This morning’s roundup of the latest venture capital news and analysis:dailystartup_D_20090806101628.jpgArt by Mike Lucas
Look out Nintendo. A team of industry heavyweights is getting behind some microscopic monsters with a $29 million investment for Smith & Tinker Inc., an ambitious company looking to integrate multi-player PC gaming with offline, handheld play on a proprietary device. The company recently launched “Nanovor,” an online world where nanoscopic monsters live and battle on silicon chips deep inside computers. Players can also play the game on a portable device called the Nanoscopeä, scheduled to launch in October. Read the VentureWire story here….
Was the financial crisis caused by hormones? Sister blog Deal Journal believes so, citing a recent study that concludes that testosterone levels play a big role in a person’s proclivity to take financial risks. (The picture in the blog post of a pumped-up body lifter is terrifying, by the way.) Guess we should put an asterisk next to the credit-boom era to mark an era of juiced-up Wall Street executives….
For a clear explanation of what’s happening to the venture industry, check out Benchmark Capital Partner Bill Gurley’s blog post yesterday. There’s nothing eye-opening here if you follow venture capital regularly, but for those who don’t it’s an excellent account about why the VC industry will likely shrink in the years to come - and why it won’t disappear….
At a conference last month, Sequoia Capital’s Michael Moritz stated, “At age 35, Mozart was dead,” in response to a question about the age of a typical entrepreneur his firm would back. While Moritz was joking, Paul Michaud, an IT specialist at International Business Machines and a former entrepreneur, said the comment struck a particular cord with him for two reasons: “1) This comment is a complete 180 from the advice and belief of the venture capitalists 20 years ago when I launched my first company. 2) Because I think the comment, although it was in jest, reflects a subtle truth and a bias in the current startup community, which I am not sure I agree with.” Michaud, 40, reflects on his life to understand what’s got him riled up. As an aside, we refer you to this recent study that showed the median age of an entrepreneur is 40 years old….
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