You may love to hitch-hike rides, and even dinners, but have you ever thought of hitchhiking your way to success? There are massively successful tech start-ups who rode the back of successful tech start-ups to their own fame. These start-ups understand the principles of not going the journey alone especially when it is one as dicey but equally lucrative as a tech start-up, if you can get it right.
Here are five outstanding tech start-ups who did and are famous for it;
Airbnb
Airbnb is the disruptive collaborative online marketplace which enables short term lease of lodgings by travellers. These lodgings can include hotel rooms, vacation rentals, hostel beds, apartment rentals, hostel beds, home stays, and a host of other adventurous hideout stays. With over 3 million lodgings in 91 countries and 65,000 cities, Airbnb has become a $31 billion company in less than 10 years.
So how did they pull off such a daring feat? By simply sticking out their thumb on a speed train internet company.
But did the train pull to a halt to let them on board? No. They timed the train and flew into it – literally.
So what exactly did the Airbnb Founders do, in clear terms?
Founders of Airbnb, Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia were simple graphic designers and had no programming skills whatsoever. In a bid to earn some cash to pay rent, they turned their living room into $80 per night lodging for three visitors attending the Industrial Design Conference by placing a mattress in their loft and serving the guests’ breakfast. This was the start of a billion dollar tech start-up idea. They saw the potential in this idea and recruited a friend, Nathan Blecharczyk who could write programs for the development of their website. The founders did all kinds of things to enable the take off of the platform but growing user base was quite slow and that was when it hit them.
The Craiglist Hitchhike
The ad listing platform, Craiglist had an enormous user base and Airbnb decided to take advantage of this. The users of Craiglist wanted cheap alternatives to heavy hotel charges and they capitalised on this gap to grow their own user base.
To gain these users, the Airbnb team offered to list advertisers on Craiglist free of charge if they would list on their own platform as well. With some technical integration between the two platforms, the strategy took off like wild fire with the listers preferring Airbnb to Craiglist because of the quality of pictures, description of each accommodation which was more personal than that of Craiglist. These attributes which Airbnb had over Craiglist made users stick with Airbnb. From 2010 to 2014, listing growth on Airbnb had skyrocketed from a meagre 10,000 to 550,000 with a doubling of their revenue base and hosting of 10 million guests.
Airbnb is now worth as much as great legacy hotels such as Hilton and Hyatt.
IrokoTV
IrokoTV now a household name in the streaming of Nollywood movies, Nigeria’s version of Los Angele’s tinsel town, was once just a Youtube dream. From struggling entrepreneur, Jason Njoku, founder of irokotv reels from the success that may never have been if not for Google’s acquired company, Youtube.
How did the irokotv idea come about?
The idea for irokotv came to be as Jason could not find Nollywood movies online for his mother to watch. By enacting licence partnership deals with producers, he began hosting them on his Youtube channel, by streaming for free. The popularity of his channel led to big time profits which got noticed by the international media including giants like CNN and Techcrunch for enterprise news features.
Becoming a tech start-up
First investors in Facebook, Tiger Global led an $8 million investment in irokotv, making it a bonafide tech start-up with global prospects, all thanks to its leverage from Youtube.
Irokotv is viewed in more foreign countries than in Nigeria as the diaspora find it great TV viewing away from home. By operating through a subscription model, irokotv has spread its tentacles as far as the United States, Malaysia, the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany and Italy to mention a few.
IrokoTV has become the world’s largest legal digital distributor of African movies with content distribution deals spreading beyondYoutube to Dailymotion, Vimeo, iTunes and Amazon.
Nasty Gal
The most popular girl fashion brand ecommerce tech startup Nasty Gal rode on the back of Ebay to become world famous. Founder Sophia Amoruso started off by selling used vintage clothes on her Ebay store which she aptly named Nasty Gal Vintage in honour of funk and soul singer plus fashion icon, Betty Davis.
Nasty Gal Collision with social
Latching fast on early social trends, Sophia and her Ebay Nasty Gal store gained prominence on MySpace with a 60,000 followership base she constantly interacted with to sell her fashion pieces. This prominence brought on increased sales and instilled gigantic confidence in her ability to go solo, giving birth to the NastyGal ecommerce fashion store.
