Exactly a week ago, I was at the wrong place at the wrong time (intersection car accident in NYC).
It was near the JFK airport in NY, I had just finished facilitating a workshop at Stony Brook, and got a suggestion for dinner from the hotel concierge.
The expressway north heading toward Flushing was slow to a crawl, so I exited and filled up the tank, then was ready to re-enter the expressway.
Sitting in the middle lane waiting for the green light at the intersection of the Van Wyck Expressway (687 north) entrance and Hillside, I was content: it's ~6pm on Sunday in NYC and the weather is cooperating, I might even get a little work done and get to sleep early after dinner!
The green light came, and cars in the lanes to my left and right started moving. I put my foot lightly on the gas pedal. Then in my peripheral vision, I saw a car coming from the right and thought "huh? is this possible?" and within that second, I felt the impact of being hit somewhere in the front of the car. Within the next few seconds, my car spun to the left 90 degrees toward the bridge, while the other car spun 180 degrees, returning to hit my car's left and driver side. My car was getting dangerously close to the concrete pole and the voice in my head kept repeating: "don't hit the pole, don't hit the pole!"
Things appeared to be happening in slow motion as I saw my life flashing by and thought:"I'm going to die". When the cars stopped moving, I returned to reality. I moved my feet, my arms, my legs and my head, everything appears to follow command.
At this time, a man was speaking to me outside of the car: "Are you okay? Get out, your car is leaking, it may blow up!" Well, my driver door is molded to the other car's driver door (with all the turns, the other car is now pointing to the opposite side of its original direction of traveling, while my car was 90 degrees off from the original course), and the passenger door is less than a foot from the concrete pole I was desperately avoiding. I yelled back:"I can't! I'm stuck." "Climb out of the back!"
My knee was hurting and I was shaking all over. The same man walked up to the driver of the other car, and said "What were you doing? she had the green, I was behind her."
Long story short, after informing the appropriate authorities, waiting for the police, and getting the car ready for towing, taking a taxi to JFK, and getting a replacement rental car (thank you, Hertz, for making things easy, I've been and will continue to be a loyal customer), I was exhausted, hungry and phone battery was drained.
Shortly after 10pm when I finally walked into the hotel lobby after dinner, I was greeted by the lady at the front desk saying urgently:"Your husband has been trying to reach you, please call him back."
"They can't find the car that needs to be towed, it may be impounded or stolen."
Is this really happening? Do I really need to file two police reports within three hours? I caught myself from self pity and dialed 911 again.
Life happens, and you just have to deal with it.
Close to 11pm, I got a call of relief while still with 311 on the phone: "AAA located the vehicle."
I relaxed and tears started flowing down my cheeks. Through this ordeal, I had forgotten to nurse my sore knee and pay attention to what else that may need attention.
I have often had the luck or planned to be at the right place at the right time, to capture opportunities to advance or to help others. Being jerked into life's realities gives me different perspectives:
- You can do a lot of planning but sometimes things just happen outside of your control.
- I need to treasure each day and live it to the fullest so I don't have regrets if things do happen
- If I am a witness to an accident (or something else) I will also provide my account of the event (which I hope the man driving the vehicle behind mine would come around and do so), as the parties involved may not be able to fully account what has happened
- I have a new appreciation for the work processes and compassion of emergency workers: it helps to hear words of comfort: are you safe? do you need medical attention? Have you contacted family?
With Thanksgiving coming up, I'm especially thankful to be around friends and family, having come out of that accident with these new perspectives.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
Tuesday, September 06, 2011
When GPU Computing meets Advanced Analytics
In August the HPC/GPU Supercomputing Meetup Group featured a talk that generated much interest in both the GPU and the advanced analytics communities.
As an effort to expand readership, I posted the blog at NVIDIA's blog site as a guest author. Thanks to Will Park of NVIDIA for his help and suggestions.
We would love to hear your experience using GPUs to accelerate analytics: What are the challenges and how did you overcome them? How viable do you find GPUs accelerating advanced analytics? How much of the BI analytics market can GPU effectively address?
About the HPC/GPU Supercomputing Meetup Group:
As this is just one of many stimulating talks and discussions at this Meetup group, here is some background: Dr. Jike Chong initiated the Silicon Valley group in February this year, the group has attracted 200+ members, many of them pioneer parallel software practitioners who are passionate about high performance computing and GPU supercomputing. If you find topics in these areas interesting, join the discussions on Monday September 12!
