< Back to front page Text size – +

The Facebook & Brightcove IPOs, and what they tell us about Boston

Posted by Scott Kirsner February 13, 2012 01:14 PM

E-mail this article

Invalid email address
Invalid email address

Sending your article

Your article has been sent.

  • E-mail

    • E-mail this article

    Invalid E-mail address
    Invalid E-mail address

    Sending your article

    Your article has been sent.

By Scott Kirsner, Globe Columnist

Sunday's Globe column took a look at two companies that got their start in Harvard Square in 2004: Facebook and Brightcove.

One left, one stayed. One was founded by a first-time entrepreneur, the other by an entrepreneur who'd built a public company before. One wasn't able to raise money here, and one was. One focused on consumers, the other on solving a business problem.

Facebook's forthcoming IPO is expected to value the company at about $100 billion. Brightcove will be worth somewhere around $300 million when it goes public.

I asked Todd Dagres, founder of Spark Capital in Boston, for his take on why Boston can be so hospitable to start-ups like Brightcove while it gives fledgling companies like Facebook a cold shoulder.

Here's his take:

It's a combination of things in Boston, including:

- Discomfort with business-to-consumer models. [Investors are] more comfortable with enterprise/business-to-business models. They worry about consumer marketing... This is a blind spot that seems to persist, resulting in a B-to-B bias.

- Discomfort with unproven entrepreneurs, [and a] preference for older, more experienced and serial entrepreneurs. Problem is, many of the best B-to-C companies are being founded by youngsters like [Mark] Zuckerberg, [David] Karp of Tumblr, etc.

- Preoccupation with technology and intellectual property. This results in a lack of appreciation for the user experience and interface that combines art and computer science. Early in [the life of] a B-to-C start-up, the tech can seem trivial. My guess is that Facebook's technology didn't seem as impressive as Jeremy Allaire's. Oops.

Your thoughts? Has Boston changed enough since 2004?

  • E-mail

    • E-mail this article

    Invalid E-mail address
    Invalid E-mail address

    Sending your article

    Your article has been sent.

On Facebook

Scott Kirsner on Twitter

    waiting for twitterWaiting for twitter.com to feed in the latest...

Subscribe via e-mail

Get Innovation Economy updates via e-mail. Enter your address and click 'Subscribe':

More from Scott

about the blogger

About Scott Kirsner Scott Kirsner was part of the team that launched Boston.com in 1995, and has been writing a column for the Globe since 2000. His work has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, The New York Times, BusinessWeek, Newsweek, and Variety. Scott is also the author of the books "Fans, Friends & Followers" and "Inventing the Movies," was the editor of "The Convergence Guide: Life Sciences in New England," and was a contributor to "The Good City: Writers Explore 21st Century Boston." Scott also helps organize several local events on entrepreneurship, including the Nantucket Conference and Future Forward. Here's some background on how Scott decides what to cover, and how to pitch him a story idea.

Events

June 12: MITX Innovation Awards
Honoring innovative sites, software, and tech products created in New England.

June 13: Mass Innovation Nights
The monthly product launch event and schmooze-fest comes to the North Shore for the first time.

June 18-21: BIO International Convention
The enormous biotech industry trade show comes to town, with speakers like Senator John Kerry, Christopher Viehbacher of Sanofi, and Human Genome Sciences CEO Thomas Watkins.

archives

links we like