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The Valley will not soon be displaced and will do just fine in spite of the larger economic problems - nowhere else in the world will one find such an aggregati

by grellas 17y ago

The Valley will not soon be displaced and will do just fine in spite of the larger economic problems - nowhere else in the world will one find such an aggregation of talented entrepreneurs, monied investors, academic expertise, and, above all, critical relationships with those who know startups well and are integrally involved in launching and promoting them. With every cycle (I have seen them all), the Valley takes new shape in its economic drivers, and it will likely do so again this time around. But the tech revolution has fundamentally changed world commerce and is not about to slow down. The Valley remains its epicenter, in spite of any bleak short-term issues. Early-stage startups (my area of specialty) have not slowed but rather increased in the past year, and their quality is up (very often driven by immigrants or first-generation children of immigrants - this is a big change from 25 years ago). The venture-backed part of the startup world has been on hold and will largely remain so for the time being. In time, it too will emerge again, but this will depend on an eventual opening up of the IPO market. The Valley will survive and emerge stronger than ever, in my view. Opportunities for those seeking to launch new startups are as good as they ever have been (and office space is cheap and plentiful, and certainly not just in large office buildings but everywhere).

Alex3917 17y ago
"The Valley will not soon be displaced and will do just fine in spite of the larger economic problems" Which seems more likely in twenty years: A) The CA/US debt, education, and political problems will be fixed B) In the near future Boris Johnson or some other politician who 'gets it' is able to convince their government to pass a series of bills that create the same economic/social conditions that created SV, and over the next twenty years this new area catches up to and surpasses SV despite SV's current massive advantage. As for education, IIRC it was one of the top three issues for every presidential election between 1964 and 2000 and virtually nothing changed. For the past two election cycles it hasn't even been one of the top five issues, and there's no evidence that it's coming back in 2012. The fact is that the vast majority of CA/USians can't read English proficiently, that is well enough to compare and contrast the viewpoints in two different newspaper articles. This means the vast majority of our population is completely useless in the modern economy. Not only are we making zero progress toward fixing this, but there is zero will to fix it. And even in the past when there was tons of will to fix it, it still proved unfixable. As for the CA/US debt, the vast majority of citizens STRONGLY support increasing the debt. A black-gay-atheist would have a better chance at winning the south in the 50s than a presidential candidate who supports the kind of tax increases needed to fix the debt. As for our other political problems, our policies are completely based around made-for-TV soundbites and not academic research. That's why our infrastructure is crumbling, we support torture, we're destroying the value of the dollar, etc. And I see zero sign of this changing. As much as I love SV-- and I still intend on moving there-- let's face the facts, the chances of someplace else catching up to SV are vastly better than the chances of fixing the problems facing the US.
- skmurphy 17y ago
  Silicon Valley is more than 100 years old. I blogged about this in http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2008/11/05/steve-blank-on-secret-history-of-silicon-valley-at-chm-nov-20/ http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2008/11/05/steve-blank-on-secre... but here is one quick data point: California Landmark NO. 836 PIONEER ELECTRONICS RESEARCH LABORATORY - This is the original site of the laboratory and factory of Federal Telegraph Company, founded in 1909 by Cyril F. Elwell. Here, Dr. Lee de Forest, inventor of the three-element radio vacuum tube, devised the first vacuum tube amplifier and oscillator in 1911-13. Worldwide developments based on this research led to modern radio communication, television, and the electronics age. Location: In sidewalk, SE corner of Channing Ave and Emerson St, Palo Alto Radio technologies preceded and prepared the way for electronics and semiconductors, and it was fueled with risk capital.
  - pg 17y ago
    That is a somewhat misleading claim. Whatever area had turned out to be the center of the semiconductor industry, there would presumably have been some electronics firms there already.
    - skmurphy 17y ago
      My argument is not that Silicon Valley was inevitable but that it takes a long time to grow an entrepreneurial region. It's not misleading in raising the bar to areas/regions that want to be the next Silicon Valley and don't have an entrepreneurial substrate and appropriate ancillary services (e.g. attorneys, accountants, banks, that understand startups and entrepreneurs) to form a viable ecosystem. I don't think the 100 years is misleading, if it had happened somewhere else (e.g. Boston) I think it would still have involved the same antecedents: major universities, risk capital, electronics firms...It may also have been important that it was primarily agricultural land that was pushed aside, if there had been other active industries they may have preferentially competed for the same talent. Three good books I rely on for this analysis are "Understanding Silicon Valley" by Kenney http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Silicon-Valley-Entrepreneurial-Stanford/dp/0804737347 http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Silicon-Valley-Entrepren... "The Silicon Valley Edge" by Lee, Miller, Hancock, and Rowen http://www.amazon.com/Silicon-Valley-Edge-Innovation-Entrepreneurship/dp/0804740631 http://www.amazon.com/Silicon-Valley-Edge-Innovation-Entrepr... "Regional Advantage" Saxenian http://www.amazon.com/Regional-Advantage-Culture-Competition-Silicon/dp/0674753402/ http://www.amazon.com/Regional-Advantage-Culture-Competition...
gaius 17y ago
talented entrepreneurs, monied investors, academic expertise, and, above all, critical relationships with those who know startups well and are integrally involved in launching and promoting them Silicon Valley had none of that before Shockley and the Fairchildren (AKA tha Traitorous 8) rolled into town back in '57. Was that truly a one-off? The world's a big place.
- evgen 17y ago
  And Hollywood was nothing more than orange groves outside of Los Angeles before Lumiere invented the motion picture camera. Was that a one-off? So far that does seem to be the case. Lots of places will compete for the title of being the second-best version of "the center of the universe" for industry X, Y, or Z but there are very few examples of the center actually moving once it has established itself.
  - gaius 17y ago
    London wasn't always Europe's financial capital.
- skmurphy 17y ago
  I believe that both Federal Radio (1909) and Hewlett Packard (1939) benefited from talented entrepreneurial engineers, risk capital, academic expertise, and a deep understanding of how to foster innovation not just manage invention.