Ecommerce store big time fashion brand
From its very little beginnings as one of those many fashion used clothes stores on Ebay, Nasty Gal has gone on to have its own ground stores in some of America’s major cities including Santa Monica and Los Angeles, raising investment funding from some of America’s biggest venture capitalists.
Also leaving its vintage effect behind, Nasty Gal has gone on to launch its own fashion line including clothes, swimwear, footwear, denim, lingerie, lipsticks, nail polish etc., in partnership with some of the biggest brand names in fashion and beauty.
Nasty Gal has been named fastest growing retailer by INC magazine although it filed for bankruptcy in 2016, the larger than life image Sophia Amoruso has created for the brand caused it to be purchased by BooHoo group.
From Ebay back store, to famous global ecommerce store selling to over 550,000 women in 60 countries, talk about a hitchhike of a lifetime.
Zynga
Zynga is a social video game service development company which began in 2007 by warrior entrepreneur Founder, Mark Pincus, who is willing to do anything possible to get and keep his company in business; a company focusing on developments for mobile devices using platforms such as Android, Windows and iOS and social networking platforms like Google+, Facebook and Tencent.
The Facebook Effect
The ride of a lifetime which put Zynga on the global map was the launch of its game, Farmville on Facebook which garnered over 10 million daily active users in only 6 weeks becoming the world’s largest online gaming company tailored to social networks becoming Facebook’s biggest App developer.
This grew to over 265 million monthly active users with three out of five of Facebook’s most played games namely, Farm Ville 2, Zynga Poker and ChefVille owned by Zynga with the company generating about 80% of its revenue from Facebook and to credit Facebook, has its vision as connecting people through gaming with Zynga games contributing 12% to Facebook’s revenue in 2011.
Of course with these successes under its belt, Zynga launched CityVille which swept off the impact of Farmville to become the most played Facebook game with 61 million monthly active users and figures like these get the briefcase boys knocking which was so for Zynga which swept up funds after funds from some of the best Venture Capital firms in America including Kleiner Perkins.
This social boost from the largest social network in the world granted Zynga the impetus to go public, though not the biggest success story after this move as its stock share was largely mocked after a slide, the company has however stood the test of time, acquiring other major game brands and portfolios from across the world.
Besides acquiring myraid game studios, Zynga has built its own platform to cater for its fan base outside of Facebook. A bullet ride with Facebook is any startup’s dream and Zynga sure had and still has its fill with the social monster.
Paypal
Hosting some of the world’s most psychedelic tech stars as Founders like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, Paypal, the innovative internet payment company has had its own share of hitchhiking to sit on its golden throne.
Big Companies can hitchhike too
While not a new or down trodden tech startup, the already publicly owned Paypal’s acquisition by Ebay for a grand $1.5 billion really gave it the push it needed to become the over $50 billion valued company it presently is today.
By expanding its services among Ebay users in America and international markets, Paypal rose to become ecommerce giant’s default payment system, an average of one in four online payment transactions were sealed using Paypal allowing its profitability skyrocket out of the roof.
This allowed Paypal to create partnerships with some of the world’s biggest payment brands such as Mastercard and also acquire some of the world’s largest online payment companies like Xoom.
Its access to the user base of these multifaceted acquisitions created a vast international spread for the brand allowing the company to be responsible for over 40% of Ebay’s revenue by 2012, processing payment volume of $145 billion in 2012 alone.
A Trailer within a Trailer
Paypal’s runway success ushered in the need for a spin off from Ebay to create room for greater growth, strategic competitiveness and flexibility for the brand leading to its second IPO valued at over $46 billion in 2015.
From its Ebay acquisition, Paypal has been listed as a Fortune 500 company possessing 197 million active users with registered accounts and operating in 202 countries and 25 currencies worldwide and surpassing Ebay’s $37 billion valuation.
The Paypal ride with Ebay is a once in a lifetime hitchhike dream any startup would definitely die to be a part of.
Starting a tech startup?
If you want to make money and have a tech startup idea, sampling how you can take a ride on the back of already successful tech start-ups may before you go spending all you have and fail, may just be the best move to make.
In this context, a ride is a leverage, something that can easily help you to get to your next level and this leverage does not have to be the biggest start-up, just a very strategic one. A lot today, we see really successful applications built on the back of APIs of other successful platforms, this may just be the way to go.
So think critically, whose back can you ride on before starting your tech start-up?
