Morettini on Management

General Management and Marketing Advice for Software and Tech Companies

Tag: business model

Starting and Growing a Software Company in a Difficult Fundraising Environment

Some would say that it’s ALWAYS a difficult time to raise funds for a startup company. In general, I’d agree. With the exception of a few brief moments, such as pre-Internet Bubble in the late 90’s where money was being thrown around like air, fundraising is hard. There are a few lucky folks that don’t sweat this startup task, like repeat entrepreneurs who hit it big the first time, or those with truly obvious ground-breaking IP. But for most it’s a grueling and soul-sucking necessity.

 Today fundraising for a startup company is tougher than every. The Venture Capital (VC) business is in disarray, with the number of active firms in the process of shrinking. The financial crisis and general economic malaise has made finding capital from nearly every source more difficult, from traditional banks to angel investors. So if you’re planning on starting a company today, it might be time to get creative.

 Most of the ideas presented here are applicable to any type of company. But for those smart about it, a software-based business is one that can be started and grown with minimal, or zero, outside capital. This has always been true in the software business, but a number of developments have made bootstrapping even a more realistic possibility today. You will need to accept upfront that it can be done, and structure everything you do with minimal financial resources in mind.

 Successfully bootstrapping is tough if you’re a first time entrepreneur, especially for those that have been working in large companies, with all the trapping that come with that. But embracing the proper attitude early on is essential if you’re going to have to bootstrap your company, at least in the beginning. Let’s examine some tactics that can increase the odds of startup success:

 Understand early-on the level of capital you’ll have available

This is crucial. Most get going on their business, moving ahead and worrying about funding once they have a business plan, prototype/beta, etc. Only then do they put together an investor pitch and think about how much money to raise. But it can be really helpful to have a realistic view as early as possible how much money will be available to you in the early days. No question this is hard to do and by definition the result will be inaccurate. In reality, a number of things will dictate how much money you’ll have available: Management team reputation and track record, investment contacts, dilution philosophy, local investment resources, business model, IP, etc. The key point here is to do your best to understand how much money you’ll realistically have available at startup and early on….

 Structure your business accordingly

….then design your business model to fit your prospective available funding. In reality, this rarely happens. Most design their business, and then try to raise money to fund it. As a result, for example, I see people start enterprise software companies, with complex products at high price points that demand a team of outside sales reps and field engineers with $150-250K comp plans. Most startups won’t be able to attract the funding to support this sales model. Or adopting a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) approach, without planning for the added operational expenses required with a SaaS model, essentially taking on the role your clients IT department. If you can match your business model to your expected capital resources from the beginning, your chances of success go way up.

 Start while you’re still working

One of the best things a startup entrepreneur can do is to start working on your business while you still have a job. This is especially true of the technically-skilled software company founder. Many software companies have been started by a sole programmer, writing the initial product on his or her laptop while sitting at home in the kitchen. It’s one of the beauties of the software business; you can create a product with very little capital investment. Of course, care needs to be taken that you don’t use any of your employer’s resources or do anything on company time. Make sure that you aren’t violating any of agreements signed with your employer. But once you stop working to start up a new venture there’s no telling when your personal income will start flowing again. So do as much as you can, before cutting the cord with your steady income.

 Do it yourself and don’t be wasteful

Entrepreneurs often find that they can actually do things they never dreamed they could. When dealing with scarce capital, it’s critical to make sure that you actually NEED to pay someone else to accomplish a particular task before parting with your cash. This will lead to personally doing a lot of mundane activities that you don’t really want to do. But it’s important to take those duties on early on to conserve cash. Also try not to waste money on ANYTHING, not just labor. Count those paperclips! The corollary to this is when you really do need outside help, DON’T SKIMP and just do an unacceptable job internally. Bad marketing is an example of this for the technically-oriented founder. This can be truly penny wise and pound foolish, and can cost you much more money in the long run than you save in the short term. Recognize what skills you just don’t have that are absolutely critical to the business, and save money elsewhere so you can afford outside assistance in those crucial areas.

 Don’t reinvent the wheel

I referred earlier to it being easier than ever to build a software company with minimal capital. Development tools have matured to make development quicker than ever. Many target platforms have much less memory constraints, reducing the time needed to produce code that is extremely memory-efficient. There are many pre-built modules for standard functions available for a modest cost. Ten years ago it might have taken a half million dollars to build a quality website that you now can replicate for a few thousand dollars. As a software startup, make sure that you scour all pre-existing resources for things that you can use, before you build them yourself.

 Outsource and off-shore, if appropriate

Another area responsible for much lower costs in starting a software business is the potential for outsourcing/offshoring. This isn’t for every company or every situation, but where it makes sense, it can both reduce your costs significantly and expand the availability of critical development resources. While everyone would prefer the developers under their own roof, in many cases there just isn’t the right talent where the company is located–or the budget to fully staff with full-time, onsite employees.

 Don’t ignore international markets

A big area which most software companies ignore initially for their products is international sales. It’s natural to want to focus on your domestic market first. But doing this exclusively can cost you some excellent growth opportunities, even from the very beginning. This is particularly true for US-based companies. The US is the toughest market in the world. It’s the biggest, and the bulk of the software industry is located there (all looking at the US market first….). As a result, the competition is almost always less in non-US markets. So there is low hanging fruit to be had, plus you can partner in many markets with distribution partners whom have existing market presence, and can take on much of the marketing investment required to gain traction. All of this can mean an excellent return on a modest investment. Once you’ve invested so much to create valuable product IP (which is very “perishable”, by the way), don’t limit your return on that investment by focusing on a narrow geography, if at all possible.

 Don’t give up and enjoy the journey

Don’t ever give up prematurely. The most important thing is to keep grinding until you start to gain traction. Starting up and growing a software company is an exciting–and difficult–endeavor. Above all, I believe you need to be able to enjoy the journey, in addition to having your eye on the end prize–success. There will be difficult times where you need the willpower and stubbornness to push through. Often startup success is found by staying alive long enough for good fortune to find you.

 That’s my advice on starting up a software company and growing it in relatively tough times. Post a comment if you have your own experiences to add.

Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

3 Comments by admin on August 8, 2010
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, General Management, Startup/Early Stage, enterprise software
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Selling SaaS through the VAR Channel

The move toward Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is the strongest trend in the software business in recent memory. It changes the software business model in a number of fundamental ways. For the purposes of this article, I’m assuming the reader has a basic understanding of the SaaS business model. I’m also going to assume a basic understand of what a Value Added Reseller (VAR) is and does. I’ll focus on the fit between SaaS and the VAR distribution channel.

