Alfidi Capital at TiEcon 2017

I scored access to several sessions at TiEcon 2017. The TiE people are some seriously accomplished entrepreneurs and are among the most well-connected people in Silicon Valley. I had to go check out the scene, absorb startup wisdom, and maybe score some free coffee. My readers know I'm all about free stuff. I just can't turn down free access, freebies, and free knowledge.

I check out the action at TiEcon 2017.

The govtech track was a good fit for my background. More techies now know about how the US Digital Service is changing the federal government's cultural approach to deploying tech, but not everyone knows that FITARA is changing how the government's CIOs do business. The entire software sector has tried to move from waterfall development to agile development and Uncle Sam is finally following through. I sometimes wonder whether the entire US government lives in a "cone of uncertainty," but that's what the private sector calls a trial stage for govtech projects developed with lean startup methods. I betcha there's an app for Scrum contractors. Federal government contractors are accustomed to long sales cycles with more predictable revenues. I think the US can look to other countries for examples of successful govtech adoption. Governments most likely to adopt agile govtech, automated documents, knowledge management, mobile stuff, and whatnot will have similar factors. Francis Fukuyama's high-trust cultural traits (like in Scandinavia), a high degree of 4G coverage, and widespread mobile adoption are my picks for those success factors. The Digital 5 effects with e-Estonia are the kind of template the US needs.

The social impact track showcased concepts that are all the rage among business people who want to harmonize themselves with the universe, or something like that. Large banks and wealth management firms are developing their own philanthropic programs and encouraging employees to volunteer in the community. I have no idea whether their salespeople are smart enough to leverage those functions into referrals from donor-advised funds and family foundations. Impact investors are following the herd of VCs into agtech and are using the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. Here's the UN Sustainable Development Knowledge Platform if you need to get started. Rich people and corporate big shots can use the SDG Philanthropy Platform to select the SDGs that will most enhance their brand images or social standing. A non-profit executive at TiEcon mentioned that using a "network effect" of social peer pressure validates an impact investment pitch with well-heeled people. Yeah, it's all about elite peer acceptance of the latest cool idea they can brag about at social events.

One social impact expert thinks that four key cycles are out of balance: carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and Gini. Whacked-out cycles imply investors will favor environmental projects that will help the poor. I have no reason to think any of that is made up, because it sounds like it's all super-advanced science and smarty-pants stuff. I have every reason to think that microloans for 3D printers, Arduino boards, and other small assets can enable a tidal wave of artisanal tech for disadvantaged people, just like microloans for aquaponics in urban food deserts. Crowdfunding platforms could support microloans for lots of small-scale impact projects. It will be tough to pull these things off without US support for the UN SDGs and Paris Agreement on climate change. It will be even tougher without USAID programs for development abroad and US HUD programs for people at home. Deconstructing the US government in a nationalist fit of rage has an opportunity cost of foregone future development.

The TiEcon youth track had tons of stuff that even a middle-aged guy like yours truly could use. I thought I heard one guy at TiEcon say that some Indian regional government entity sponsored a hackathon with 900 participants. That is way more people than I've ever seen the biggest US tech conferences attract. India and China have huge populations and lots of students studying STEM. Quantity has a quality all its own. The US urgently needs crash STEM programs so lots of people can handle distributed processing in machine learning and analytics, just to catch up with our major strategic competitors. IMHO scalable models like Rethinking Engineering Design and Execution (REDX) would get mid-career non-STEM experts pushing youth into STEM projects that quickly solve real problems.

One VC addressing the youth track said successful entrepreneurs have five superpowers: passion, charisma, speed, focus, and "flight" (i.e., mental agility and constant pursuit of increased competence). He's Joseph Floyd, and you can check out his amazing comic book at Silicon Heroes. I read the book myself and it rings every bell for tech entrepreneurs striving to make their mark.

Athletes speak the entrepreneur's lingo. Former NFL player Anthony Trucks spoke about how he put tremendous work into the game he loved before he even knew he would be successful, a great lesson in hustling for entrepreneurs. Olympic table tennis player Lily Ann Zhang shared her humility and passion, and wanted us to enjoy our journey to success. Wow, I'm so glad I stuck around for the inspiration. It pays to be young at heart.

Anyone into biotech should check out Open Source Pharma Foundation and Nutrition International (formerly the Micronutrient Initiative). The impact investors pushing these concepts help enable simple innovations like universal iodized salt that become UN-led policies. One cool idea I heard from these advocates was for a "social DARPA" enabling giga-scale open innovation for billions of people.

TiEcon 2017 was well worth my time. I scored all the free stuff I could find so I came out ahead once again. The TiE people still haven't invited me to speak at their conference. They are really missing out because I have plenty to say about innovation. I also like Indian food even though I'm not Indian, so I will eat anything they put in front of me when I'm the star attraction at a future TiEcon.

