This morning Rod’s advice to prospective start-up technology companies was published on the Herald site. It’s a great read for anyone contemplating the move, it appears this was the first in a series of articles – my only request (if you’re reading this Rod) would be to spin more positives into the pointers you give. Let’s here about all those traits and businesses that DO work, we know there’s lots of reasons an routes to failure, let’s celebrate the routes to success.

That said its great to see Rod giving up some of his Hawkes Bay leisure time to help other start-ups.

Ben Kepes

Ben Kepes is a technology evangelist, an investor, a commentator and a business adviser. Ben covers the convergence of technology, mobile, ubiquity and agility, all enabled by the Cloud. His areas of interest extend to enterprise software, software integration, financial/accounting software, platforms and infrastructure as well as articulating technology simply for everyday users.

4 Comments
  • Rod’s article on how (not) to start a business recommends avoiding competing with his neighbours at TradeMe. That’s probably sound advice given the nature of the investor community here.

    New Zealand is too small.

  • I’m with you there Paul. I would advise anyone looking for cash to go overseas…or look for angels with a global perspective.

  • Of course Rod comes from a perspective that TM does it right (he’s on the board after all). I don’t occur with that point of view – their momentum is a result of their huge user base, not a result of them doing things 100%.

    The question remains whether the competitor that out does TM in terms on context, focus, service and value add could steal their thunder.

    What value momentum?

  • I just read his spiel and actually its a reasonable list. I can relate to some of them:

    Founders not wanting to travel overseas: well we do that now..once a month to the US and soon elsewhere.

    Any business only willing to give up 10% for $1m wont get funded: er sorry ..we did.

    handing over the reins: can’t wait 🙂

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.