 The VAR channel has been a major factor in the B2B software business for a long time. There are tens of thousands of VARs, most of them now focused on specific vertical markets. While it is still possible to find a horizontal VAR, in a market of any size you’ll likely find a nice number of VARs specializing on that segment of customers. As a result, anyone who is selling software (whether via traditional licensing or SaaS) would love to have this stable of key market influencers representing their product. Let’s take a look at the situation:

 Major SaaS strengths

  •  Simplicity of startup for the customer – For many SaaS apps, getting started is as simple as signing up, obtaining a user name and password. Contrast this with the lengthy, complex and sometimes extensive setup and configuration period for some B2B apps. (This strength is a potential problem for VARs).
  • Available from any web browser - This is one of the great capabilities driving the SaaS revolution. Of course, traditional apps can have a web-based interface as well, but SaaS apps by definition are web-centric. Browser-based apps can limit functionality in some cases, but is becoming less of an issue all the time.
  •  Simplicity of maintenance for the vendor - This is a big one. With traditional on-premises apps, the vendor has to deal with “pushing” updates to the client, often into wildly varying hardware and software environments. With SaaS, the vendor presses a button and the new version is universally available to everyone. This is a huge advantage leading to reduced rollout costs for the vendor, and less pain for the client. (Also a potential problem for VARs) 
  • Less IT infrastructure required by clients - Theoretically a company could nearly eliminate their IT department by adopting all SaaS apps. As a practical matter, this isn’t happening in companies of any size, and likely won’t. But any reduction in reliance on perennially overworked IT departments is usually seen as a good thing. (Potential problem for VARs, but also an opportunity)

 Major VAR motivations

 Sell Services (not products) – Contrary to the expectations of channel neophytes, VARs are generally seriously interested in products to the extent that they have the ability to generate service revenue for the VAR. (Early SaaS models eliminate many traditional service revenue streams)

 Secure ongoing revenue – VARs don’t own intellectual property(products) to stabilize long-term revenues as a rule, so they’re always interested in ways of “smoothing out” their business with predictable, ongoing revenue streams. (SaaS eliminates much traditional service revenue, but subscriptions open up new possibilities)

 Maintain client control – VARs are very sensitive about retaining control of the relationship with their clients. They view these relationships as hard-won, and without owning the intellectual property, they are probably the most strategic aspect of their business. (VARs shy away from vendors who try to wrest account control from them, and many new SaaS vendors have this “direct-first” mentality).

 The Gap

 The problem as discussed in the above paragraphs is that the ways VARs traditionally make money (installation, training, integration, customization, support, client control) have been eliminated or severely reduced as opportunities by first generation SaaS vendors. Frankly, it’s never been easy for any software vendor to recruit VARs who are “active” with their products. The current situation sets up the typical first generation SaaS vendor as an arch- enemy to VARs. The SaaS vendors aren’t attractive partners due to the lack of potential service revenue (and often aren’t looking to partner), but are targeting the VAR’s customer base. To some, it looks like the end of the VAR channel for anyone running a SaaS-based company. Sound like a caution sign to SaaS vendors, one which makes the vendor focus strictly on direct selling? Maybe–but let’s explore a few ideas for changing the equation.

 Ideas on how to bridge the gap and attract VARs to your SaaS offering

 There are some forward-thinking SaaS who have been able to leverage the VAR channel for their companies. But at this point, they are few and far between. For many of the reasons stated in the above paragraphs, there is no established, tried and true model for attracting VARs to a SaaS offering today.

The biggest thing I’d like you to consider with respect to the sentence underlined above, is that when things are least established, there is the MOST opportunity for newcomers. Since there is no established perfect SaaS/VAR cooperative business model yet, no SaaS player is dominating in this still very influential channel. For a newcomer, this creates great opportunity and potential payback for creative approaches. Let’s take a look at a few such ideas to attract VARs:

 Design your SaaS offering from the ground up for easy customization and integration

Unfortunately I don’t see many SaaS vendors considering channel strategy when designing their first product. In the early days of SaaS, enabling customization and integration with other products was tough to do. Now the tools are there to make it very possible, but it’s a lot harder if you try to do it “after the fact”, once your architecture has been set and the first commercial release is done. This one step can be a huge asset when you are later trying to design programs attractive to VARs, and it can of course be a huge advantage with certain end users as well.

 Offer solid upfront margins, but focus on downstream revenue streams for your VARs

I recommend offering competitive upfront-sale margins, but going overboard here can be a waste of resources. Remember that VARs don’t build their business on upfront product sales revenue. Focus on finding ways VARs can make money dealing with you after the initial sale is complete. As an example, how about sharing downstream subscription revenue–but only if the VAR creates X amount of new sales revenue for the year? This is an example of a win/win which could lead to great loyalty to your offerings, tying the VAR’s interest to your business in the long run.

 Instead of building a large in-house consulting team, use VARs to help fill IT gaps for your customers

VARs have a lot of capability to offer services that your end users might require and demand. Rather than competing with VARs (and using scarce capital that could be deployed elsewhere), take a look at creating programs to utilize the best of your channel partners as your outsourced consulting team.

 Create a program to enable the outsourcing of upfront product training to your VARs

Initial product training is a great example of a “consulting service” to outsource to your channel. Most product groups see training as a necessary evil and an afterthought, often giving it away for free–while providing it with insufficient attention from the end user’s perspective. With the right tools, a VAR could turn this into a profit center for their business, reducing your utilization of key resources on a non-core activity, while tying the VAR tightly to your products.

 Be careful to allow your VARs to continue to lead in account management activities

In everything you do, keep in mind that the VAR is paranoid about account control (with good reason, unfortunately). Remember, you are in a business partnership with the VAR, and you need to trust them to do the right things for your joint business interests in the account. If you don’t feel like you can trust a particular VAR in this regard, don’t change your program to wrest account control from your channel. Stop doing business with that VAR.

I’m optimistic that adopting a few of these ideas can give you a leg up over the competition in building a productive channel business. I hope that you’ll find this article provocative, if not accurate in your view! This is an emerging, rapidly changing environment. Please post a comment with your own thoughts to expand the discussion.

Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

2 Comments by admin on July 18, 2010
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Distribution Channels, Product Marketing/Management, SaaS, VARs, enterprise software
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Is HP acquiring Palm a good idea?

To answer the question posed in the title, it definitely is if you’re Palm!

A long time player and sometime innovator in the mobile device marketplace, Palm was rapidly losing steam, market share and relevancy in the hyper-competitive Smartphone market. The company had staked its future on its new WebOS software platform and the recently release Pre SmartPhone.

 After a long period of decline due to an aging product line built on an obsolete software platform, the Palm Pre and its WebOS software was introduced to critical acclaim by industry reviewers and pundits. Had these introductions come a few years ago, they might have indeed turned around Palm’s fortunes.

 But competition in the SmartPhone marketplace has heated up to a white-hot level. After a promising early start, sales momentum of the new Pre products stalled, and this “last-stand” product introduction proved to be too little, too late. At nearly the first sign of Pre sales weakness top Palm executives began bailing out, while Telco partners quit promoting the product heavily, and it was also being dropped from the assortment of major retailers such as Radio Shack. The end was clearing in sight for this handheld industry pioneer.

In swoops HP to save what little shareholder equity was left. HP is on a roll, and in conjunction with their upward momentum they seem to be intent on acquiring everything available for sale, as well as competing in nearly every category of the technology business. This particular acquisition appears to me to be particularly high risk/high reward. It raises several key questions:

 Did HP pay too much?

Probably. The price HP is paying for Palm is about $1.2M, while most knowledgeable industry observers had placed the value below $500M. This is hard to understand for the casual observer, but you must remember that a company is worth what the highest bidder is willing to pay. Except for those on the inside of the deal-making, no one knows what the sizes of the competitive bids were. So it’s a bit pointless to speculate whether they paid more than they needed to. The better question is what is the intrinsic VALUE of Palm to a company like HP?

