If you want to call a business that you found in Google Maps you can do it now thanks to a “call” button. And it’s free!!!
Google will dial both parties (you and the business) and establish a regular phone connection. Google pays the cost of the call for both parties. Great isn’t it?
Other major portals have tested different click-to-call services, but it seems that Google is the first with a widespread launch.
Of course, this is free for now, and I think that the business model will change rapidly, as many businesses would be ready to pay significantly more for a phone call than a click to their website.
This is a good move and another example of the capacity of this big company to innovate.
Friday, December 01, 2006
Monday, November 27, 2006
Sequoia, KPCB, Accel & Benchmark Capital
Here is some info about 4 big names of the VC industry and the companies they have funded:
Sequoia Capital
Oracle
Yahoo!
Electronic Arts
Apple
Google
YouTube
LinkedIn
Cisco Systems
Paypal
…
Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
Digital Chocolate
Friendster
Google
Blue Nile (see my post)
Palm
Ciena
E.Piphany
Juniper Networks
iVillage
VeriSign
Amazon
Citrix Systems
Netscape
Macromedia
AOL
Flextronics
Electronic Arts
Symantec
Sun Microsystems
…
Accel
UUNETReal.com
Macromedia
Brightmail
ComScore
Facebook
Netvibes
Synopsys
Walmart.com
Weeworld
...
Benchmark Capital
1-800-Flowers
AOL
Bebo
Betfair
E-Loan
eBay
Friendster
JAMDAT
Matrix Semiconductor
Metacafe
MySQL
Palm Computing
Pageflakes
Red Hat Software
Shopping.com
Synopsys
WeeWorld
Yoox
...
Friday, November 24, 2006
The European adventure of Benchmark Capital and Accel Partners
I just read an article on Real Deals, a famous Private Equity and Venture Capital magazine, about two major Venture Capital funds: Accel and Benchmark Capital.
The scope of this article is to describe these two funds that arrived in Europe in 2000, just before the bubble burst, and decided to stay in Europe. Actually, as mentioned the article “they are the only US venture capitalists not to have beaten a hasty retreat”. For them, Europe is “an under-served venture capital market relative to the number of entrepreneurs and technologies in development”. Therefore, considering the European market as a real opportunity, you need to have a local base (ie London).
What strikes me in this excellent article is that Benchmark and Accel do not have an exit track record in Europe: “the big home runs, on which their model is predicated, are yet to come”.
Let’s hope that these home runs will come shortly in order to confirm that the European technological market exists and can create a lot of value!
The scope of this article is to describe these two funds that arrived in Europe in 2000, just before the bubble burst, and decided to stay in Europe. Actually, as mentioned the article “they are the only US venture capitalists not to have beaten a hasty retreat”. For them, Europe is “an under-served venture capital market relative to the number of entrepreneurs and technologies in development”. Therefore, considering the European market as a real opportunity, you need to have a local base (ie London).
What strikes me in this excellent article is that Benchmark and Accel do not have an exit track record in Europe: “the big home runs, on which their model is predicated, are yet to come”.
Let’s hope that these home runs will come shortly in order to confirm that the European technological market exists and can create a lot of value!
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Yahoo! and Major Newspaper Deal
This week, Yahoo ! announced a strategic partnership with a consortium of 170 US newspapers. This deal extends Yahoo!’s advertising network, which also includes eBay and Right Media.
Actually, the consortium will use Yahoo!’s technology platform to sell online advertising for the newspapers’ sites, while the consortium will manage local ad sales for Yahoo!
Regarding the search business line : deployment of Yahoo! Web search (including sponsored search of course) on newspaper sites. The deal extends to reach of Yahoo!’s local tools and content to the consortium’s sites.
How this agreement should benefit Yahoo! ?
Yahoo! Will leverage the newspapers’ sizable local sales efforts to reinforce its local advertising to monetize local queries and the newspapers sites’ 58 million unique visitors will add significant new reach and monetization potential for Yahoo! Ad network.
The initial execution will integrate Hot Jobs with the newspaper recruiting: the consortium will begin upselling its job listings on HotJobs and adopt HotJobs as its technology backbone by Q1 07.
