Press: The Bay Area's Golden Age
When it comes to money, technology and talent, right now all roads lead to the Bay Area.
That includes Wall Street, Hollywood Boulevard and the streets of the financial districts of Shanghai and Hong Kong.
The Bay Area is enjoying a virtuous cycle of money financing startups that create jobs and companies that, in turn, will be acquired or go public one day, triggering another wave of wealthy investors and innovation.
“Success breeds success,” said Matthew Le Merle, a Marin County investor in several Bay Area startups.
“If you’re young, ambitious and have an entrepreneurial dream, you come to the Bay Area,” said Le Merle, managing partner at Fifth Era. He sees the Bay Area’s rising tech-fueled fortunes entering 2014 as simply the latest magnet to the region, a theme going back to those pulled here by gold fever.
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Press: From Social Gaming to Social Everything
Author: Matthew Le Merle published in the Financial Times
By now every CEO has read about the 850m (and rising) active monthly users of Facebook and the attractiveness of other social networks including Google+, Twitter and LinkedIn. As much as 50 percent of Facebook’s revenue is driven by social games such as Cityville, Draw Something and Happy Aquarium (Facebook discloses that 12 per cent of its 2011 revenue came from Zynga alone).
These incredible revenue numbers are making social games companies extremely valuable. Last year’s IPO of five-year-old San Francisco-based Zynga left it with a market capitalisation of more than $7.5bn, and this year’s IPO of London-based competitor Zattikka demonstrates continued investor interest in this phenomenon. Every chief executive watching this meteoric rise wants to know how these social gaming leaders have created so much shareholder value so quickly and whether they can do the same by digitizing and socializing their own offerings.
Press: Technologist Transform Thyself
Author: Matthew Le Merle published in the Financial Times
Global technology industry leaders have become giants fueled by the digital technologies that they unleashed on other people’s businesses. Those technologies are now undermining the very parents that bred and raised them. That’s a problem - but also an opportunity. The technology companies that learn how to successfully manage the same transformations they thrust upon other industries will be the ones that are “fit for growth” in the digitally enabled technology industry of the future.
Editorial: How to Prepare for the Future of the IT Solutions Industry
Author: Matthew Le Merle published in CRN.com
Digital technologies are rapidly enabling new offerings and business models across all industries, including IT. Cloud infrastructure and on-demand business models, connectivity and mobility, big data handling and analysis, and social and local technologies are driving the world’s largest IT companies to change their go-to-market operating models and launch new products and solutions.
Editorial: How To Prepare For a Black Swan
Author: Matthew Le Merle published in Strategy + Business Magazine
Disrupter analysis can help assess the risks of future catastrophic events. This article summarizes a more comprehensive perspective in which the author outlines a pragmatic approach for boards and executive teams to ensure they are better prepared for unexpected risks and disruptions to their businesses.