 A case can be made in this situation for bidding at a price that will prevent the transaction from dragging out. Software loses value quickly–especially in a fast-moving market like SmartPhones, and this is largely a software acquisition. Another big key to the valuation question is whether or not HP is able to hold together and retain the Palm team, especially the key developers. In most cases, buying a software business (which is the key asset of Palm) without the team is nearly worthless.

 Can HP compete in the SmartPhone business, and should they?

This is a huge question in my mind. Hewlett Packard is definitely becoming the 10,000 lb gorilla in the tech business. But even the biggest giants reach a limitation on resources, most importantly senior management bandwidth and market segment knowledge. IBM at one time looked much like HP today, competing actively in nearly every important technology market. Eventually IBM lost traction and did a painful restructuring focusing on services. Microsoft is huge and still dominant in software, but they’ve been far from successful everywhere they’ve invested. There are many examples in the tech business of competing in too many competitive markets at once. The often-used analogy (which still rings true) is to Hitler opening up a two front war by invading Russia. The old joke goes that had he been more focused, we might all be speaking German today. I am very skeptical of Hewlett Packard being able to win in all of the major markets they appear to be serious about at the moment.

 Can putting two losers together ever create a winner?

Not usually. I can’t think of a single high profile successful instance of this, although I’m sure it’s happened before. It usually doesn’t work in such a highly competitive market as SmartPhones, however. Palm was around 5% market share and fading fast.  HP is very successful overall, but its iPaq SmartPhone has less than .1% market share–I’ll bet most of you are shocked to hear that HP was even in the SmartPhone market prior to this deal! When there is a reason that both companies are unsuccessful, it’s very difficult to change the equation simply by combining. Mergers often create more problems then they solve, regardless of how good they look on paper.

 Having said all this, there is some synergy here. There is a belief is that one reason the Pre wasn’t gaining much traction was Palm’s precarious financial position. No one wants to carry around a phone that could soon become an orphan. The HP acquisition should help immensely on that front. Hewlett Packard certainly has the financial might, industry muscle and influence to improve the position of a well regarded platform like the Palm Pre and WebOS platform.

 Will HP be patient and persistent enough to win in SmartPhones?

To me this is the biggest question. If you asked me 10 years ago I would have said no. As a former HP employee, at one time this wouldn’t have been the type of market that I would expect Hewlett Packard to have success. But since them I’ve seen the company persevere for decades as an also ran in the low margin, down and dirty PC business, and finally push Dell out of the top spot. There was a time when Dell (and a few others) used to laugh at HP in the PC market–but that ended a while ago.

 I’m convinced that this ever more powerful version of HP can succeed in SmartPhones if they so choose. But as discussed above, even in a giant company like this, can they win so many tough fights across so many difficult market segments? That is a different question entirely–and something may have to give. They might not be able to win on all fronts.

 Bottom line

The bottom line for me is that HP can probably muscle their way into the SmartPhone market if they want to bad enough. But can they do it while they also compete with Cisco in networking, IBM in services, and Dell in PCs–just to name a few? Even for a successful industry giant like Hewlett Packard is today, I believe in the concept of “biting off more than you can chew”. That is the real risk. One thing I think for sure is that this won’t play out quickly. Only time will tell whether HP ultimately has the market knowledge, patience, tenacity and will to win in this hit-driven and brutally competitive market. What’s your take on this high profile acquisition? Post a comment to rev up a discussion.

 Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

3 Comments by admin on May 14, 2010
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Mergers & Acquisitions, Retail, hardware
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The Future of Venture Capital Funding in High Tech

Like almost every aspect of the current economy, Venture Capital Fundings of High Tech and Software startups are way down.

There is pressure on virtually every segment of our economy, and the worldwide financial system is in by far the greatest disarray of our lifetime. The preferred exit strategy for Venture Capitalists, the IPO, pretty much shut down quite a while back. Financial returns at Venture funds have taken a hit like everything else financial, and VCs are definitely not in good position to attract new capital in the near term–given the current frantic flight to quality by investors. Things look dire in the VC business. There are even suggestions by many people, including some prominent VCs, that the long running and revered Venture Capital business model is “broken”, and that it will cease to exist as we now know it.

So what really is going to happen? Is the end of the world near? (well…maybe, based on the news headlines every day). Will a software or technology entrepreneur be able to fund their company via the VC route in the future? Let’s take a look at some of the things I expect to see happen.

SHORT TERM AND LONG TERM IMPLICATIONS
First of all, I don’t believe the end of the world is near. Nor do I think that the Venture Capital business is going away. There is a fair bit of pain left to go in this very down economic cycle, and the VC business will be no exception. So in the short term, new VC funds will have a difficult time raising money, startup capital will remain very tight, valuations will be lower and the whole experience of raising money will be even more painful than normal (and it’s always painful). Many VC-backed startups which haven’t gotten sufficient traction have been told if they don’t have 12-18 months of cash in the bank, additional funds won’t be forthcoming. But make no mistake, there are software and tech companies closing funding rounds every day. VCs still have not deployed a very large amount funds they raised in better times–that money needs to be put to work. There is still money out there in the short term for deserving business plans. And in the long run, the economy will rebound and things will go back to “normal”. I do believe that the Venture Capital business needs to make some adjustments, however–so it will probably be a “new normal”.

HOME RUNS VS. SOLID SINGLES AND DOUBLES
One of the staples of the VC business model has been finding “home runs”, meaning those companies that can grow large enough for an IPO. These are few and far between. VCs have always said they would gladly invest in 5 to 10 failures to find that one big hit. The IPO market has essentially gone away for the time being, which puts a lot of pressure on the basic premise of how to make money as a VC. I’ve always thought the “big hit” model was lunacy, and akin to throwing darts at a board–it’s so hard trying to pick out who the huge winners are going to be a startup stage. There’s a lot of luck involved in a company getting to an IPO, and even more luck involved in picking them out at birth. This strategy seemed to work fine when the markets were consistently heading up and to the right, and quite a few companies could do an IPO and get a billion dollar market cap. But I’ve always thought the very basis of investing and company building is in finding those companies that can give you a return on your money, skillfully balancing risk and reward. Considering those companies that have truly developed a strategic advantage and a sound business plan, some of them may get very big, others not so much–depending upon the specifics of their target market and business. But VCs for years have been basing investment decisions almost solely upon huge markets and the potential for the big hit. I think it was lazy investing, and that part of the VC business model may need some adjustment.

VC COMPENSATION MODELS
As VC fund size and limited partner returns increased during this golden era of VC funds, so too did the compensation to the General Partners of the fund. When funds and returns were outsized, limited partners swallowed hard or looked the other way. It’s analgous to a mutual fund with a hefty management fee–when the returns are great, it’s no problem. But in times like today, the small fees associated with an index fund look pretty good compared to that underperform mutual fund with active, expensive management. VC fund Annual Management Fees which have typically been in the 2-3% range will likely be reduced, or maybe even go away entirely. The 20% carry standard will probably hold, and may even go up and bit if there is heavy pressure to reduce the management fees. LPs won’t mind the carry if they are realizing good returns. What does this mean for the software/tech entrepreneur? It may not mean much, on the surface. But I do think it will require VCs to do more homework on their potential investments, which possibly gives an edge to those entrepreneurs will less dramatic, smaller business plans, but better risk profiles.