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Disclosure: This review, article or report was first posted on http://www.babeonideas.com blog in 2017. The http://www.babeonideas.com blog no longer exists. Some information may be outdated or a startup may no longer exist in the form or all of its form when it was first reviewed.
‘The world’s largest IPO – Circus comes to the NASDAQ. Facebook IPO, a sham-stead. Everyone loves Twitter. Just a minute, the Facebook plunge is just halfway to the bottom. Get that protégé out of here and bring in professionals. Twitter is doing everything Facebook didn’t. Wow, a silver lining appears on the Facebook cloud – mobile advertising. Twitter is the real social media jewel of the Nile. Still, looking for a cheap stock to lay claim to? I’ll advice Facebook. Twitter stock – not a keepsake. May Day, May Day, Twitter is losing altitude. Oh no, a Twitter eulogy already? Facebook stock soars on mobile ads. Twitter treads with wobbly feet. Facebook thumps expert expectations.’
Devised, but characteristic chattering, headlined by experts declaring the missteps of Facebook pre, on and post IPO launch as its opening share of $38 nosedived to $34 and its present soaring to $75, to the compulsive adulation of Twitter prior to its IPO launch and after, for its staggering rise from $26 a share to close at $42, to its later dismal performance on the market. We also witnessed expertise foresight on the descent of Apple after the demise of Mr. Jobs and the ascent of Samsung as the industry poster boy as both giants battle for supremacy on multiple spheres.
We have watched expert-tales run amok of their storylines, inapt commonness mostly making a homerun on IT-based conglomerates and startups as the industry maintains the hype of high growth sector, and poised to be advantageously mined by investment enthusiasts. No doubt, the sector has positioned itself in the last three decades, as the new road to Eldorado, for its creation of record time runway successes of conceptualized solutions, churning overnight billionaires in its wake.
Needless to say, the failure of expertise in predicting outcomes of ideas, products and industries, especially those driven by technology has been nothing short of mortifying, causing me to mutter, “Expertise, in this century, is doomed!” The visceral nature of my conclusion does not solely lean on the seeming futility of expertise but on contributing forces beyond their control as the asteroid-like momentum these ideas are being launched into the marketplace – along with their peculiarities, produce misty concepts of what to expect, as we all truthfully strive to grasp an industry taking infantile strides – a fact experts need to more frequently chime.
With some of these ideas appearing to dilly dally within realms of dream-injection to alter the course of a business empire (in our case industries) as seen in the Leonardo Dicaprio led Hollywood hit, Inception and some spooky Harry Potter tale set on the Hogwarts campus with a goal to demystifying the legendary evil Voldemort. Or so my perception gnarled, until I coincidentally stumbled upon ‘What will be’ – a hearty rendition on the future of the information technology marketplace by late MIT Laboratory for Computer Science Director, Michael Dertouzos – from a used book store owned by a client who flipped payment for services with a barter deal I considered absolutely generous.
An almost perfect craft of all we see today lay in it, garnered by long, hard years of steering and sitting atop cutting edge research he commingled with scientific progress and timeless human attributes. Ultimately bulldozing any extraneous ideologies of seventh heaven experiences to generating information technology idea-wonders I may have nursed. But then, these technological ideas still soar above minds of Einstein-IQed tech CEOs, who even though birth them, are more often than not misplaced in the maze of management flow and rippling industry innovations. While pundits may sneeze up a storm, a whole new level of amenability marked by traditional bird’s eye view, walled-ears and criticism laced observations should be welcomed. This is a deep-seated understanding of the fuel that fires a generation, saddled with the enormous task of defining a new business era. Therefore, romanticizing the surrounding opportunities it bestows, and its unfolding challenges, and the impact they bring to this future deserves precedence.
Who runs the world?
Saying information technology has transformed the 21st century business landscape, with an unyielding position to immeasurably determine future outcomes in inconceivable ways is restating the obvious. From governance to health, education, agriculture, manufacturing, retailing, finance, telecommunications and all industries on the planet that provide routes to market share conquests, financial profitability and enterprise sustainability, including those which in the past never canoodled thoughts of technology as a match made in heaven, like the third sector, are all being betroth.