As an effort to expand readership, I posted the blog at NVIDIA's blog site as a guest author. Thanks to Will Park of NVIDIA for his help and suggestions.
We would love to hear your experience using GPUs to accelerate analytics: What are the challenges and how did you overcome them? How viable do you find GPUs accelerating advanced analytics? How much of the BI analytics market can GPU effectively address?
About the HPC/GPU Supercomputing Meetup Group:
As this is just one of many stimulating talks and discussions at this Meetup group, here is some background: Dr. Jike Chong initiated the Silicon Valley group in February this year, the group has attracted 200+ members, many of them pioneer parallel software practitioners who are passionate about high performance computing and GPU supercomputing. If you find topics in these areas interesting, join the discussions on Monday September 12!
Monday, August 08, 2011
Top 10 Mistakes in Demo Pitch (by Demo Coach Nathan Gold)
This can be quite useful as Plug and Play Startups gear up for their pitches to VCs (go Krowder!). Thanks to Nathan Gold for sharing at http://democoach.com/
1. Weak opening
2. Slides abuse (don't ever use dense slides)
3. Similarity & analogy metaphors
4. Power thieves (use pauses)
5. Clickfest demo (TMI/long/deep... count the # of clicks)
6. Terrible online ettiquette
7. lack of enthusiasm
8. Cultural unawareness
9. poor Q&A
10. Toooo many slides
Many of these may sound trivial, but it's easier said than done.
Earlier this summer, I started working with the guys who started Krowder, an early stage startup that is building a community supported delivery platform revolutionizing the way packages will be picked up and delivered locally by taking advantage of the economies of crowd-sourcing.
As demo day approaches, we need to get our audience excited about what we are excited about, in a mere few minutes. We'll have to have a good story, keep it very short, show a killer demo, and close with a call-to-action that flood people our way.
One of my all time favorite quotes is "If I have to make a two-hour speech, I can prepare it in 10 minutes. If it is a 10-minute speech, then it can take me two hours." (Winston Churchill). Let the preparation begin!
1. Weak opening
2. Slides abuse (don't ever use dense slides)
3. Similarity & analogy metaphors
4. Power thieves (use pauses)
5. Clickfest demo (TMI/long/deep... count the # of clicks)
6. Terrible online ettiquette
7. lack of enthusiasm
8. Cultural unawareness
9. poor Q&A
10. Toooo many slides
Many of these may sound trivial, but it's easier said than done.
Earlier this summer, I started working with the guys who started Krowder, an early stage startup that is building a community supported delivery platform revolutionizing the way packages will be picked up and delivered locally by taking advantage of the economies of crowd-sourcing.
As demo day approaches, we need to get our audience excited about what we are excited about, in a mere few minutes. We'll have to have a good story, keep it very short, show a killer demo, and close with a call-to-action that flood people our way.
One of my all time favorite quotes is "If I have to make a two-hour speech, I can prepare it in 10 minutes. If it is a 10-minute speech, then it can take me two hours." (Winston Churchill). Let the preparation begin!
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Market Validation
In this and the next few entries, I will share some learning from a series of startup workshops. I will start with marketing sizing and segmentation.
Imagine a VC sees 2000+ business plans a year, schedules 200+ meetings, puts ~20 term sheets together, and closes <10 deals, there is no question that the first meeting is very important. One of the things to do well to stand out in that first encounter is to show that you've carefully thought through your addressable market, and that big markets with high growth rates are in the horizon.
There are six areas to consider, six T's:
Theme: what is the product you are selling (e.g. independent third party verification for ads)?
Team: who are in the founding team (two or three people, their perseverance, domain expertise)? VCs like opportunity and shy away from risks. The more experienced the team is, the clearer the market, the better. Experienced teams plan for the what Ifs? They perform SWOT analysis. A players hire A players and people they trust. Trust among team members is very important.
Terrain: what is the total available market and the addressable market? The first second and third players in the market get most of the shares, about 65%. Where are you going to be?
Timing: Is the market too early too late?
Technology: How will your technology work?
Terms: What is the right exchange for a part of the company? What can the VC firm contribute with beyond money?
Market estimations:
Bottom up: Start with a user, see how much that customer would pay after year one.
Top down: Look at the size of your market.
Next time, a few different paths around making money.
In this and the next few entries, I will share some learning from a series of startup workshops. I will start with marketing sizing and segmentation.
