not, here are a couple of reasons that make me believe it was smart of Tata to buy Jaguar

Transfer of technology: (obvious), Tata’s technology is so far behind that what Jaguar engineers will willingly share will help Tata make better cars and ultimately make an entry into more developed markets
Learning the other markets: By selling jaguar in Europe and the US, Tata will learn what it takes to sell cars there and could prepare to take their future “Tata” global
Risk mitigation: With all the discussion about the potential crash in emerging economies (India or China) finding shelter in luxury goods can be a smart play
Greater distribution for Jaguar in the subcontinent and Asia

Of course people might say that this is bad for Jaguar and few synergies can be found with Mittal but Tata has proven for over 100 years that it had a very strong business sense and succeeded in various industries (creating the first steel mill in India, providing electricity to Mumbai, starting the country’s first airline, and being the first to locally make trains).

What they now need is to prove that they can manage a truly global business and capture the value of synergies,... great challenge ahead !

The espresso dilemma

2008-03-25T16:35:00.003+01:00

I subscribe to the blog of a few successful entrepreneurs. In the last week I read the tips for startups from 2 different ones, both very credible.

One said: “get an espresso machine (and a Wii)” explaining how the company would save money because people will spend less time outside
The other said “don’t buy an espresso machine” because people in a startup should have passion and people with passion work hard anyway.

As an entrepreneur and an extravert, I often seek other people’s feedback. On subjects much more important that the espresso machine, I usually get intelligent and contradictory advice. In the end I can only look for trends (if everyone tells me the same thing), keep common sense in mind and trust my judgment/intuition.

The power’s in your hand

2008-03-24T11:11:00.005+01:00

I just came back from Plugg in Brussels. I went there to learn about other people’s perspective on web 2.0 and to network. I found the event well worth the trip, the presentation and attendance of quality but that’s not the point.

I always believed that internet would enable a massive shift of power toward consumers. It started with price comparison sites and evolved into the various new themes of web 2.0 (social networks, blogs, consumer produced content, etc.). During the conference, most speakers/entrepreneurs, at some point, touched on that. This proves that today’s internet is starting to deliver on the late 90s promises.

So, now that the consumers’ voices have more power the question is: what really is the next big thing?

I believe that in web 2.0, like in web 1.0, companies who figure out a strong revenue model and build capabilities that are not so easy to replicate will prevail. The web 2.0 consumer-facing companies are usually either partial (i.e. selling their own products) or limited in their revenue model (i.e., advertising and little more, etc).

I don’t know about you but I feel like a piece of the puzzle is missing and that more depth is needed to monetize this new value without reducing its ability to feed upon itself. If you want to know what I want to do about it do not hesitate to e-mail me and ask :-)

Coming of age

2008-03-14T14:44:00.005+01:00

According to OJOinternet, the e-commerce in Spain increased by 47% in 2007 and half of the revenue went to Spanish companies. According to the same article, revenues reached €938 Million between April and July 2007.

If we assumed that the average transaction is worth €100, this would mean that every calendar day, 77,307 Spanish consumers complete a transaction online. That's great news but it also shows tremendous opportunities ahead. Indeed, in the last 2 years, there has been an estimated 7 million high speed internet lines installed in Spain so, even if we assumed that all of this was B2C, it would still equate to only 1% of the people with high speed connections.

400 competitors...

2008-03-14T10:20:00.008+01:00

Competitive landscapes...
Part of the reason I am so optimistic about my project is that the European market is, in general, trailing behind the US in terms of mortgage distribution and use of internet. I was talking yesterday with the founder of a company, based in California, who has developed capabilities similar to some of the capabilities I plan to build. During the conversation he mentioned that he had, in the US, 400 competitors. He also mentioned that he recently started to export his technology to 2 other non European countries and found... 0 competitor.

In Europe, the number is not 0 but it certainly is not much more... now more than ever I believe that I need to find some horsepower to get the project off the ground quickly, thinking scale and reach from day one before 400 others do.

Vive la France!

2008-03-12T16:21:00.009+01:00

I used to think that the subprime crisis was imported from the US until a friend reminded me of John Law. Granted, John Law was Scottish but he also was “Controller General of Finance” under Louis the XIV, our very own “Roi Soleil”. While there, Mr. Law pretty much created paper money and, rolled up trading companies.

He then created what would be called today “securities” out of the future trading revenues of these companies. In the process, the value of Louisiana has been “over stated” making shares of the consolidated trading company bubble and, later, leading to a 97% decline in the company’s market cap. Since 75% of the company’s capital was in government bills, this bubble burst made France and the rest of Europe plunge into a huge financial crisis.

John Law, and his paper money

Residual value

2008-03-12T15:23:00.011+01:00

If, like me, you are trying to start a business, think about its residual value, in other words, what will remain if everything goes wrong?

My last business was a small boutique consulting firm where, with a small team, I basically sold my expertise and energy. It did well but once I decided to stop, nothing was left. That was fine because consulting pays in cash rather than equity; however it is not what true entrepreneurs typically look for.

So, back to the subject in the title, how do you know if your business will have residual value? In truth, you can never be 100% sure however, you should think about which capabilities created in your business are unique or hard to replicate and respond to a market need that is expected to be here for a long time. This will sound to many as an evidence… too often when looking at other people’s business plan.

The H word...

2008-03-12T12:39:00.000+01:00

Has Spain gone crazy with mortgages (hipotecas)? Hipotecas are everywhere, every time you talk to someone, the intensity in the discussion goes up immediately after the H word and usually another H word (help) follows within minutes. I found "hipoteca" (or rather the promise of potentially getting rid of it) in milk or olive oil, and my friend Yannick Laclau from www.properazzi.com was telling me yesterday he found it in his salad! (well,... on the bag)

There is a Hipoteca “malaise”, but what else is new? Until we fix this mess I thought we might as well be Mediterranean about it and look for the humor in the situation so I added YouTube videos using the H word as a filter. Whether you speak Spanish or not, you should get a feel for the situation here and hopefully have some fun.

My bottle of olive oil...