Social Entrepreneurship at TiECON 2015

I got my first limited exposure to TiECON just this year.  I was lucky enough to score a free pass to the social entrepreneurship track.  Someone told me it would also score admission to the entire conference but the check-in people told me that was not the case.  What a bummer.  I prefer free admission whenever possible.

I did not know that the UNICEF Innovation Center existed until they sent a representative to speak at TiECON.  I would like to see more success stories about how tech breaks the cycle of victimhood in humanitarian aid.  More self-reliant clients means more inefficient relief NGOs can close their doors.  I'll believe UNICEF is serious about Big Data relief solutions when it works its way out of existence.

The social investors panel dropped some gems of wisdom.  If I recall correctly, one expert said innovation, reach, impact, and determination are the preferred social enterprise success factors.  Show me the KPIs for each category so our social entrepreneurs know how to fulfill each factor.  The funders see entrepreneurial potential in Indian high school grads in the academic top 10-15% of their classes who gain admission to engineering and medical school.  I think they should refine their criteria to include personality assessments that select for people with intrinsic motivation and a low need for approval.  The funders are also big believers in personal role models for the high-potential proteges they identify in underprivileged communities.  It sure is nice when someone powerful launches a deus ex machina into a poor region.

I give bonus points for the creativity in naming a talk "Making the Elephant in the Indian Economy Dance."  Just don't dance anywhere near that elephant and you should be okay.  Infrastructure attracts capital and talent; Silicon Valley has long known this and Indians have figured it out.  I thought of Maslow's hierarchy of needs when the speaker dude said making a change in someone's life meant meeting all of their needs.  The point is that it's impossible for an entrepreneur to reach Maslow's self-actualization pinnacle if they worry about what to eat and where to sleep.  Here comes my massive revelation, people.  Short of meeting all human needs, a scalable social entrepreneurial solution lowers the challenges a disadvantaged population faces, so they can meet their own needs with less difficulty.  The solution must of course serve a large target market to be worth scaling, and India definitely has a large population of very poor people.

I had never heard of the Hinduja Group Foundation until this conference.  The controlling family's representative could certainly practice her public speaking skills before addressing TiECON.  Having family wealth grants access to the WEF at Davos but does not guarantee obvious strategic vision.  I agree with the family's advocacy for greater gender parity and maternity benefits in career tracks.  I always want to see women get ahead, especially the ones wiggling shapely behinds as they climb their career ladders.

I still cringe when minimally qualified people get a public platform through the luck of their birth into privilege.  Gall dang it, I would rather have spent time in TiECON's oil and gas track than listen to a dilettante mouth off.  Speaking about social capital means having competence in allocating capital.  Family mouthpieces need to have the most competent parts of their bloodline facing the public.  The weaker people should stay on the sidelines at the polo field.

The final panel shared some best practices for nonprofits' success.  The panelists wasted time talking about everything their nonprofits did, except for how they succeeded!  I kept wondering about a best practice for scoring with hot nonprofit babes.  If donors are the equivalent of VCs for nonprofits, they should make their expectations clear through the various forms of donor-advised giving.  If nonprofits want to avoid being held hostage to donor demands, they should develop market-based revenue streams that will make them financially independent.

TiECON is doing the right thing by branching out into social entrepreneurship.  More care in selecting their noted experts would enhance this track's credibility at future conferences.  TiE should note how SOCAP operates.  The nonprofit sector doesn't generate the returns that TiE's capitalist entrepreneurs are accustomed to seeing in their careers.  I appreciate the hot Indian babes who attended this particular track.  I'm certain I can leverage their assets in some future joint ventures, if you know what I mean.

US-India Innovation Funding Panel at TiE Silicon Valley

I get emails from The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) all the time but yesterday was the first time I actually attended a TiE event.  I've really been missing out on some quality insights all of these years.  I journeyed on down to TiE Silicon Valley's conference center in Santa Clara to hear from panelists discussing U.S. and Indian joint initiatives in funding innovative technologies.

The best insight of the evening was from an Indian-American academic I met during the buffet dinner.  BTW, one reason I'm now considering joining TiE aside from the great events is that they serve good Indian buffets.    I'm sitting next to this guy and I ask him whether India still has a rigid caste system.  His answer was that it's much like the class system in the U.S. and other countries.  Indian class status is determined by economics now, and not so much by birth.  I think that's progress.

The introduction from a senior TiE guy extolled the organization's application of the "pay it forward" Silicon Valley ethos where established business leaders mentor younger entrepreneurs.  He noted that Steve Jobs was brazen enough to call Intel's Andy Grove in Apple's early days and Mr. Grove gave him a one our meeting.  That is rare anywhere else but commonplace in Silicon Valley.