This strategic agreement enables Yahoo! To leverage the newspapers’ high quality local content and classified advertising on Yahoo! Web pages. Let me remind you that the local advertising market is around $100 bn!!!
Actually, the consortium will use Yahoo!’s technology platform to sell online advertising for the newspapers’ sites, while the consortium will manage local ad sales for Yahoo!
Regarding the search business line : deployment of Yahoo! Web search (including sponsored search of course) on newspaper sites. The deal extends to reach of Yahoo!’s local tools and content to the consortium’s sites.
How this agreement should benefit Yahoo! ?
Yahoo! Will leverage the newspapers’ sizable local sales efforts to reinforce its local advertising to monetize local queries and the newspapers sites’ 58 million unique visitors will add significant new reach and monetization potential for Yahoo! Ad network.
The initial execution will integrate Hot Jobs with the newspaper recruiting: the consortium will begin upselling its job listings on HotJobs and adopt HotJobs as its technology backbone by Q1 07.
This strategic agreement enables Yahoo! To leverage the newspapers’ high quality local content and classified advertising on Yahoo! Web pages. Let me remind you that the local advertising market is around $100 bn!!!
Sunday, November 19, 2006
Blue Nile: a success story
I really like this company. It is the largest online retailer of certified diamonds and fine jewellery. On their web site they underline that “Internet Retailer Magazine reports Blue Nile is bigger than the next three largest online jewellers combined. The company is built on a unique idea: choosing an engagement ring doesn't have to be complicated. Diamonds can be simple to understand. Making the right choice can be easy.”
Last year revenues were $203 M, the 06 forecast is around $252 M with a net Income of $12 M. The market cap, yes it is a listed company (ticker NILE), is approximately $650 M. In 2005, 72% of the sales were diamond engagement jewellery. The average order size is huge at $1 884 (+6.3%!!!).
Blue Nile has a 50% market share in the online engagement ring market and the company expects to increase this figure. Actually, they are doing pretty good as they reported for Q3, revenues ahead of expectations. Their current strategy is built on two main axes: diversification of the product catalogue and international expansion. But the online jewellery market is becoming more crowded and therefore the customer acquisition cost is expected to outpace the sales growth. According to some analysts, Blue Nile will have to increase its marketing budget in order to maintain its predominant position.
Once again, this is an example of what I strongly believe: all kind of products can be sold on Internet, even expansive ones like diamonds! I talked about that here with Sarenza, the on line shoe retailer.
Last year revenues were $203 M, the 06 forecast is around $252 M with a net Income of $12 M. The market cap, yes it is a listed company (ticker NILE), is approximately $650 M. In 2005, 72% of the sales were diamond engagement jewellery. The average order size is huge at $1 884 (+6.3%!!!).
Blue Nile has a 50% market share in the online engagement ring market and the company expects to increase this figure. Actually, they are doing pretty good as they reported for Q3, revenues ahead of expectations. Their current strategy is built on two main axes: diversification of the product catalogue and international expansion. But the online jewellery market is becoming more crowded and therefore the customer acquisition cost is expected to outpace the sales growth. According to some analysts, Blue Nile will have to increase its marketing budget in order to maintain its predominant position.
Once again, this is an example of what I strongly believe: all kind of products can be sold on Internet, even expansive ones like diamonds! I talked about that here with Sarenza, the on line shoe retailer.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
The Digital Generation
In my previous post, I mentioned this new Digital Generation without any specific details. I’ve read few things on different blogs and reports about it and here is my synthesis.
- This Digital Generation (DG) is aged 8-24
- The Internet is fully integrated into their daily lives.
- They are always connected, thus they work and play very differently than the older generations. Actually, this is the first generation that grew up with interactive media.
- They are becoming the most immediate content creators online.
- According to the Kelsey Group, this DG is multi-tasks. They can perform 3 or 4 other tasks while they are online and 2 or 3 while watching TV. They spend less time with TV and more with “digital devices” like mobile phones, iPods or PCs.
