The drought is OVER ...

The drought has officially ended. While many of you may have thought I had been on vacation for months, a fugitive from the innovation law, still recovering from my Celtics winning the NBA championship or "gee another blogger who starts fast and fades like the French swimming relay team anchor" but I have been waiting to blog for a reason. My last blog was about little to no venture-backed IPO's in the US this year; so I thought I would wait and blog when the next IPO went to market. Hence, I waited, waited, and waited.



The wait is now over. Rackspace went public last week; the first venture backed IPO since Cardionet on March 19th; first technology IPO since Valentine's Day ish (sorry Hallmark).



So does this mean the flood of IPOS will begin now? Will the "pearly gates of liquidity" open freely? Some thoughts:



1. No



2. Rackspace is a company with size $300+MM in revenues and profits. It also has been around awhile and has a model of hardware and services that makes sense. Will it commoditized soon? maybe, but for now it's the best we got.



3. One of the uniqueness of my job at OCTANe is to hear "what is going on in the trenches and on the street" .. from hi-tech to biomedical to clean tech. Softness in consumer technology started mid last year, consumer oriented medical products within the first half of this year, clean tech? .. still sexy and getting money like women's based reality shows. (question is what will last?).



4. Early stage money is still not flowing in earnest, but you HAVE to consider this as an opportunity for asset allocation advantages now that the bloom is off real estate (my 2 cents .. another 12 months of real estate weakness for you investors).



5. Now for the good news, for you entrepreneurs and the community, innovation driven businesses that solve real problems are getting funded and I think, always will. During times of softness, focus on the science, the technology and develop value in the business. You can not predict or time the end game, just create value and ultimately you will be rewarded.



So, I am back to blogging on my semi-regular basis. Out.



Gary

Is Obama Technology's first Presidential Candidate?

I was watching a great movie called Recount on HBO last week. The movie stars Kevin Spacey, Dennis Leary and others and is about the Bush-Gore paper "hanging chad" fiasco in Florida during the 2000 election. Really entertaining TV in a day when if it were not for animated movies, we would have little to watch. Reality shows for me are for people without a reality. But I digress.

It got me to thinking, "what if technological advances in voting" had been around in 2000 like they are now in elections? Who would have won? Would Al "Green" Gore have been our President? Possible. Can't "hang a chad" online until 3-D virtual reality comes around. One thing I wouldn't want to see is Catherine Harris in virtual reality, but I digress.


Fast forward to today, Obama (funny how he has elevated to "one name" status with Prince and Madonna) gets the great majority of his fundraising war chest (it is 3X Hilary Clinton) through use of the Internet and the concept of "social communities meet giving". One of the early founders of Facebook has helped design this "technology driven community and donation model".

Hence, since more money brings more votes in most cases, can you make the case that technology, the non-use in year 2000 and the extended use in 2008, is influencing our Presidential election? Could Obama become America's first "technology president"?

Wonder what the future holds for us in the electoral process? Come hear these discussions at the So Cal Digital Tech Forum on June 9 - 10 However, at this pace of technology advancement, I will be voting for an Avatar for President by 2020.

Thoughts?