Management
When I was new to the workforce, I was violently opposed to matrixed organizational structures. “They're bullsh*t," I thought, "people will always favor one direction over the other, making one of the two managers superfluous. And, if that's the case, then why bother
IPO
Zynga went public last Friday. The company raised $100M and was valued at around $7B off TTM revenues of about $1B (see S-1 here). This puts the Zynga's valuation in the same range as Electronic Arts, a company founded in 1982 and whose TTM revenues are 3.6x
VC
Let's go back to July of 2010. Imagine you're having coffee with Endeca's CEO, Steve Papa, a brilliant guy and someone for whom I have great respect. But let's say we're having a coffee with Steve in July, 2010 and
Enterprise
I finally found some time to read over the approximately 175-page registration statement (S-1) that enterprise social networking software provider Jive Software filed on August 24, 2011 in support of a upcoming initial public offering (IPO) of its stock. In this post, and subject to my usual disclaimers, I'
I've heard a fair bit of discussion about whether IBM or Oracle is likely to step in and start a bidding war for Autonomy which HP last week announced that it will buy for $42.21 per share, or $10.2B, as discussed last week in Kellblog when
Just a quick post to share the widely published rumors that HP is in discussions with Autonomy over an acquisition estimated to be about $10B. * TechCrunch: HP to Buy Enterprise Software Company Autonomy for $10B * Reuters: HP Nears $10B Autonomy Buy * AllThingsD: HP Reportedly Close To $10B Buyout of Autonomy
Management
The situation was clear. The company had just brought in a new COO. That person was band-leader, intent on bringing a slew of folks from his last company. My friend Pete, who worked for the new COO, had strong track record of delivering results, but the internal rap on him
Management
I first became interested in decision making more than a decade ago, back when I was running marketing at Business Objects. My interest was prompted by the evolution of taglines among BI vendors. In the early days, taglines were descriptive like First in Enterprise Decision Support or The Enterprise Data
Strategy
When asked why he won so many matches, chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer would reply: "all that matters on the chessboard is good moves." That is, winning is all about the moves. And moves, in turn, are all about the situation. Contrast this to today's Silicon Valley
Marketing
This post was inspired by a recent beer with long-term colleague, friend, and fellow volleyball dad, Paul Albright, now chief revenue officer at Marketo. The question we discussed was how can a company sell current product capabilities but also market vision at the same? (For brevity's sake I
Silicon Valley
The first time I heard the word "pivot" in the context of business strategy was about nine months ago. As a student of language, my ears perked up when I heard it. I remember thinking, "pivot ... interesting, haven't heard that one before, ... strong buzzword potential,
Marketing
As a marketing guy turned CEO, I have the relatively rare experience of having seen marketing from inside the organization as well as from above it. Yesterday, the SV Forum Marketing SIG invited me to give a presentation where I discussed marketing from the CEO's perspective. I'