The opportunities this virtual motor-source could yield for business far outweighs any form of scientific postulating or psychic mirror balling any industry juggernaut may aim to foretell as it trails its uncertainty, struggling to adapt to each new move in a bid to staying relevant. Though a mid-level hobbyist, I never gave schooling in computer programming much thought until a vision of the night chauffeured me into a future where coding was the alphabet – the building blocks of all language. Taunting glares I received from confidants I relayed this to, did little to stifle my trepidation as all I could think of was where to begin. At 33 and still soon-to-be wed; I had jumped into primal feminine mode, apprehensive about the life and career success of my unfertilised ovaries.
At the back of my mind, the unflinching resolve to chaperon a creative, forward thinking educational development for my offspring, one which equips them to thrive in versatility in an ever expanding world of information and sub-specialisation dynamism. As hours turned into days, I felt a fading of my flash of genius with some introspection – self-taught kids. With majority of frontline IT applications emerging from mostly self-taught kids possessing magical curiosities for coding, information technology demands a form of wonderment and interest above any aim to impart. It has taken a stance that it seeks marriage with boldness and genius and is unperturbed by the imperfections this union may present. This passion for computers and the power to code by a handful, vanguard a participatory millennial business era, according room for the flourishing of seeds of innovation that cross cuts global audiences.
The Swinging Sixties Unprecedented technological advancements into the 20th century facilitated the evolving of the concept of computers to programmable, mainframe systems too expensive to be reproduced, giving rise to the time-sharing innovation with which came greater advantages as computer sharing within a community of people working from individualized terminals was born. Technological developments also largely influenced diverse trends which included those within the recording industry, as widespread use of vinyl record and improvements on the electric guitar and microphone, culminated in the explosive growth of music in the 50s with the invention of the transistor, and used as a replacement of vacuum tubes in radios, leading to the mass production of the transistor radio, all catalysts to the boom of rock n roll.
These growths, in my humble opinion, created a meeting point for two revolutionary movements, one quiet, and one loud but each creating similar resonance; time-sharing and rock n roll. While time-sharing on computers expanded solely within research communities in the 60s, rock n roll had taken the world by storm in the mid-50s, crystallizing its spot in the 60s as a reputable genre in the history of world music. A feat that would take 30 years for time-sharing to replicate with information sharing using computer technology. Rock n roll, emanating from a mix of European instrumentations, African American styled Jazz, R&B, Gospel and traditional southern American Country, enabled cultural collision as white artists incorporated this style, creating a distinguishable genre idolized by affluent white teenagers.
An experimental youth culture dreaded by parents who feared its negative influence on their pliable teenagers, rock n roll served as the icing of the counter culture movement of the Sixties; a definitive decade which propelled a breakdown of cultural norms, snowballing into social revolutions of civil rights, women and minorities rights. The revolutionary dimensions created by this evolutionary music style were extensive, defining an age group like no other music had ever done, shattering barriers and instituting avenues for synergy and shared experience between teenagers of different races, fostering a crazed-teen culture possessing its own language idiosyncrasies, attitude, fashion and lifestyle.
Spawning multiple sub-genres from rock to acid, folk and metal rock, itself spawned from rockabilly, an extremely fun, danceable worldwide phenomenon with classic sound instrumentations and core country, jazz and blues influences, a genre made popular by a 19 year old greenhorn artist, Elvis Presley, who became known as The King. In the same vein, the re-inventing of the transistor consistently transformed mainframes into modern, manageable sizes, birthing the personal computer powered by the information super-highway, triggering another youth subculture with surprisingly interchangeable effects.
Communities for information-sharing and social interactions have come to define an age group, granting them a voice to drive social movements. And like rock n roll, has produced its own distinct language – emojis and texting abbreviations; attitude – selfies; lifestyle – social media. And funnily, exchanged transistor radios for smartphones, producing terrified parents who fear the influence of global virtual connections for their teenagers and also importantly, its own pop culture kings ascending their thrones as early as 19. We are ushered into another era of rock n roll, albeit led by timesharing we term, the information revolution, bagging its own youth subcultures that include tech culture and social media. And like rock n roll defined the baby boomer generation, information sharing and its tools have come to define millennials, equally presenting them opportunities to drive changes on many levels.
Young and Restless…and Fearless
The metrics though, are not all same, as the appearance of a similarly idealised generation with an again purported ‘specialness’ buoyed by a revolution, exhibiting great boldness and keenness in participating and spearheading this change through the creation of global scale consumer products, much different from their revolutionary predecessors who were instead, symbolized for the creation of vast consumer products. These comparisons mirror the impact of demographic shifts as it relates to business and as seen in the Baby Boomer generation. As the world witnessed a consumerism boost with more babies born in the post-war era, and now in the millennial generation, as it experiences a population aged below 30, accounting for 51% of its 7 billion number, consumerism effects are once more, proving to be nothing short of outstanding.