THE OXYMORON OF “LATE STAGE VENTURE CAPITAL”
I’ve always thought that the idea of “late stage” venture capital was kind of a joke. However, the Venture Capital business has been moving this direction for quite a while. Part of the reason is that VC funds have gotten so big that it’s hard to deploy all of the money with “real” startup investing. And also it’s a less risky way to get to that big IPO payoff. But really, these late stage funds have gotten pretty similar to Private Equity firms, except their time horizon may be shorter. So maybe these investors should really just be re-classified–in many ways they don’t look anything like their early stage brethren. At this stage, there are usually many other potential sources of capital. I believe that this late stage segment of the venture capital business is one that is due to shrink the most in the near term.

CAPITAL-EFFICIENT BUSINESSES VS. KISSING FROGS TO FIND THE “BIG ONE”
I think that the Venture business will trend back to true startup investing, and will reduce it’s reliance on the long home run as its basic method of making money. This is where they really add value to the “business-creation value chain”. What I expect to see is a renewed search for businesses which are “capital efficient”. What I mean by this are companies that will turn an invested dollar into a high multiple of that investment, in terms of revenue, profits and valuation. You might say this has always been true. But the key difference, I believe, is that that venture funds will be smaller, and as a result will feel less pressure to fund high risk, high ceiling businesses where a lot of capital needs to be deployed. As I stated earlier, VCs with large funds have previously felt that the economics of their business demanded this approach. With smaller funds, I believe that capital efficient businesses in smaller markets will no longer be ignored. Solid singles and doubles may come back in vogue (for those of you that understand baseball analogies!).

IS MONEY REALLY “SMART’? OPERATIONAL EXPERTISE VS. FINANCIAL GUYS
I’ve always felt that the idea of “smart money” has always been a fallacy, or least one that was greatly overblown in the Venture Capital business. I know that there are A LOT of people that will disagree with me on this point. A lot of startup advisors will tell you that it’s imperative to raise money from investors who will provide much more than cash. I think it’s a bunch of malarkey. No doubt that there are some experienced, skilled and very well-connected VCs that can provide a strategic advantage to entrepreneurs, who are fortunate enough to attract them as investors. But with money being a commodity, this is mostly about a VC firm trying to differentiate and provide a value-add. Fundamentally, the need for capital and the need for advice and other business assistance aren’t tied at the hip. Both are o
ften needed, but they don’t need to come from the same place–they are important, but separate ingredients to the successful startup recipe. If you can get both in one package, that’s great. But too many VCs present themselves as experts in areas where they’ve really just been investors. This is especially true for those many VCs that come from a financial background, rather than from a high tech startup management background. Frankly, entrepreneurs need to be careful of utilizing faulty advice, regardless of whether it comes from someone who has put money in their company or not. Having money in a pocket should not be confused with operational knowledge or expertise. I’m not sure whether it will happen or not, but I’d like to see the Venture Capital business present a more realistic view of the value that they are adding–it’s not the same in all cases.

SUMMARY: WILL VC FUNDING GO AWAY?
The short answer is “definitely not”. I do think that the bubble excesses have highlighted some weaknesses in the Venture Capital model. There will be adjustments to it–just like there will be adjustments in many other businesses, as a result of our economic duress. I’ve offered some ideas to get everyone thinking–please feel free to disagree, or otherwise add to the discussion. I’d welcome everyone to post a comment, if you have an additional take on this always interesting topic.

Phil Morettini
PJM Consulting
www.pjmconsult.com

No Comments by admin on March 2, 2009
filed in Financing, Startup/Early Stage
tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

System Integration vs. Product Development

I’ve recently engaged on assignments with two new clients. Both of them have businesses selling to large, blue chip customers. Customers of the size that are used to “having it their way”; as a result, getting a deal with them often includes the need for a lot of customization.

The interesting thing about these two clients is how they perceive and approach that need to customize.

A Tale of Two Companies

Company A views customization somewhat as a pain and distraction, something to be controlled–I am assisting them with creating a standard solution offering menu outlining the “Base” offering, with a list of options available at an added cost. They really want to discourage certain customizations, absolutely won’t do some things that will be asked, and want to make sure that they charge dearly for items that they find painful. They have the classic mentality of a product company; they want to do the amount of customization necessary to make a large sale to this important customer–but NO more than they have to.

Company B, which also considers itself a product company, has a very different mentality about customization. They welcome it, pride themselves on it, and position themselves to these potential large clients as someone that can quickly bring solutions to the client, customized to their desires. They want their big account reps to be scouring the big accounts for unique pain points or opportunities, which might fall within the company’s core capabilities, enabling them to propose a customized solution. In fact, up till now, their product development approach has really been to find out what individual accounts want–and build it for them.

So which of these two business models is the best way for technology companies to go?

System Integration Business Models

Advantages:
*More flexible and able to change with shifts in the marketplace
*Not as capital-intensive due to less “betting” on upfront product development
*Easier to grow business organically with internally-generated capital than in a product business

Disadvantages:
*Less risk due to lower upfront investments
*More competition; System Integration is an “easier-entry” business
*Generally lower operating margins
*Growth is less scalable than a product-oriented company

Product-Focused Business Models

Advantages:
*Provides greater opportunity for strategic advantage and resulting fast growth
*Less competition if a product/brand/technology differential advantage is created
*Can scale much quicker if a hit product is developed
*Higher operating margins if product is successful
*Usually more marketing-driven and less labor-intensive
*If creating a very large company is the goal, much easier to raise outside capital

Disadvantages:
*Much more risk of “crib death”, resulting in complete capital loss if first product has problems in development or marketing
*Harder to “get over the hump”; success is harder to come by, and success often happens as a step function after a difficult startup period

First of all, I want to emphasize that there isn’t necessarily a “wrong” approach with either of these business models. You can make a lot of money pursuing either model. Both of the companies I have used as models have managed to attract blue chip customer which would be the envy of any company. What we are really talking about here is the difference between a classic product-driven company and a system integrator.

Company A is that classic product-driven company. They customize when they have to, but also have a point where they will say “no”.

Company B also self-identifies itself as a product company, and in fact they have built their business around a small number of standard offerings. But as their core strategic advantage they really are utilizing relationships, the ability to customize beyond what standard product companies (especially larger ones) are willing to do, as well as to react very quickly to customer requests. They’ve built a very nice business doing this, but have some frustrations as well. They are highly dependent upon a small number of major accounts for virtually all of their revenue, and have the major revenue/profit swings that are associated with this type of business–up one year, back down the next. They also are in constant fear that a larger company will come along and “take away” their marketplace, because they’ve continuously failed to create new products which build upon a core offering which is very dated technologically. The core offering appears long-in-tooth and vulnerable. This company is very account-focused, and the lack of a market focus has kept them from being able to create additional, broadly marketable products which provide them with a strong proprietary advantage (and causes a lack of sleep at night!)

