Entrepreneurship in Germany

Interesting discussion prompted by Tom Coates (via Hebig) on where are all the start-ups. I could say a lot about it, and plenty of earl stage VCs worry about where the next crop of start-ups will come from...but that's another post. The following has been languishing in my drafts folder for some time, but I think the attitude is not unusual.

Barbequeue with friends, kicking around ideas, talking about what's happening in software and technology. What was striking was that the outlook was always very technological (in a sample of two ;-). Designing the perfect product seemed always more important than selling it to customers. Case in point: delicious library, a software to manage all your books and other media, with integration in Amazon web services as secret sauce. Two person outfit, 9 months development. Sentiment: how dare they turn& ;over $40k $56k of sales on the first day, and over $200k in the first week of trading when you cant even share your lists ?! Clearly not release worthy ;-). Me, I'd always rather have an extra customer than an extra feature delaying a sale.

PS: I've since seen that there is a windows equivalent: MedianMan