The impact of this size on business is being immensely felt, as their awareness of lesser job opportunities, and much less job stability than their majorly Baby Boomer parents, has produced challenges and opportunities. With the challenges come lesser income and spending power and with the opportunities, appear chances for globally induced income extractions leading to much larger earning capacities resulting in contemplation and jostle, to be in on the action. These opportunities, bolstered by information technology which as a vehicle has placed today’s generation on a fortunate pedestal to pedal the global economy, reconstruct social and economic landscapes, question norms and values, and dictate the relevance of consumer products and their delivery mechanisms.
With globalisation and digital interconnectivity fuelled by new media, they have in their hands, the tool to power sustainable growth and literally transform the world as we know it. The swiftness and ease in adopting new trends especially those tailored to or inspired by the information revolution culture, produced the baton exchange between Facebook, Twitter and Instagram in the space of two years as number one social media platform.The urge to muddle up within social communities for benefits, online learning, selecting jobs that grant workspace liberty, all create innumerable domino effects, further boosting an overtly rapturous crave for freebies than ever before, as millennials want all they can get for free, from movies to music, books, to even copyrighted content. The T-shirt economy, open source activism and the success of social media are direct offshoots of these desires, and the urge for cheaper goods and services is the engine powering the rise of collaborative consumption and the sharing economy.
These sensitiveness encroach on the future growth of superannuated industries like automobile, Cable TV and store retailing as ride and car-sharing services like Uber, Lyft and ZipCar are favoured, an expansion of entertainment consumption via smartphones and tablets with streaming services like Netflix, Youtube and Vine, and the constant rise of ecommerce.
Listening to the electrifying lyrics of Rock n roll great Neil Young’s, Restless Consumer, I was suddenly provided schematic insights into this hip and trendy generation. A song in no way created to mimic demographic generalities, described consumers from multitude lands, with multiple voices resounding as one, harbouring a ferocious demand and voracious appetite for anything sellable, cutting a perfect picture of the power, restlessness of millennials in an era that has provided them a tool that gives them a voice.
We witness capricious allegiances and wanton exhibitions in the quest to hop on the next ‘big thing’ ship sailing along, be it for leisure, to garner financial benefits or to intrusively dissect its pros and cons to recreate another must-do, must-have or must-follow fad. Fearlessness, – and astute restlessness, propelled by the deep seated longing for self-expression, for belonging and being known for something, most likely outlandish. Like rock n roll, information technology and its characteristic sub-cultures seem like the major route to fulfilling this high.
The Patrons, the Waiters and the Chefs
Chefs to waiters and finally to patrons; the routine course of restaurant meals, candidly categorize these hip-hoppers. As to some degree, most are aware technology avails everyone the opportunity to gobble up or offer services but only a fraction among them – the chefs, have chosen to create all forms of dishes on the menu and know that patrons will get addicted to products and services that feed their responsiveness and are doing everything possible to be of service.
The Google duo exemplifies this ambition as their engine has rolled out over 200 services from products or acquired companies and are poised to expanding that portfolio as indications show from their $USD17 billion spend in the past two years, a pace both old and new tech giants try to keep up with, while currently hosting over 1.3 million applications on Google play – an irresistible spread of technology delicacies. A host of these ideas create the ‘you are dead if you do not use this app’ impression, engendering a culpable feeling of being left behind, though many will still be out served by newer, free, cheaper or collaborative innovations in no distant time.
This is happening despite the arguable management knowledge that a business cannot be all things to the market, awaking arguable questions in core business divestiture; we watch a foundering replay with Google’s Motorola Mobility notwithstanding its overall astonishing success. But positively, these moves breed standout beneficiaries who utilise the successes for personal gains, driven by an eagerness to clasp exciting technology concepts before the masses as seen with the ever increasing Youtube, Vine, Blogspot and Twitter millionaires, serving advocacy and promotional dishes to individuals and the corporate sector for pay checks. Does this also serve as an opportunity to erase the burden of global unemployment in many quarters?