Company A understands who they are and what they want. That doesn’t guarantee success, but it makes it much easier to build a plan that everyone agrees on. At that point success or failure usually depends upon execution, unless the plan is awful. If failure ensues in this scenario, more times than not, the problem is in execution. Company B’s biggest problem is that they are floating right in the middle between the two business models. They are trying to leverage both of these business models, and struggling with execution, in some ways with both.

SUMMARY
It isn’t impossible to combine these two business models successfully. I’m sure that many of you can’t point to several examples of such a very successful compromise. In fact, many technology companies combine both of these models to some extent, with good success. But I find that usually, a company identifies itself primarily as a product company first, or a systems integrator. That identification is their strategic focus, and takes precedence when prioritizing the use of always scarce assets.

The secondary business model is usually utilized on an opportunistic basis. Product companies integrate and customize as needed to get a big deal. Integrators create “products” to fill the needs of a big account, and sometimes happily find they are saleable to other accounts. Occasionally, these “products” prove so widely saleable that they are spun off into a separate product company, or the integrator changes its focus into becoming a full-blown product company.

The most important thing, in my opinion, is to understand who you are, and what you are trying to accomplish strategically. It’s the company’s that are trying to leverage both business models at once, without one model taking the lead, that gets itself in a heap of trouble. That’s my opinion–what’s yours?

Phil Morettini
PJM Consulting
www.pjmconsult.com

1 Comment by admin on September 21, 2007
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Financing, Operations, Software/Product Development, Startup/Early Stage, VARs
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Business Models in the SMB Market

The SMB market is typically a very popular topic for hardware and software companies. Every one wants to sell to the Enterprise market; as a result, competition is fierce and standards are very high. If you get to the Enterprise market early, with an innovation that creates a new category, you can find success if you are truly making a contribution to the market. But late entries into a market segment, as well as early stage companies competing with larger, established companies, often have a very tough go of it. In these situations, attention often turns to the Small and Medium-Size Business, or SMB, market.

And why not? At first blush, the SMB market appears to be huge, as well as underserved. It looks like a perfect haven for an early stage or turnaround company with a solid product, but not quite enough differentiation, brand name, or marketing muscle to push out the big boys in the Enterprise space. So the decision is made to focus on SMBs.

What’s Wrong With This Decision?

There is nothing wrong with this decision, per se–if it’s done with eyes open, for the right reasons. But too often, it is done to run away from a problem (the inability to penetrate enterprises), rather than run to a great opportunity. A lot of times, companies see the SMB market as easier turf; simply a larger, less competitive market than the Enterprise market. Major problems can result from this type of mentality, and I see it quite often in my consulting practice. Companies that enter the SMB market from this perspective usually aren’t fully prepared to do what it takes to be successful, in what is a very different type of market than they may be familiar with. So where are the land mines in the SMB marketplace?

What’s Not Obvious in Marketing to SMBs

The first thing to consider is that customer needs are often quite different. A lot of this depends upon what technology and market segment you are in, and whether your product is aimed more at the “S” (small) segment, or the “M” (medium) segment of the SMB space. For example, if you are selling a single user productivity tool which is useful staff accountants, you may not see much difference. If on the other hand you are marketing a company wide, networked application of some complexity, the differences may be huge. Like everything in technology marketing–the devil’s in the details. Every situation needs to be evaluated closely, and treated differently on its individual merits. The most important thing is TO NOT ASSUME THAT THINGS ARE THE SAME BETWEEN SMBs AND ENTERPRISES IN YOUR CATEGORY. Do the work, evaluate the situation–don’t assume. Assumptions, without verification, are what get you burned in this transition. Below is a list of some of the major differences in the SMB market:

IT Departments are small and less of a factor–if they exist at all.–In Enterprises you may be dealing with persnickety CIOs that want thing just so. In SMBs, if there is a CIO at all, he will be looking for an off the shelf SOLUTION that will “just get the job done”. Or you may end up struggling to figure out how you can sell your complex solution, to a company that has NO IT DEPARTMENT AT ALL.

There is less money to spend–It’s harder to make money with big ticket hardware and software, let alone customization and expensive services. Your products better have value – and margin – right out of the box.

Ease-of-use is even more critical–There probably is no training department or other corporate staff, and people are busier overall. If they can’t figure out how to use it quickly, you’re going to have a hard time selling it.

There is much less time available to purchase products–Even the sales process may be compressed, in terms of how much time the prospect spends reviewing your marketing literature, or talking to your sales people. The actual TIME ELAPSED during the sales cycle could be EVEN LONGER due to lack of time available to the prospect, but the INTENSITY of the purchasing engagement is often much less.

How Do You Need To Structure Your Business Model Differently?

Lower prices– They just can’t, and won’t pay the same prices that you can get in the Enterprise space, in most cases. So you’d better come into this segment with a price and value proposition that makes sense to these price-sensitive customers.

Marketing vs. sales–The SMB market is more marketing intensive, with respect to marketing/sales ratios, than the Enterprise market. There are many more customers; the average sale amount is much lower, and much less face time available for direct sales. While in many respects Enterprises are the most demanding customers in the world, you’ve got to be a better marketer to succeed in the SMB space than you need to in the Enterprise world.

Low cost sales force– With much lower average sales amounts, and much less time available on the customer side, it is usually impractical to have a large, high-cost field sales force. Inside sales forces are the general rule in this market. If you have a product that demands customization and hands-on support, VARs are a good adjunct to consider. The more they are taking orders generated from marketing, and the less they are cold calling prospects, the better.

Better usability and reliability– You’ll need many more units being sold to get to the same level of Enterprise revenue, across a much larger customer base, with much less (if any) maintenance revenue to fund a large support staff. Your product better work when it’s installed and better be very easy to use over time. Unless you have a highly customizable solution and are using VARs as a channel, SaaS is a great platform for delivering software to this market.

Little or No IT support–The good news is that there is no prickly IT committee or staff that you have to “go through” to sell to the real users. The bad news is that if even the littlest thing goes wrong, there’s no one internally at the customer to pick up the slack–you’re going to hear about it directly from the user–over an over again.

Summary

The SMB market is actually a simplistic catch-all phrase for a large, heterogeneous group of markets. But it is a useful abstraction, as a starting point for understanding how to penetrate and thrive in B2B marketing to smaller companies. I hope this short introduction is useful–feel free to pitch in and post a comment adding to this topic.

Phil Morettini
PJM Consulting
http://www.pjmconsult.com/

1 Comment by admin on June 10, 2007
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Distribution Channels, Pricing, Product Marketing/Management, Software/Product Development, Startup/Early Stage, VARs, sales
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Open Source Software Business Models

Open Source has been gaining ground for quite some time. Some would say, using the example of Linux, that Open Source has Microsoft and the rest of the traditional software giants on the run. No doubt that open source software has had a major impact on the economics of the software business, across many different market segments.

But is it a good model to use in your software business–if you are actually interested in making money?

Not Generally My Cup of Tea–But Let’s Take Another Look

I will admit that my feelings toward open source business models have always been lukewarm, at best. Maybe there’s a bit of dinosaur in me. But the idea of putting into the public domain the code that you’ve sweated to produce, at great emotional and financial expense rubs me the wrong way. It trikes me as fundamentally opposed to the basic nature of capitalism and the entrepreneur.

Like just about everything else in business, however–the devil’s in the details. Using Open Source methods has been shown a number of times that it can be a competitive weapon in the software business–when used thoughtfully and strategically.

