3 ms·

> the amount of liability is also why startups may find it hard to land clients in the enterprise space. This is definitely one factor, but I think it's someth

> the amount of liability is also why startups may find it hard to land clients in the enterprise space. This is definitely one factor, but I think it's something that enterprises manage on a regular basis. They have many suppliers and different arrangements to cover the risks. The problem is often on the startup side where there is a reticence to do anything that would change the product to suit a particular customer and "compromise the mission" of the startup. End users are important, but aren't the real customers of an enterprise startup. If you are relying on enterprise customers this will naturally bring a level of tech debt in order to service them. It's better to embrace this than avoid it in many cases. I've seen startups in denial that certain features would be useful to many customers, only to provide them to a subset of customers where they are legally obligated, simply to maintain a facade that they aren't really a traditional enterprise startup (to support recruitment, product management egos, etc.)

thecleaner 8y ago
> They have many suppliers and different arrangements to cover the risks Doesn't that push up integration costs ? For every new product there is data migration from the old one, installation costs, API changes (maybe not this) and just cost due to downtime.
- ethbro 8y ago
  In my experiences, large enterprises make decisions based on integration surety over integration cost (if it's competitive within an order of magnitude). A ridiculous number of integrations fail. If you can convince someone with authority (either technically or via relationship) that an integration will be successful, you're in. This is IBM and SAP's greatest asset: knowing that, if shit hits the fan, management can write a check for $x,000,000 and a team of engineers will be on-site tomorrow to fix the effort. Not having that is exactly what scares management about open source and/or startups.
  - beat 8y ago
    This is also part of the enterprise startup system... an enterprise startup doesn't need to and probably shouldn't build a whole enterprise sales chain. They just need enough to get a handful of enterprise sales - enough to prove their value proposition is high enough that enterprises will put up with startup shortcomings in order to get that technology. Then, sell the company to a big player like IBM, Salesforce, Atlassian, etc, who just add it to their sales/support portfolio.
    - ethbro 8y ago
      I think all things considered, large enterprise sales probably aren't the best idea for a startup... IF you can avoid it. The power and financial disparity is too great. When one customer is >25% of your revenue (and they know it), bad things ensue.

thecleaner 8y ago

> They have many suppliers and different arrangements to cover the risks Doesn't that push up integration costs ? For every new product there is data migration from the old one, installation costs, API changes (maybe not this) and just cost due to downtime.

ethbro 8y ago
In my experiences, large enterprises make decisions based on integration surety over integration cost (if it's competitive within an order of magnitude). A ridiculous number of integrations fail. If you can convince someone with authority (either technically or via relationship) that an integration will be successful, you're in. This is IBM and SAP's greatest asset: knowing that, if shit hits the fan, management can write a check for $x,000,000 and a team of engineers will be on-site tomorrow to fix the effort. Not having that is exactly what scares management about open source and/or startups.
- beat 8y ago
  This is also part of the enterprise startup system... an enterprise startup doesn't need to and probably shouldn't build a whole enterprise sales chain. They just need enough to get a handful of enterprise sales - enough to prove their value proposition is high enough that enterprises will put up with startup shortcomings in order to get that technology. Then, sell the company to a big player like IBM, Salesforce, Atlassian, etc, who just add it to their sales/support portfolio.
  - ethbro 8y ago
    I think all things considered, large enterprise sales probably aren't the best idea for a startup... IF you can avoid it. The power and financial disparity is too great. When one customer is >25% of your revenue (and they know it), bad things ensue.