Imagine a VC sees 2000+ business plans a year, schedules 200+ meetings, puts ~20 term sheets together, and closes <10 deals, there is no question that the first meeting is very important. One of the things to do well to stand out in that first encounter is to show that you've carefully thought through your addressable market, and that big markets with high growth rates are in the horizon.
There are six areas to consider, six T's:
Theme: what is the product you are selling (e.g. independent third party verification for ads)?
Team: who are in the founding team (two or three people, their perseverance, domain expertise)? VCs like opportunity and shy away from risks. The more experienced the team is, the clearer the market, the better. Experienced teams plan for the what Ifs? They perform SWOT analysis. A players hire A players and people they trust. Trust among team members is very important.
Terrain: what is the total available market and the addressable market? The first second and third players in the market get most of the shares, about 65%. Where are you going to be?
Timing: Is the market too early too late?
Technology: How will your technology work?
Terms: What is the right exchange for a part of the company? What can the VC firm contribute with beyond money?
Market estimations:
Bottom up: Start with a user, see how much that customer would pay after year one.
Top down: Look at the size of your market.
Next time, a few different paths around making money.
Monday, May 16, 2011
The World of Startup Equity
Startups are hot, and those looking to join startups should be aware of a few things. Thanks to a couple of friends who are startup veterans / serial entrepreneurs for sharing their experience:
First read up on the basics of startup equity for employees.
Next with the knowledge of the startup's current funding position, assess how the options may get affected with another funding event, and get a copy of the perspective company's stock option plan to review, if you can.
Next read up on 83b election and how that you should organize your decisions around vesting schedules.
Finally be aware of different clauses and events so no big surprises take place. Ask the startup founders/executives questions. Experienced founders/executives are often open about the share info and the valuation. It may be a red flag when they are not willing to divulge that information.
Startups are hot, and those looking to join startups should be aware of a few things. Thanks to a couple of friends who are startup veterans / serial entrepreneurs for sharing their experience:
First read up on the basics of startup equity for employees.
Next with the knowledge of the startup's current funding position, assess how the options may get affected with another funding event, and get a copy of the perspective company's stock option plan to review, if you can.
Next read up on 83b election and how that you should organize your decisions around vesting schedules.
Finally be aware of different clauses and events so no big surprises take place. Ask the startup founders/executives questions. Experienced founders/executives are often open about the share info and the valuation. It may be a red flag when they are not willing to divulge that information.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Much to Learn from a Marketing Analogy
Being in the technology space, I've seen my share of solutions marketing messaging. A recent visit to Pragmatic Marketing webpage shed some light on why technology-based companies' approach to marketing might not be working:
Instead of a tech firm, let's say they were KFC, the message might look like this: "Would you like to buy some packaged dead chicken parts? We’re an end-to-end solution for the killing, chopping, freezing, cooking, and packaging of chicken.”
Does your companies do this?
Ever wonder why your prospects are bored by your messaging?
This certainly gets me thinking about how I market Parasians...
Being in the technology space, I've seen my share of solutions marketing messaging. A recent visit to Pragmatic Marketing webpage shed some light on why technology-based companies' approach to marketing might not be working:
Instead of a tech firm, let's say they were KFC, the message might look like this: "Would you like to buy some packaged dead chicken parts? We’re an end-to-end solution for the killing, chopping, freezing, cooking, and packaging of chicken.”
Does your companies do this?
Ever wonder why your prospects are bored by your messaging?
This certainly gets me thinking about how I market Parasians...
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Parallel, Concurrent, and/or Distributed Computing?
First there's a bit of confusion (or lack of clarity) in the computing space with the terms "concurrent computing", "parallel computing", and "distributed computing". They do overlap, and there are some distinctions.
Concurrent computing describes the process with which multiple workloads get operated on at the same time. For example, your computer maybe burning a DVD, browsing the web and doing virus checking at the same time. All these workloads are running concurrently - making visible progress from the user's perspective during any given second. But underneath, the workload may be time multiplexing sequentially on the same core in the same processor in the same system, or running on multiple cores or multiple processors or multiple systems at the same time.
Parallel computing is a subset of concurrent computing, where the multiple workloads really are operating on different hardware resources at the same time. The different resources could be different cores or different processors or different systems.
Distributed computing is a subset of parallel computing where the execution takes place on computer systems that are distributed. This is usually motivated by the distributed nature of the location of data, where the computation can take place close to where data is located.
Why should we care about the similarities and differences?