Poor Use of Open Source

Let’s first examine a typical example of what I consider a misuse of the Open Source model. It often goes like this: Technical founder with a crack programming team, and little marketing money or expertise, decides that they are going to use Open Source to inexpensively roll out their new product in the market. Being programmers, they love the idea of Open Source from a user perspective, and so have a strong belief that the market they are aiming at will love it as well. Unfortunately, they aren’t trained as marketers, and don’t think the situation completely through.

Here are some of the negative things that can happen:

1) Since the company is releasing the initial product as Open Source, they are not quite as diligent as possible with QA of the code, as well as other “commercial product” polishing activities. Basically the product is rushed to market. The product isn’t well-received, costing them the one opportunity that you have, to make a good first impression

2) Open Source tactics are used prior to developing a proven business model: “We’ll release a free, Open Source product, and have so many users, we can figure out how to make money later”. This is reminiscent of the old “eyeballs” business plans prevalent just before the Internet bubble burst in 2001. It’s very important to have a solid idea of what the Open Source release is going to gain you, and what the steps are that will to allow you to capitalize on the wide attention. Ultimately, you need to monetize SOMETHING. There are ways to make money with an Open Source model: customization, training, training, premium versions–but in many instances, these won’t really support a serious, mainstream core software development effort–if you are also interested in profits.

3) The company has done some thinking about the business model issue, and has decided that there will be a free, Open Source version released initially to seed the market. The follow on product will be commercial/paid with added features, with the hope that the large user base from the free version will upgrade to the more attractive premium version. But without expert marketing analysis, balancing how much to “give away” in the free version, and how much to “hold back” for the premium version, can be quite tricky. If you don’t get the balance right, the potential revenue stream can be greatly reduced.

4) The company is in a market segment that highly values order and traditional business practices–in this circumstance, using an Open Source model could seriously devalue your product, in the eyes of your target prospects.

Good Use of Open Source

The other side of this story is that when implemented thoughtfully, Open Source can be a major strategic weapon in certain markets. Let’s look at some scenarios of how an Open Source strategy might be implemented more shrewdly:

A) When entering a new market against a huge, strongly entrenched (but slow and stodgy) competitor, where it will be difficult to get traction with traditional marketing methods. This is Open Source used as a Guerilla tactic.

B) In markets where the availability of Source Code REALLY IS IMPORTANT. This may be for reasons of integration, or for reasons of business continuity (for example, a bank application) where they would require source escrow anyway.

C) Having a free Open Source version for one type of small volume customer (internal developments), but to redistribute the code for commercial purposes, there is a royalty/fee. This is using the Open Source model only partially. MySQL has used this model very successfully for quite a while.

D) Formulating a well thought out, hybrid business model ahead of time. For example, a free Open Source version is made available to seed the market. Backed by extensive research and marketing planning, a paid premium version is made available, with just the right features at just the right price, creating huge upgrade numbers with minimal marketing expense.

E) An Open Source product is created for a particular market segment, with data backed by research that this segment will require and pay for substantial levels of integration, customization and/or support.

Summary

That’s my view of the good and bad in Open Source as part of a commercial business model. Used well, it can be a major weapon–when the situation calls for it. But if used blindly by companies just following a trend toward the newest thing–it can be the “Business Model of No Return”.

Drop me a note or post a comment with what you think.

Phil Morettini
PJM Consulting
http://www.pjmconsult.com/
info@pjmconsult.com

3 Comments by admin on March 29, 2007
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Software/Product Development, Startup/Early Stage, enterprise software
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Flattening of the Growth Curve

In every company’s history there comes a time (or two or three or four times!) when your momentum slows, and the sales curve begins to flatten. This can be one of the most trying and frustrating times for software and technology companies. It’s certainly not as difficult as the startup phase, when “crib death” is an ever present fear. And a no growth, flat revenue scenario is much preferable to declining sales combined with negative profitability that follows, which leads to a “death spiral” if no effective action is taken.

I do find this situation is often more confusing to company management than either the start up or death spiral scenarios. This is because it often occurs just after a period of fast growth and prosperity, where it seems that the company can do no wrong. As a result, senior managers are often in denial about what is happening—whereas in the startup or death spiral situations, the situation is much more obvious, usually motivating folks to take fast, decisive action.

Search for the Culprits, Blame for the Innocent

With flattening growth, it’s easy to blame things that may not be the true cause. I often here excuses and tactics such as the following:

“The marketing department just needs to put out better promotions. Fire the VP Marketing and bring in someone who will get the job done”.

“The sales force isn’t selling hard enough, they just need to close more deals. Get the VP Sales off the golf course and tell him to kick some butt, or he’ll be the next to go”.

“The channel is useless; they’re taking 30% but they aren’t pushing the products—take more deals direct”.

“We just need to charge more for our products; we’re leaving money on the table”.

“Cut the price to stimulate demand.”

“The UK distributor is fat, dumb and happy—sign two more of his competitors to motivate him and maximize sales in that country.”

Now some of these reasons may even be accurate, and some of the proposed tactics could be possibly be useful. But I have found, quite often, that things of this nature aren’t the fundamental issue, and beating up the sales force, cutting or raising prices, or messing with your channel balance may exacerbate the situation and make things worse—not better.

The Real Problem

Sometimes the answer is as simple as “All good things must come to an end.”

Growth cycles don’t last for ever, as much as every software & technology company CEO, VP marketing and VP Sales wishes it would. There is almost a natural cycle that occurs with revenue that often coincides with the life cycle of your products. Also, the economy changes, competition heats up, novel marketing programs age and are copied—which reduces their effectiveness, market segments get saturated, and customer budgets are re-targeted to the “next new thing.” Stuff happens—always. The only real question is when.

So what’s a befuddled and perplexed tech company CEO to do?

Finding a Solution

Well, the first thing I recommend is to really spend some time getting to the bottom of things. Instead of shot-gunning blame that may be misplaced, or impetuously blowing up established pillars of the business—conduct a real, objective analysis of the nature of the slowdown. I don’t suggest paralysis by analysis by any means, but do take the time to gather some data, so that your actions will be based on more than knee-jerk reactions.

Past that, it’s hard to generalize on a course of action, because the proper action will depend upon what you find in your analysis. But for the sake of discussion, let’s say that while there are a few factors that you find which could be leading to slower growth, there isn’t a “silver bullet” reason that can be “fixed” to get the revenue curve again pointed up and to the right. Below are some general steps that I’ve found may enable you to “restart growth”. I might add that many of them are most effective if you begin them prior to actual revenue flattening:

Try marketing programs you haven’t used before
Usually when you get in a period of high growth, there is a workhorse program or two that has worked well for you, and there is a tendency to “keep doing what works”. Unfortunately, even the best conceived marketing programs eventually run out of steam. One of the keys to having consistently good outbound marketing, is too be constantly testing new ideas, placing small bets, and fine-tuning them if there is enough success to continue. As I’ve said before, product marketing is part art, and part science—with the art portion unfortunately upfront. You need to do a little trial and error to find a good program, and then the science kicks in, using data you’ve gathered to optimize it. But the key is to be constantly testing new ideas, in good times and bad. If you wait until your growth has already slowed, you may scramble for quite a while, trying to find a new answer.