- As most of them are younger than 18, they do not have a credit card, and therefore they do need the parental authorization to do shopping on the Web, which is not good at all for impulse purchases. The good thing is that the DG is still a real opportunity as teenagers become young adults. This DG will drive additional revenue through the online channel as they will become more financially independent.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Pierre Bellanger de Skyrock et Skyblog
J'ai assisté à une présentation de Pierre bellanger, fondateur et PDG de Skyrock. Je ne connaissais absolument pas le personnage et je dois vous avouer que j'ai été assez impressionné.
Skyrock, c'est aujourd’hui 4 M d'auditeurs, dont 60% ont plus de 25 ans!
Pour Pierre Bellanger, il y a, dans notre société actuelle, trois générations qui cohabitent : la plus ancienne est composée de gens qui ont grandi dans le monde analogique, l'intermédiaire a grandi dans l'analogique, puis dans le numérique et enfin la plus jeune a grandi dans le tout numérique. Or ce qui est plutôt amusant, c'est que la transmission entre les générations se fait actuellement à l'envers : ce sont les plus jeunes qui enseignent aux générations intermédiaires et surtout aux plus vieilles à se servir des nouveaux outils numériques qui nous entourent.
Vous l'aurez compris Skyrock et Skyblog se positionne à cheval sur la génération la plus jeune et sur l'intermédiaire et pour ce faire ils ont dû procéder à leur netamorphose (néologisme entre Net et métamorphose pour ceux d'entre vous qui ne suivraient pas). Le résultat de cette évolution s'appelle SKYBLOG qui compte 6 M de blogs et une moyenne de 10 000 nouveaux blogs créés par jour. Rappelons également que Julien Dray a créé son blog Ile2France sur Skyblog.
Pour Pierre Bellanger, l'avenir des médias est dans le Web 2.0 à savoir le User Generated Content et plus dans la diffusion unilatérale dans un contenu fait par quelques-uns et diffusé à tous! Si les groupes médias ne le comprennent pas, ils seront condamnés à voir leurs recettes publicitaires diminuées au profit des acteurs du Net ou de leurs concurrent qui auront su s'adapter. N'est-ce pas, d'ailleurs, ce qu'essaie de faire TF1 avec WAT.TV?
Voilà, je voulais partager avec vous ces idées présentées brillamment par Pierre Bellanger.
Skyrock, c'est aujourd’hui 4 M d'auditeurs, dont 60% ont plus de 25 ans!
Pour Pierre Bellanger, il y a, dans notre société actuelle, trois générations qui cohabitent : la plus ancienne est composée de gens qui ont grandi dans le monde analogique, l'intermédiaire a grandi dans l'analogique, puis dans le numérique et enfin la plus jeune a grandi dans le tout numérique. Or ce qui est plutôt amusant, c'est que la transmission entre les générations se fait actuellement à l'envers : ce sont les plus jeunes qui enseignent aux générations intermédiaires et surtout aux plus vieilles à se servir des nouveaux outils numériques qui nous entourent.
Vous l'aurez compris Skyrock et Skyblog se positionne à cheval sur la génération la plus jeune et sur l'intermédiaire et pour ce faire ils ont dû procéder à leur netamorphose (néologisme entre Net et métamorphose pour ceux d'entre vous qui ne suivraient pas). Le résultat de cette évolution s'appelle SKYBLOG qui compte 6 M de blogs et une moyenne de 10 000 nouveaux blogs créés par jour. Rappelons également que Julien Dray a créé son blog Ile2France sur Skyblog.
Pour Pierre Bellanger, l'avenir des médias est dans le Web 2.0 à savoir le User Generated Content et plus dans la diffusion unilatérale dans un contenu fait par quelques-uns et diffusé à tous! Si les groupes médias ne le comprennent pas, ils seront condamnés à voir leurs recettes publicitaires diminuées au profit des acteurs du Net ou de leurs concurrent qui auront su s'adapter. N'est-ce pas, d'ailleurs, ce qu'essaie de faire TF1 avec WAT.TV?
Voilà, je voulais partager avec vous ces idées présentées brillamment par Pierre Bellanger.
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