Yes, as they become ovens for the fostering of inclusive growth and job creation on large scales. We see strive for ascent by distributors like Sophia Amoruso, moving her second-hand clothing store from Ebay to launch teenage sensation online store, Nastygal and a full swing support of the sharing economy by mass number of millennials eager to utilise their social capital and consumer capacities to boost their resource strength. With the constant growth of these changes viewed as opportunities, they will congregate in amassing proportions on varying scopes across the globe to see their dreams become reality, increasing possible scale of impact for tech giants.
The Crush, Clash and Crash
This infatuation with the sharing economy has brought with it joys and pains; joys, as individuals can earn or benefit by collaboratively sharing excess resources within a community, and pains; as its business model is poised to upturn longstanding industries resulting in clashes between policy makers, regulatory bodies, established sectors and sharing platforms. Record success stories with global impact, spare room sharing, Airbnb and ride sharing, Uber have emerged, each presenting its own unique challenges to the marketplace with multiple fallouts including legal suits, professional restrictions, licensing and insurance debacles, job loss claims, union protests, strikes and bans – all of these happening across varying geographical locations in the world. Is this business model going to stand the test of time?
The global unemployment burden resulting in decreased spending power is a critical contributor for the approval nod by millennials. In spite of the clashes that may ensue or foreseeable sector crashes, it is viewed from laudable perspectives by patrons, that include efficiency enhancement, bettering of workers’ rights, distributive income for all, environmental friendliness through the promotion of everything recyclable – as long as it can be used by somebody else, creating tech startups like Tushare; for sharing and giving old clothes, swap and swaptree; for exchanging CDs, books, children clothing and taskrabbit; for errands and handy-jobs.
Such revolutionary goals feed Tesla’s open source rendezvous, juxtaposed with the fickle nature of technology patents and the carbon crisis. The growth inconsistencies of the car industry may be a major beneficiary of global car and ride sharing defiance as it loses its battle with cash starved millennials. As BlaBlacar has demonstrated through its cost efficiency and no-profit approach, short circuiting the regular upheavals, in the process granting it unhindered success as it enables intercity transportation of over 600,000 people monthly in ten cities, with a global goal after its $USD100 million funding, a presumed poisonous economic model may just be exhibiting a long awaited cure.
For Richer and for Poorer
This first of its kind venture capital round in a France-based startup depicts the optimism reflected by the market about the global information technology frontier despite apparent odds arising from technology applications’ transition into modern business status quo. Creating thought-chanting investors avowing to see profitability by betting for successful business outcomes in the face of newer cyberspace products. The frenzy generated by the $USD1.5 million funding of the Yo! App on $USD10 million valuation, accentuates this as the financing question metamorphoses from ‘how do I get funded?’ to ‘when do I get funded?’
We are presented with a future business environment where funding will be available for ideas – even those unworthy, a dilemma investors will be willing to borne as long as it presents the slightest open door to staying ahead of the pack. They know that it is easier to get rich and yet easier to get poor in this century, leaving us peering at a ‘for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer’ scenario. Once again, the revolutionary advantage stretches its hand in support of a restless generation and while this position demands mindedness, it is a welcome note in emerging economies where non-existent to poor credit rating have long impeded business funding access, much less for tech ideas.
Should VCs hunt in the untapped and often neglected terrain of emerging third world economies? Yes, they should. A step traditional banking and private equity firms need embody to fund innovations and the localization of already successful global ideas as enabled in developed markets. The agitation to get what they want, when they want it is opening doors, as millennials understand that by sticking together they can win on multifaceted levels which they had earlier been overlooked or deemed under experienced to flex their muscles or not availed the opportunities to do so.
Setting crowd funding afloat, a collaborative model of technology driven financing, giving life to Kickstarter, Indiegogo, Kiva and Crowdrise to help fund ideas, projects, businesses and social causes formal financing would not get to fund, providing millions a chance for success generated by collaborative fund pools. Has there ever been a better time in history to start a business? Never! Startups can leverage on low-cost advertising focused on target-specific markets on social and collaborative platforms to advocate brand growth in the face of stringent funds.
