Author:
Jocelyn
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Date Posted: 06:35:36 03/07/02 Thu
Patsy,
do u have a sample of a book report that u've done? do u mind posting one here?
>
>Review of START UP: A Silicon Valley Adventure by
>Jerry Caplan
>Published by Warner Books, London 1995
>Reviewed by Lynne Hamill, Deputy Director, DWRC
>It's not often that you find a book about a business
>failure, particularly not one written
>by the CEO and Chairman of the business in question.
>It takes a brave man to admit
>that he made mistakes. And in "Start Up", Jerry Caplan
>has owned.
>This is the story of the GO Corporation, from its
>birth in 1987 to its death in 1994. It
>is a gripping tale. Caplan describes the "start-up"
>game as "an elaborate
>contest….designed to motivate our brightest, most
>creative and hardest working
>individuals to improve the use of society's resources,
>increase employment, and
>provide a broader range of quality goods and services.
>Here's how the game is
>played." It stars the big names of Silicon Valley:
>Microsoft and Gates, Apple and
>Sculley, IBM and AT&T among others. It is about a “big
>idea, hard work and the
>raising and spending of $75 millions dollars”.
>The “big idea” was to produce a portable computer that
>did not require a keyboard.
>Instead entries were to be made using a "pen" and
>translated using handwriting
>recognition software. The founders believed that it
>would revolutionise computing,
>but fatally underestimated the work needed to develop
>such a machine. Remember
>that this company was started 13 years ago. In effect,
>it they were trying to produce
>the forerunner of today's PDA. But as those who use
>PDAs today well know, the
>handwriting recognition software is still far from
>perfect. (I certainly prefer using the
>screen-keyboard to trying to emulate 3 Com's special
>writing that is necessary to input
>text directly.) It was, therefore, an idea before its
>time. The result was that deadlines
>were repeatedly missed, causing a desperate need for
>more cash to keep the company
>afloat. And I do mean desperate. At one point, they
>had just enough to keep going for
>two weeks and pay off the staff!
>The belief that a small, start-up company could
>undertake the work required to take
>such a major technological leap forward would appear
>to have been the fundamental
>mistake (although Caplan doesn’t quite put it as
>bluntly as that!). The constant need
>for cash meant that the company was driven into
>unsuitable alliances with the "big
>boys". But Caplan makes it clear that a small company,
>desperate for cash, is just in
>no position to negotiate effectively. Caplan reports
>one of the GO board members
>who put it nicely:
>"Remember blowing soap bubbles as a kid? You know how
>sometimes you
>get a great big bubble with a little bubble stuck on
>its side? It stays that way
>for a while, but they always either break into two
>separate parts or combine
>into one….Well, it’s the same with corporate
>partnerships. Either the little
>company doesn't matter to the big one - in which case
>they inevitably wind up
>going their separate ways - or it's real important, in
>which case the big
>company can't take the risk of not owning the little
>one outright"
>The "big boys" also know that the law provides no
>redress if you can't pay the
>lawyers. Non-disclosure agreements are of no value if
>you "can't afford a taxi to the
>courthouse"- as Caplan realised when Gates reminded
>him that Microsoft had just
>spent $4 million dollars on one lawsuit! What normal
>folk would consider sharp
>practice is a key element to this tale. It was no
>coincidence that Apple's Newton bore
>a very strong resemblance to GO's product. Nor that
>Microsoft produced something
>similar too. A Microsoft vice-president is quoted as
>saying "Given all you have read
>in the press about the FTC and about the perception of
>Microsoft dominating the
>industry, you might think that being a vice-president
>of Microsoft is like being a field
>general for the Evil Empire, but I don't really think
>that's the case." For those of you
>who do indeed feel that Microsoft is the Evil Empire,
>reading this book will probably
>reinforce your judgement.
>In any event, by the end in 1994, the GO Corporation
>employed 200 - but still wasn't
>producing machines commercially. So although the book
>tend to focus,
>understandably, on the wrong-doings of the "big boys",
>there were clearly major
>management problems. For instance, they were unable to
>control "feature creep", "the
>irresistible temptation of engineers to load a product
>down with their favourite
>features". That meant that the software became, in
>effect, too big for the hardware.
>There was great enthusiasm and dedication to the
>company. But it took its toll. Caplan
>describes how he lost contact with his family and how
>quickly he turned grey: "one
>gray hair for each day as an entrepreneur" as he puts
>it. That the key staff and their
>funders continued to have faith for so long is perhaps
>surprising.
>The book does make for a fascinating tale. I recommend
>to anyone considering
>starting up a new technology company or who is in a
>small company dealing with the
>big players!
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