The Indo-US Science and Technology Endowment Joint Panel members gave their introductory remarks.  The guy from the US-India S&T Endowment Fund said their fund originated from the US government's food aid program for India.  They grant $2-3M/year to startups to promote commercialization of technology with social impact.  The focus has historically been on accelerating India's development but US-based tech startups obviously benefit.  The fund reviewed about 400 proposals in its third round and will soon announce awards of about $500K each.

The next guy represented the Indian government's sci-tech policy body.  I didn't match all their names and faces with their jobs, so hang in there.  He said India's economic liberalization in 1993 accelerated the country's development.  Sci-tech funding grew rapidly and the number of published academic papers absolutely exploded.  The Indian government has a fund for non-Indian companies that can benefit the Indian market.  I believe he was referring to programs under the auspices of India's Global Innovation and Technology Alliance.

Another Indian guy on the panel addressed the country's business climate.  He said Indian business failures often end up in court.  Yeah, like that never happens in the US, right?  Former partners sue each other all the time in Silicon Valley.  I have digressed; back to the Indian guy.  India has had positive GDP growth for 31 years.  India doesn't seem to have much of a native VC sector, because 94% of all funding for early-stage startups comes from outside India.  I discovered after the panel that there is an India VC Association but the announcements on the home page all refer to investment conferences outside of India.  I think Indian VCs should pump their own activities because you gotta start somewhere.  The Indian guy also mentioned that there's a lack of quality Indian mentors for startups.  No wonder these guys came all the way to TiE; there's nothing like it back in India.

The panelist from the US Department of Agriculture predicted world population peaking in 2050, with water scarcity and limited arable land already setting limits on growth.  The USDA wants to see new agricultural tech to help grow a sector still characterized by hard work and low pay.  He mentioned that US cows in the 1940s produced 4000 gallons of milk (I'm not sure whether he said it was an annual figure or a lifetime figure), but today they produce 30,000 gallons.  Technology drove this improvement in yield.  I checked the USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service for data on milk production.  I clicked through to "milk - production, measured in lbs/head" because that seems to be the metric for how much a single cow yields in a given year.  The data readout shows that the figure was 5007 lbs/head in 1947 and 21,697 lbs/head in 2012.  Maybe the USDA guy meant to say pounds rather than gallons, but his current year number is still way off and his historical number looks like an average of annual 1940s numbers.  Whatever, close enough for government work.  His basic thesis is still correct.  The technology revolution matters in agriculture.

The US Embassy India's Sci-Tech officer spoke last.  He noted that an open government platform works collaboratively with Indian innovators.  US and Indian coders rolled out upgrades to Indian government websites together and now the India government uploads much more data to its websites for public use.  He mentioned several joint programs promoting women in science, clean energy R&D, oceanography, and health care initiatives.  I'd like to see some Indian financial blogger run through that country's open source data like I do with US data.

Now we get to the panel discussion.  Someone referenced India's innovation timeline as too small and slow, asking how to scale up Indian innovation to match Silicon Valley's rapid time scale.  The panel said the board members of the Endowment Fund agree Indian innovation cycles are too slow.  Their fund has done milestone-based grant funding so far rather than equity funding.  One panelist said the Indian government has funded network centers that do virtual collaboration.

Another guy asked how entrepreneurs can expect to benefit from development funding if the Indian government's requirements for technology transfer are so restrictive.  The panelists said the Indian government takes innovation seriously, but they need entrepreneurs to help show them how to be innovative.

One TiE gal (a rare woman in a mostly male audience) said there's a huge fear of failure in India but Silicon Valley culture sees failure as a stepping stone.  She wanted to know how India would overcome this cultural fear.  The panel guy who said Indian failures end up in court commented that the Valley's tolerance of failure is unique.  Cultural change will take time.  He said India's colonial history may have contributed to its risk averse culture.

Someone asked about Indian water quality and waste.  The panel said different regions face different water contaminants, so there are many ways to deploy innovation.  The Indian ministry that regulates water use is spending money on technology.  I find it interesting that 90% of India's water is used in agriculture.

One of the final questions was about how India incentivizes US serial entrepreneurs to come and do business.  The panel extended an open invitation.  I got the feeling after several questions like this that the typical TiE serial entrepreneur is frustrated with the Indian government's limited understanding of how to develop an entrepreneurial culture.  The TiE folks have their work cut out for them.  A camera crew from the local IND TV studio was on hand to get shots of the action.

My hat is off to TiE.  I can't believe I've missed out on this organization's awesome resources for so long.  I am definitely coming down the peninsula as often as I can, and not just for the Indian buffets.  TiE people have what it takes to blaze trails in business.