Have an internal “growth” brainstorming session
Ideally you are doing this before you fall into a revenue rut. But regardless, do bring together people in your organization to bring out the ideas they may have to give the top line a kick start. Do hold these sessions in an open, non-threatening and non-political environment. It’s important that people are able to speak freely, and not be ridiculed, if they come up with an idea that’s “too far out of the box”. That is often where strategic breakthroughs are made. And don’t just limit these sessions to executive managers. Remember, the people at the bottom of the org chart are often the ones closest to the business, and are sometimes able to more easily spot a big opportunity that the company could capitalize on.

Hire some outside help
Consultants have a very bad name in some areas—unfortunately, sometimes with good reason. But bringing in someone with deep marketing or management expertise, with a different viewpoint than the internal management team, can sometimes be the quickest way to new approaches that will turn the ship quickly. I’d recommend staying away from folks that that have a cookbook formula, have only been consultants and not operating executives, or take too much of an academic approach. Every company, market and point in time is different and needs to be analyzed as such. But hiring the right outside consultant or firm who is creative, analytic and “been there and done that” can have a big impact. PJM Consulting has often worked as a change agent in these situations, and increasing or restarting traction is an area of specialty.

Look at entering an adjacent market
If it’s determined that your current market space is getting saturated, one of the first things to do is to look at adjacent spaces. Preferably, look somewhere that you can leverage your current marketing, distribution and brand, but also possibly where you can apply existing company technology to a different customer’s problem. The key here is don’t go to a complete green field that looks attractive because it’s large or growing fast, but where you have no real possibility of competing. Again, it’s best to be taking this step in anticipation of slowing growth in your current business—rather than waiting until it happens. Getting traction in new areas can take some time.

Consider M&A to fill out your product line or distribution system
If you’ve been caught by a surprise slowdown and you need to do something quickly, a strategic acquisition can sometimes be the answer. I warn you to proceed with caution here. M&A is fraught with danger—statistics show that most acquisitions don’t work out well. You need to think it through, proceed carefully, and don’t get overly excited by the thrill of the deal chase. If done well, however, a strategic acquisition can be a real shortcut to entering an adjacent space, filling out your product line for an existing strong distribution system, or adding sales channels to your strong product offerings. This is another area where PJM Consulting has strong experience, and can offer assistance.

Think it through before you start shooting

There are obviously endless other potential ways to explore when attempting to jump out of a revenue rut. I wanted to suggest a few to stimulate your thinking—and more importantly, steer you away from some “knee-jerk” reactions, that often make your situation even worse.

What have you done in the past when you need to restart growth? Post a comment below and fill us all in on your strategies.

Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

4 Comments by admin on April 19, 2006
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, Distribution Channels, General Management, Marcom, Mergers & Acquisitions, Product Marketing/Management, Promotion, Software/Product Development, market research
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Strategic Advantage

How does a company compete in the long run? I’m not talking about day to day stuff—but what sets your company apart, and gives it a place in the marketplace that allows it to survive, and hopefully, thrive?

There are a lot of different terms used to describe the ability to compete: strategic advantage, differential advantage, competitive advantage, unique value proposition, etc. But all these terms mean essentially the same thing—what have you got that the market wants–that other don’t?

Drinking the Kool-Aid

At PJM Consulting I have the opportunity to talk to a great many software and hardware company CEOs, many which are of the early stage variety. I’m taken aback that some of them don’t even understand the concept of strategic advantage. To start a company, and not have thought about what is going to allow you to break into an existing market seems pretty strange to me. Ignorance is bliss, I guess.

A far greater number of CEOs understand the concept of strategic advantage, but have a tendency to fall in love with their company’s sales pitch—also referred to as “drinking the Kool-Aid”. This is natural, but really unfortunate. Lack of realism as to what your company brings to the table is not helpful in creating a company that will break through market noise and become successful. I would argue that realism, even skepticism, about a company’s advantage is an attribute that is important to every startup CEO. Don’t get me wrong; I don‘t mean to imply that a CEO should walk through the halls of his company, spouting “whoa is me, how will we ever make it”! But at least in internal thinking, he or she should be constantly questioning and testing whether his company’s advantage is real, and not fading. A bit of healthy paranoia can be very useful when it comes to strategic issues.

What is a Real Strategic Advantage?

So what does it take to have a real, sustainable competitive advantage? Let’s look at some of the things that are—and some that are not—what I’ll call “mirages”.

REAL ADVANTAGES

First Mover
The first mover advantage has led to some of the great success stories in high tech. Apple in PCs, Cisco in Routers, IBM in Mainframes, Adobe in Document Standards, Intuit in Personal Financial Software, SalesForce.com in Hosted CRM—just to name a few. What is important to mention here, is that while the first mover advantage is real—it isn’t necessarily sustainable for very long. First movers that don’t develop another, more sustainable advantage, often end up as road kill in the long term.

Critical Mass
Being big can be great—as long as the mass is muscle—not fat (see the large company discussion below). Being big can allow you the resources to build a great brand, spread your fixed costs over a large number of unit sales to provide a cost advantage, and enable you to attract and pay very smart people. Yes, size can be an enormous advantage, particularly in manufacturing market segments where scale is so important. As long as the company keeps its eye on the ball and uses its mass to its advantage, this can be one of the strongest, most sustainable strategic advantages.

Patents
I have mixed feeling about this one. Patents can of course become a major strategic advantage, over the very long period that the patent is enforceable. If you have a strong patent portfolio backing a product that has achieved market success—this is one of the most powerful, sustainable advantages available. But I believe that the pursuit of patents can often be “fool’s gold” for many young technology companies. First of all, they really aren’t that important, unless you have success in the market. If you aren’t successful in the market, sometimes you can become “patent troll”, suing others for infringing your patents—but that is truly a business plan of last resort. In software markets, in particular, I’m of the belief that almost anything can be “coded around”. Also, with the wide variety of stuff available for patent these days, coupled with great confusion about what is truly enforceable, it’s gotten harder to obtain a patent that you are certain you can count on. I’ve seen a lot of early stage companies dump too many scarce dollars into the patent process, which could have been very useful in that critical time window available to make a new product successful. I’m suggesting a balance here. Using the patent system can have huge payoffs, but this should be balanced with the need for capital in achieving market success.

Low Cost Producer
This is another major strategic advantage if you can achieve it. It can allow you to essentially control how much profit is made by an entire market segment. It is a lot more realistic to gain a significant cost advantage in hardware than in software. But with rapid globalization and the constant emergence of lower cost labor markets throughout the world, even current low cost producers cannot allow complacency to set in. Years ago, if you achieved the low cost producer position, you were probably set for a while. But not anymore.

Brand
This is the ultimate strategic advantage, and arguably, the only one that is sustainable in the very long term. If you establish your company as the leading brand in your market segment, it will allow you to charge higher prices, get away with somewhat higher costs, smooth over your slower decision-making, and much more. A great brand covers up many sins in the short run, and gives you additional time to recover from your mistakes, which competitors with lesser brands won’t get. In the long run, brand is practically everything.