Paypal shrugged…and wants a chunk
I scribbled on my browser, “Where the heck do we get funding?” out of sheer frustration and out popped a Mass Challenge advertorial. The world’s largest startup accelerator and competition, boasting backers like Verizon, Oracle and Microsoft with objectives to addressing seed-stage investment gap and promoting innovation and collaboration locally and internationally, was a divine find. Literally racing against time to submit our most pressing idea within a two-day deadline, I encountered a barrier trying to send the initial $USD100 payment as PayPal was the payment gateway integration linking the regular debit cards. “Wasted labour of hard, sacrificial two-day work”, I thought, until I was notified of a waiver to continue my application. When asked to rate the entire submission process, “I don’t think PayPal has to block a whole country because of fraudulent activities perpetrated by some Nigerians…” my comment ensued.
Seven months after this incidence, PayPal wheels into Nigeria, as tag team partner of First Bank, Nigeria’s biggest Bank and Africa’s 15th largest. PayPal shrugged, and for good reason. ‘Yahoo! boys’ a pseudonym for online scammers as Yahoo emails happened to be the go-to tool to prey on unsuspecting ‘magas’ (derogatory slang used to define European or American internet users quick to fall for balloon ventures or love) with an aim to extorting monies from them. Indigent acts that germinated into a cultural phenomenon among youngsters leading to the blacklisting of the country in activating PayPal transactions.
Nigeria, a culturally diverse nation possessing 514 languages according to Greenberg diversity index with exceptional economic prospects as Africa’s largest population and economy, boasting 170 million people with 78% aged 35 and below and a GDP of $USD509.9 billion but riddled with countless malaise – a lot youth borne, sufficient to hinder companies from entering an emerging market with such robust consumerism and growing middle class advantages. Multitudinous hiccups dogging emerging economies especially those with high youth populations, adapting to a variety of hydra-headed challenges could be the line between success and failure as the onus is on companies to innovatively build strategies that apply to each turf.
MasterCard’s tripartite aggressiveness in working with governments, private and social sectors in Nigeria echoes this as the lack of social security and poor credit rating is being tackled with the launch of a national identity debit card, private partnerships with financial institutions and the MasterCard Foundation’s impact through social entrepreneurship. With PayPal losing its position as the Atlas of third party payment processing to Alibaba’s Alipay which transacted a whopping $USD150 billion in 2013, its lethargy to innovate upon challenges prove too pricey after all. Poor governance structures, handicap infrastructure, corruption, insurgencies, kidnappings, Ebola, HIV or Lassa fever, hampering corporate expansions into emerging markets could be tantamount to not doing business in America because of epileptic gun laws or racial stereotyping, China for internet censorship, India for its inability to curb gang raping or Russia for freezing temperatures. As oil multinational, Shell sells $USD5 billion worth of its Nigerian assets as a result of pipeline sabotage by sponsored youth, the looming question of when to shut a profitable door persists.
The Ayes Have it!
More than ever, we encounter the dominance of social issues as a large play of multifaceted demands and challenges hit businesses with the voice of the majority determining outcomes, whistleblowing through technology channels. The backlash leading to the resignation of Mozilla CEO, Brendan Eich for his support of Prop 8 legislation, invalidating gay marriage is such drawback. Charged to increase brand value, threats of employee resignations, projected revenue slump from aggrieved users moving to competitive browsers and volunteers and donors investment withdrawals would instead have diminished returns. Ex-Communications Director for InterActiveCorp, Justine Sacco’s twitter gaffe connecting Africa with AIDS caused worldwide embarrassment to a company hosting top online products favoured by millennials like Vimeo, Twoo and Ask.com and her, her job.
The lingering gap between male and female CEO salaries proves to be another social issue for discourse as women receive 17% less than their male counterparts fostering management gender bias. We see the voice of the masses also influencing corporate consciousness on climate change, energy-efficient solutions, and political correctness on race, religious and cultural beliefs. Armed with collective self-motivation which demands the best from products, consumer markets, governments and even themselves, we see an un-keenness to maintain loyalties with situations or structures deemed un-evolutionary. An expanding technology CEO-base amongst millennials will brew a balanced mixture of competitiveness and social consciousness to positively wrestle controversies crossing business lines.
We must be Born Again!
Tech culture, a baby we strive to decipher, has presented vast terrain of opportunities that guarantee success, and complexities that warrant as much failures. Some of the challenges include the unpredictability trailing information technology businesses as they entrust ‘Expertise foresight’ meagre opening for infallibility, the influence of information technology on business which has provided millennials room to lead global conglomerates, the revolutionary trends of the Sixties impact on business of today and tomorrow, and the imperativeness in localizing global models to suit market-specific challenges.