Highly parallel processors such as the modern GPUs are providing the same general-purpose computation capabilities to run business-critical applications at only 1/20th the power and 1/10th the cost.
Development environments for parallel computing have become more accessible. For example, development environments for the GPUs (CUDA and OpenCL) are based on the C/C++ development environment, which allows GPUs’ computational capabilities to be easily accessed by those seeking acceleration solutions for compute-intensive applications.
Distributed computing is easier with availability of Linux and Hadoop, both excellent examples of free and open source software collaboration. Hadoop, a software framework, enables reliable, efficient, and scalable distributed manipulation of large amounts of data (think in TBs and PBs). Hadoop runs well on Linux as a production platform, which can be widely installed on commodity hardware.
The increased capabilities, flexibility, and accessibility of GPUs and Hadoop are fueling the next level parallel and distributed computing innovations to solve compute intensive and/or data intensive problems faced with both increasing throughput and reducing latency requirements.
What new opportunities do you see?
First there's a bit of confusion (or lack of clarity) in the computing space with the terms "concurrent computing", "parallel computing", and "distributed computing". They do overlap, and there are some distinctions.
Concurrent computing describes the process with which multiple workloads get operated on at the same time. For example, your computer maybe burning a DVD, browsing the web and doing virus checking at the same time. All these workloads are running concurrently - making visible progress from the user's perspective during any given second. But underneath, the workload may be time multiplexing sequentially on the same core in the same processor in the same system, or running on multiple cores or multiple processors or multiple systems at the same time.
Parallel computing is a subset of concurrent computing, where the multiple workloads really are operating on different hardware resources at the same time. The different resources could be different cores or different processors or different systems.
Distributed computing is a subset of parallel computing where the execution takes place on computer systems that are distributed. This is usually motivated by the distributed nature of the location of data, where the computation can take place close to where data is located.
Why should we care about the similarities and differences?
Highly parallel processors such as the modern GPUs are providing the same general-purpose computation capabilities to run business-critical applications at only 1/20th the power and 1/10th the cost.
Development environments for parallel computing have become more accessible. For example, development environments for the GPUs (CUDA and OpenCL) are based on the C/C++ development environment, which allows GPUs’ computational capabilities to be easily accessed by those seeking acceleration solutions for compute-intensive applications.
Distributed computing is easier with availability of Linux and Hadoop, both excellent examples of free and open source software collaboration. Hadoop, a software framework, enables reliable, efficient, and scalable distributed manipulation of large amounts of data (think in TBs and PBs). Hadoop runs well on Linux as a production platform, which can be widely installed on commodity hardware.
The increased capabilities, flexibility, and accessibility of GPUs and Hadoop are fueling the next level parallel and distributed computing innovations to solve compute intensive and/or data intensive problems faced with both increasing throughput and reducing latency requirements.
What new opportunities do you see?
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
Creating Value from Social Media – Captive Reach from Friends of Parallel6
If you are interested in a new way of using social media and mobile technologies to create value, read on…
Imagine a scenario where a family walks into San Francisco Centre, receives a welcome message and a promo for Gymboree on mom, dad and junior's mobile phones. This event then leads them to purchase, and a sharing incentive in a reward point structure motivates them to share with friends… and more sales take place.
Welcome/promo -> purchase -> share -> friends purchase -> friends share…
As of 3pm PDT, 1/24, Gymboree had 176,862 connections on Facebook, and 6349 followers on Twitter.
If only Gymboree could break into the second degree of their fans' connections (1:200), that would be reaching 35,372,400(!) more people on Facebook alone.
What if Gymboree stores can target shoppers in the vicinity, to welcome, remind, and perhaps incent them to stop by and make a purchase?
...
I’m not a social media super user myself, but the patent-pending Captive Reach Rewards technology with Geo Location that powers this is pretty cool stuff. Social Media is (still) hot, but there aren’t a lot of real innovation that create value with it for organizations.
If you are in retail/hotel/golf or other industries with some kind of member-based structure looking to grow business with the help of social media, take a look at this on parallel6.com. This file gives a good idea of the power of this technology, but is no where close to their demo, which shows (in real time) so many opportunities for businesses to reach their “fans” and friends when they are in the market!
I've now known David, the CEO of Parallel6, for several years, and this is one of the most (if not the most) exciting offer he and his team have created. This technology not only turns fans to ambassadors while getting businesses to generate more revenue, it also turns friends to ambassadors: I'd be happy to make introduction for you and Parallel6 if this can help your business grow.