by grellas 17y ago

Alex3917 17y ago

"The Valley will not soon be displaced and will do just fine in spite of the larger economic problems" Which seems more likely in twenty years: A) The CA/US debt, education, and political problems will be fixed B) In the near future Boris Johnson or some other politician who 'gets it' is able to convince their government to pass a series of bills that create the same economic/social conditions that created SV, and over the next twenty years this new area catches up to and surpasses SV despite SV's current massive advantage. As for education, IIRC it was one of the top three issues for every presidential election between 1964 and 2000 and virtually nothing changed. For the past two election cycles it hasn't even been one of the top five issues, and there's no evidence that it's coming back in 2012. The fact is that the vast majority of CA/USians can't read English proficiently, that is well enough to compare and contrast the viewpoints in two different newspaper articles. This means the vast majority of our population is completely useless in the modern economy. Not only are we making zero progress toward fixing this, but there is zero will to fix it. And even in the past when there was tons of will to fix it, it still proved unfixable. As for the CA/US debt, the vast majority of citizens STRONGLY support increasing the debt. A black-gay-atheist would have a better chance at winning the south in the 50s than a presidential candidate who supports the kind of tax increases needed to fix the debt. As for our other political problems, our policies are completely based around made-for-TV soundbites and not academic research. That's why our infrastructure is crumbling, we support torture, we're destroying the value of the dollar, etc. And I see zero sign of this changing. As much as I love SV-- and I still intend on moving there-- let's face the facts, the chances of someplace else catching up to SV are vastly better than the chances of fixing the problems facing the US.

skmurphy 17y ago
Silicon Valley is more than 100 years old. I blogged about this in http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2008/11/05/steve-blank-on-secret-history-of-silicon-valley-at-chm-nov-20/ http://www.skmurphy.com/blog/2008/11/05/steve-blank-on-secre... but here is one quick data point: California Landmark NO. 836 PIONEER ELECTRONICS RESEARCH LABORATORY - This is the original site of the laboratory and factory of Federal Telegraph Company, founded in 1909 by Cyril F. Elwell. Here, Dr. Lee de Forest, inventor of the three-element radio vacuum tube, devised the first vacuum tube amplifier and oscillator in 1911-13. Worldwide developments based on this research led to modern radio communication, television, and the electronics age. Location: In sidewalk, SE corner of Channing Ave and Emerson St, Palo Alto Radio technologies preceded and prepared the way for electronics and semiconductors, and it was fueled with risk capital.
- pg 17y ago
  That is a somewhat misleading claim. Whatever area had turned out to be the center of the semiconductor industry, there would presumably have been some electronics firms there already.
  - skmurphy 17y ago
    My argument is not that Silicon Valley was inevitable but that it takes a long time to grow an entrepreneurial region. It's not misleading in raising the bar to areas/regions that want to be the next Silicon Valley and don't have an entrepreneurial substrate and appropriate ancillary services (e.g. attorneys, accountants, banks, that understand startups and entrepreneurs) to form a viable ecosystem. I don't think the 100 years is misleading, if it had happened somewhere else (e.g. Boston) I think it would still have involved the same antecedents: major universities, risk capital, electronics firms...It may also have been important that it was primarily agricultural land that was pushed aside, if there had been other active industries they may have preferentially competed for the same talent. Three good books I rely on for this analysis are "Understanding Silicon Valley" by Kenney http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Silicon-Valley-Entrepreneurial-Stanford/dp/0804737347 http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Silicon-Valley-Entrepren... "The Silicon Valley Edge" by Lee, Miller, Hancock, and Rowen http://www.amazon.com/Silicon-Valley-Edge-Innovation-Entrepreneurship/dp/0804740631 http://www.amazon.com/Silicon-Valley-Edge-Innovation-Entrepr... "Regional Advantage" Saxenian http://www.amazon.com/Regional-Advantage-Culture-Competition-Silicon/dp/0674753402/ http://www.amazon.com/Regional-Advantage-Culture-Competition...

gaius 17y ago

talented entrepreneurs, monied investors, academic expertise, and, above all, critical relationships with those who know startups well and are integrally involved in launching and promoting them Silicon Valley had none of that before Shockley and the Fairchildren (AKA tha Traitorous 8) rolled into town back in '57. Was that truly a one-off? The world's a big place.

evgen 17y ago
And Hollywood was nothing more than orange groves outside of Los Angeles before Lumiere invented the motion picture camera. Was that a one-off? So far that does seem to be the case. Lots of places will compete for the title of being the second-best version of "the center of the universe" for industry X, Y, or Z but there are very few examples of the center actually moving once it has established itself.
- gaius 17y ago
  London wasn't always Europe's financial capital.
skmurphy 17y ago
I believe that both Federal Radio (1909) and Hewlett Packard (1939) benefited from talented entrepreneurial engineers, risk capital, academic expertise, and a deep understanding of how to foster innovation not just manage invention.