The opportunities are strong as elusiveness of IT-based startups have undeterred investor spirits, critical factors feeding millennial responsiveness towards collaborative consumption models despite sectorial hiccups and the influence of new media on social issues that cross-cut business lines. As such, a perception rebirth is imperative. With millennials leading the charge in utilizing the IT revolution as a formidable business instrument, the extremism of rock n roll will be brought to bear on the businesses they run.
It is of legend that while Sam Phillips, CEO, Sun Records received a call, Bill and Elvis fooled around with blues tune ‘That’s All Right Mama’, Elvis caricaturing and singing exaggeratedly and Bill banging his fiddle. Scampering back, Sam had them redo it while recording; the sound he had longed craved was born – Rockabilly, an anomaly of an original genre championed by two seasoned artists. Born by a novice singer Sam was reluctant to work with, who went on to become the greatest artist of all time, selling 500 million albums and defining rock n roll.
Rockabilly-ty; the ability to utilize improvisations to strategically build on business success. It is the ability to be misunderstood but maintain fierceness and dexterity to generate success after success.
The stripping and whipping of girl-slave, Patsey in the Oscar winning depiction of slavery, 12 Years a Slave melts into butter, the hardest of hearts. But then, the argument by Platt and Elisa, both unjustly made slaves, climaxed into one word which paints a futuristic picture of the information technology run business world – Survive!
This hounding word will lead, in a century where once admired giant, Blackberry spiralled out of control after being hit by cyclones of technological advancements in mobile telephony. Like Elisa, falling into despair at mega losses and putting up for sale, a platform that controlled the very soul of the world’s youth like only a great puppeteer could muster. But like Platt, the very sense or un-reason for a damn stroke of opportunity in the face of grave impossibilities led to the availing of talents that were only bound to keep him most relevant to the Master, presenting within itself, a craving for strategically thought-out, albeit heart wrenching, prolonged survival. Acquisitions to maintain relevance is rife on all spheres; Monsato’s Climate Corporation, Microsoft’s Skype, Facebook’s Occulus, Twitter’s Vine etc.
With S&P500 lifespan averaging 17 years, history is being revisited as businesses aim to be everything to the market, the results will produce colossal successes; Facebook’s Instagram, catastrophic wastages; Google’s Motorola, and an outrunning of the mother ship; Ebay’s Paypal. Can we say what the chefs will be fixing up next? What the patrons will be ordering? Will they stick with Instagram or favour Justin Bieber funded Shots? We can’t, neither can Experts.
Quizzed by an acquaintance on my seeming relegation of Engineering for Strategy, the answer was simple – Engineering is strategy and strategy is engineering. The analysis and design of structures to ascertain structural integrity based on physical laws and empirical knowledge of the structural performance of different materials and geometries, in the process making creative and efficient use of funds, structural elements and materials to achieve these goals is structural engineering. And strategy, a highly developed plan of activity for an organization to adapt to its environment or compete to achieve one or more goals under conditions of uncertainty and limited resources.
Likewise, the processes that determine the final outcome of a building are no less different from the ideas deployed in strategizing a business into existence from an abstract concept or shaping the future of an existing business. Again, I am wont to view as myopic, proponents of studying only subjects which fit into career paths, a probable good case for specialists but a rather poor one for business. As a backlog of rich knowledge roundedness is essential to creating a strategic work of genius; the engine conglomerates need to survive and then, thrive.
Business, a science of creating numbers as well as an art of creating appeal, demands experience as well as juvenile delinquency. Steve Jobs, a man misunderstood in many ways, a scientist as much as an artist, who propounded as much as he created. A genius who understood the fleeting, magical nature of the human mind – one longing for a miracle, for something beyond it, at its peak in childhood and then youth. Excelling in cross-sectors, this dexterity, Apple’s power in today’s business world. Creators, investors and experts, need brace up for the opportunities and challenges of the future. It is survival. It is dexterity. It is the thin line between life and death. It is Rockabilly-ty.
Koko Ombu, is cofounder and Lead Strategist at idea portfolio management company, Infinite Impact Ltd, www.wesellideas247.com She was selected by LEAP Africa and Business in Africa Magazine, South Africa as 101 Young African Leaders at the African Business Leaders Forum, Accra, Ghana in 2007.
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