MIRAGES

First Mover
Wait—“First Mover” already appeared in the “Real Advantage” column above! That’s right, it did. I think of being a First Mover as an advantage, but one that can quickly turn into a mirage, and often does. Think of VisiCalc in Spreadsheets, Ashton-Tate in databases, 3Com in networking hardware, Novell in network operating systems, Digital Research in microcomputer operating Systems, even Apple in PCs (they’re up now, but haven’t always been)—the list could go on and on. Many of you may not know the names of some of these companies, but they were all industry pioneers, and at one time dominant in their market segments. The message here is that being a first mover is a means to an end. It can assist you greatly in establishing a position in the market—but if that position isn’t quickly backed by some more sustainable advantage—ultimately the company may serve as a case study for some fast follower to “go to school”, and ultimately “eat their lunch”.

Technological Superiority
This is one I hear all the time from technically-oriented CEOs, talking about why their startup will win—vs. the 50 other startups and 5 established market leaders in their segment. First of all, they are usually kidding themselves—it s often not really true. They just have their head in the sand, or don’t know what’s in their competitor’s labs. And even if they do have unusually smart engineers, or a great technology platform, that in itself isn’t enough to guarantee initial success, let alone sustain it. The technology must be somehow be protected either via patents or trade secrets, and it must still be translated into an easy-to-use product that can demonstrate productivity benefits of some sort, to the target customer. Except for early adopters, no one buys products due to the wiz-bang technology inside.

Market Leadership
This is similar to the “First Mover” discussion above. Market leadership, by itself, is not a true competitive advantage. Your company may be in the lead at the moment, but
why, and for how long? Maybe there is a technological innovation in a competitor’s lab that will soon make your solution obsolete, from a performance or cost perspective. In High Tech markets, leadership can be very fleeting—unless there is some substantial, sustainable competitive advantage behind it.

Large Company
This one kills many good companies. Senior management gets complacent thinking they are one of the giants of the industry—who could possibly challenge them? This complacency is often accompanied by bloated cost structures, slow decision making, lack of “smart” risk-taking, and political/bureaucratic business processes. All of these things allow the nimble innovator in a high tech market to outflank the slow-moving large company. Having critical mass can be great—but not if you implode under your own fat.

So that’s my opinion on competitive advantage. I’m sure that you may be able to come up with many more “Real Advantages and “Mirages”. Or you may disagree with the points I’ve made. Either way—let’s talk! Post a comment on, or send me an email message.

Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

1 Comment by admin on March 24, 2006
filed in Business Models, Corporate Strategy, General Management, Startup/Early Stage
tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Should You License Your Technology?

So when should you license your technology to other companies? This can be a complicated question, since I always say “no one sells your product like you do.”

Depending upon your tendencies, there is a bias toward holding everything you develop close to the vest, unwilling to give that hard-earned technical advantage to another company. Or you may be on the other side of the fence, and want to very quickly “cash in” on a technological development—thinking that there are very large companies out there that can do a much better job selling the product than you can.

So really, what’s the right approach? Just like most other decisions facing managers of technology companies, there is no one simple answer. It really does depend on your situation.

Have a Process

The best way to approach a decision of this nature is through a methodical, logical process. It shouldn’t be done emotionally, or without proper data. To come to the optimal answer, you need to be very honest about the position of your own company in the market, your priorities, company strengths and weaknesses, and the level of resources available to you. In addition, you need to have a solid understanding of the potential of the technology in the market, whom might be an attractive licensee, how interested they may be, and “can you license to someone else and still sell your own version”?

These, and many other questions, should be answered before you reach a conclusion. All too often, however, I see companies make a snap decision on whether to pursue a licensing strategy or not. This is very strategic question for a company, yet I have seen the decision made on a whim—with less thought than “where should we have lunch today?”

What have you got?

So let’s walk through an example process. First of all, what have you got–really? Is this IP something that is a fundamental step forward, or a “nice to have?” Things that are fundamentally unique, you will want to think very carefully about before sharing with others. It may be the best thing to do, but I would recommend thinking it through most carefully, if you have something truly unique and desirable. Lesser inventions carry lesser risks of lost opportunity costs, if they are licensed out.

Does it fit the Core Business?

Second, how does it fit with your current business? If it doesn’t fit with your core business, and you have no reason to “run away” from your core business, the decision becomes a lot easier. If your current business is thriving and you have quite of bit of runway left to pursue in that market, opening up a second business has a high likelihood of becoming a distraction—potentially harming the core business. Plus, it is very likely in this instance, that you will not be able to do the new opportunity justice, anyway. So to avoid sub-optimal outcomes in both business areas, it almost always makes more sense to license the technology to another player, whose business is a better fit—and one who will dedicate the resources required to gain success.

Can you “have your cake and eat it too”?

Third, if it does fit the core business, can you license it to other segments on a non-exclusive basis? This is an important question to consider. If the answer is yes, I call this “having you cake and eating it too.” The answer to this question is dependent upon a couple of things. Are there “fences” that can be set up between your market segment, and that of the potential licensee?

As an example, let’ say you have a new enterprise application that is different, but complementary, to your existing core product. This new product can be sold to the same type of large corporate customer that your existing product is sold to. But this new application also has strong potential in government markets, where you have no current presence. The government market is very different, and contacts are crucial to success. Instead of trying to build distribution into this new government market from scratch (which can be time-consuming), it is potentially a very wise move to license the new product to a company with existing, strong government business. They can sell it under their own label, put marketing money behind it, provide support, etc. In this way you have accessed that market, without entering into an area outside of your core competency, and without spreading around your scarce resources.

Non-exclusive licensing can be a great compromise

This is the type of “complementary” licensing deal that can be very effective in optimizing your total return on a technology. The key to this strategy is for there to be a good “fence”, so that you don’t create channel conflict between you and your licensee. In this example, you’re in the corporate market, and the licensee is in the government market. So it’s very clean and complementary, basically incremental revenue with little costs.

There are other examples of non-exclusive licensing where you end up competing with your own product under a licensee’s label. This can work as well, but it’s a lot trickier to manage. You will run into channel conflict issues, much like selling your own labeled product through reseller channels, with the added twist of another brand involved in the competition.

The final thing to consider is timing. How well protected is the technology, and how fast is the technological curve moving in this market space? If the market isn’t moving fast technologically, there may be no one overtaking you quickly. A sleepy, slow moving market tips the scales toward keeping the technology and developing the market for it in-house, rather than aggressively licensing it to others. Regardless of your resources, it becomes more likely that you will have time to exploit the IP, when there is little fear of someone leapfrogging your technology. If on the other hand, you’re positioned in a brutally competitive market with rapidly evolving technology, the arrow moves the other direction. In this case, IP is a fleeting advantage, and one that better be used ASAP, before it becomes obsolete. This scenario begs for a strategy of aggressively licensing the technology, to obtain the best return possible, in the short period of time that the IP will be relevant.

There is, of course, much more to consider when undertaking a decision to license/not license out your technology. This discussion provides an introduction to some of the major points that should absolutely be reviewed in any licensing discussion.

I’d love to hear some stories about your own licensing efforts, and hear points of view from a different angle. Post a comment or email me your thoughts.

Follow Phil Morettini and Morettini on Management via Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, RSS, or the PJM Consulting Quarterly Newsletter. Contact Phil directly at info@pjmconsult.com

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