It think you're spot on. I do wish your predictions had a centricity geared more towards emerging technologies rather than acquisitions and the paths the biggest companies take...What technologies will take off this year (aside from mobile)? What new technologies will appear? What are going to be the new innovative things dabbled in (even if they don't take off) this year???
Steven Bao
· 1 year ago
You can probably agree that LinkedIn is dominating the business networking sector. There are other competitors in the same space, such as primarily-European XING and Ryze. All of them have a Free account version, and all of them have "premium" plans. LinkedIn gives a lot of freedom for its free users to use its service, backed by advertising. In my experience with the other sites - not so much.
I can't speak for XING as I'm not in Europe - but none of these competitors in my experience have as large of a userbase as LinkedIn - and for a professional networking site, that is absolutely crucial. Two-thirds of the people I network with in real life are on LinkedIn. Plaxo, a "revived" competitor, doesn't have the userbase either.
Unless the other competitors with similar features have some kind of ingenious way to gain many users, LinkedIn will remain at the top. The userbase is important, and even more so in professional networking sites.
Travis
· 1 year ago
When you said Are your parents on MySpace? Probably not. Are they on Facebook? Maybe. I know many parents that even no about facebook but they all know about myspace. I think myspace has more old people then young people on it. Facebook has a lot of people that are in college and younger. I know so many moms and dads that are myspace my mom don't even know what facebook is.
batterista
· 1 year ago
Your prediction of start-up consolidation is interesting. You see a lot of outright acquisitions, but it doesn't seem to happen w/ two competing start-ups much (if ever, really...cases?).
I'm curious about how investors (Angels, VCs) would look upon such mergers...how do bylaws/term sheets address such situations?
All Comments
I can't speak for XING as I'm not in Europe - but none of these competitors in my experience have as large of a userbase as LinkedIn - and for a professional networking site, that is absolutely crucial. Two-thirds of the people I network with in real life are on LinkedIn. Plaxo, a "revived" competitor, doesn't have the userbase either.
Unless the other competitors with similar features have some kind of ingenious way to gain many users, LinkedIn will remain at the top. The userbase is important, and even more so in professional networking sites.
Are your parents on MySpace? Probably not. Are they on Facebook? Maybe.
I know many parents that even no about facebook but they all know about myspace. I think myspace has more old people then young people on it. Facebook has a lot of people that are in college and younger. I know so many moms and dads that are myspace my mom don't even know what facebook is.
I'm curious about how investors (Angels, VCs) would look upon such mergers...how do bylaws/term sheets address such situations?