Editor’s note: Veteran Triangle entrepreneur and frequent blogger Joe Procopio warns that we are starting to forget the past – again- when it comes to over-hyped startup ideas.
DURHAM, N.C. – There was this old cliche back in the dot-com era about selling dollar bills for 99 cents. It was funny until companies like Enron and Worldcom started doing almost exactly that.
And I’m guessing that cliche wasn’t invented in the 1990s, but it seems like everyone is starting to forget the past again.
To be sure, some great companies emerged from the dot-bomb, Google and Amazon come to mind. Monster successes like those mean that you can always count on the gold rush to charge forward unabated, fueled by the notion that the average Joe (not me, the average one), can make a million percent return by getting in on the ground floor of the right startup.
Diligence be damned. I mean, a million percent of $100 is a million bucks. Small risk, huge reward, right?
Well, what if you’re not risking $100, but $23 million? Or more?
So last week, I read an article about questions and allegations swirling around UBeam, a company started by a 25-year-old first-time founder, and one with a technology that purports to charge your phone wirelessly using ultrasound.
Now, I’m not going to debate the viability of their product, I’ll be the first to admit that I got by in my Electrical Engineering courses on a wing and a prayer and a tutor and a smile. Besides, there are plenty of folks already debating said viability these days, including a former VP of Engineering calling the product “vaporware.”
But what I can debate is the culture and, of great significance here, the media.
There’s more to the story. Read the complete post at:
http://exitevent.com/article/when-great-big-ideas-become-great-big-lies-160518