If you are interested in a new way of using social media and mobile technologies to create value, read on…
Imagine a scenario where a family walks into San Francisco Centre, receives a welcome message and a promo for Gymboree on mom, dad and junior's mobile phones. This event then leads them to purchase, and a sharing incentive in a reward point structure motivates them to share with friends… and more sales take place.
Welcome/promo -> purchase -> share -> friends purchase -> friends share…
As of 3pm PDT, 1/24, Gymboree had 176,862 connections on Facebook, and 6349 followers on Twitter.
If only Gymboree could break into the second degree of their fans' connections (1:200), that would be reaching 35,372,400(!) more people on Facebook alone.
What if Gymboree stores can target shoppers in the vicinity, to welcome, remind, and perhaps incent them to stop by and make a purchase?
...
I’m not a social media super user myself, but the patent-pending Captive Reach Rewards technology with Geo Location that powers this is pretty cool stuff. Social Media is (still) hot, but there aren’t a lot of real innovation that create value with it for organizations.
If you are in retail/hotel/golf or other industries with some kind of member-based structure looking to grow business with the help of social media, take a look at this on parallel6.com. This file gives a good idea of the power of this technology, but is no where close to their demo, which shows (in real time) so many opportunities for businesses to reach their “fans” and friends when they are in the market!
I've now known David, the CEO of Parallel6, for several years, and this is one of the most (if not the most) exciting offer he and his team have created. This technology not only turns fans to ambassadors while getting businesses to generate more revenue, it also turns friends to ambassadors: I'd be happy to make introduction for you and Parallel6 if this can help your business grow.
Thursday, January 06, 2011
Dreamforce: yes the force is powerful, and yes there are alternatives
Here’s a belated short post on Dreamforce (12/6-9). I guess I’m not the only one slacking off as first-time followups from booths that I had stopped by are still coming in.
My immediate reaction walking into the conference expo was that force.com has evolved to become such a powerful platform: just about anything can be “plugged” into the force platform. If there are things customers might want to do with the information that may already exist in SFDC, there is likely a company that offers such vertical integration so the customers can do what they want to do, on a platform they are familiar with.
While force.com is considered to be PaaS, Salesforce.com is well positioned in all three new segments of the cloud space totaling $113B (as BofA’s paper: 2011, it’s the year of the cloud, points out). Salesforce.com has been positioning itself well on collaboration, database and more (again more integration).
The companies integrating well with force.com (often selling as “native”) aren’t forgoing other potential markets, either. Most (if not all) offerings connect with an open API, and about half of the people asked if I use SFDC as CRM before talking about their product/service. This was prudent as potential clients are using or looking at alternatives for cost, integration, or other reasons. A recent question on a SaaS LinkedIn group asking for alternatives to Salesforce.com drew 80+ responses offering more than a dozen suggestions (many appear to have come from genuinely happy users).
If all the predictions about strong balance sheets fueling M&A become reality, how will the landscape of CRM look like in 12 months? How will this play out for the companies that built up their businesses on a platform such as force.com? Will this model look similar to that of apps on mobile platforms?
Here’s a belated short post on Dreamforce (12/6-9). I guess I’m not the only one slacking off as first-time followups from booths that I had stopped by are still coming in.
My immediate reaction walking into the conference expo was that force.com has evolved to become such a powerful platform: just about anything can be “plugged” into the force platform. If there are things customers might want to do with the information that may already exist in SFDC, there is likely a company that offers such vertical integration so the customers can do what they want to do, on a platform they are familiar with.
While force.com is considered to be PaaS, Salesforce.com is well positioned in all three new segments of the cloud space totaling $113B (as BofA’s paper: 2011, it’s the year of the cloud, points out). Salesforce.com has been positioning itself well on collaboration, database and more (again more integration).
The companies integrating well with force.com (often selling as “native”) aren’t forgoing other potential markets, either. Most (if not all) offerings connect with an open API, and about half of the people asked if I use SFDC as CRM before talking about their product/service. This was prudent as potential clients are using or looking at alternatives for cost, integration, or other reasons. A recent question on a SaaS LinkedIn group asking for alternatives to Salesforce.com drew 80+ responses offering more than a dozen suggestions (many appear to have come from genuinely happy users).
If all the predictions about strong balance sheets fueling M&A become reality, how will the landscape of CRM look like in 12 months? How will this play out for the companies that built up their businesses on a platform such as force.com? Will this model look similar to that of apps on mobile platforms?
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)