Highlights of 2013 TiEcon- Part I: Opening Keynotes

Introduction

TiEcon is the largest global conference for entrepreneurs. It is organized by TIE (The Indus Entrepreneurs),  Silicon Valley chapter each year in Santa Clara, CA. This author has covered the conference for the past five years. This year’s conference convener was Ravinder Paul Singh, who is very highly regarded as a professional who always follows up on his commitments and is a role model for the entire TiE organization.

In this 2013 TiEcon summary article, we cover the opening keynotes on Friday, May 17, 2013. Part II. will examine the keynotes and panels for the Software Defined Infrastructure  (SDI) track. There were also parallel tracks on Mobile and Big Data on Friday as well as, on Saturday May 18, 2013, sessions on entrepreneurship, which were not attended by this author.

Venk Shukla, President of TiE-Silicon Valley

• TiE Angels have been very successful in funding entrepreneurs.
• TiE-SV will be launching a B2B incubator/accelerator in 2 or 3 months.
• 2013 TiEcon has been organized for Friday’s sessions to be about professional growth and innovation trends, while Saturday is all about personal growth, entrepreneurship and mentoring.
• Over 3,500 attended this year’s TiEcon, from over 30 countries.

Satya Nadella, President, Server and Tools Business – Microsoft

• Server, tools and cloud services generated $19B in revenue last year for Microsoft.
• Cloud computing will ensure an era of distributed computing.
• Challenge is to convert massive amounts of data into insights and action for business.
• Windows Azure (MSFT’s cloud offering) provides needed consistency among heterogeneous IT systems throughout an enterprise.
• There are opportunities for start-ups to add value in the cloud space.
• $2T in IT spending is up for grabs.  The $19B in revenues from Satya’s Microsoft Division is just a drop in the bucket, compared to what’ll be spent in coming years on cloud services alone.
• Microsoftis committed to being a channel led company (i.e. they will use many different types of sales channels).
• Microsoft is transforming from a pure software company to a software, services and devices company.  Examples include Office 365 software, Windows Azure cloud service, and Xbox Live.
• Advice to entrepreneurs; be bold, innovate, take risks.

Jeff Weiner, CEO – LinkedIn (LI)

Leadership is all about inspiring others to achieve shared objectives.

In order to inspire others, a leader needs:

1. Clarity of vision
2. Courage to maintain your convictions
3. Believe in your vision “with every fiber of your being”
4. Ability to effectively communicate and evangelize the above points

Tools of Effective Leadership:

1. Technology vision: understand the direction of the technology and how it might reshape society.
2. Ability to harness where technology is going to build great products. No one was better at this than the late Steve Jobs.
3. Have a sustainable business model, that includes how to scale the product or service as it meets previously unmet needs of the customer.
4. Evangelize and inspire your team of workers.
5. Most important: Resourcefulness to be able to “get things done.”  This is especially critical when the company experiences challenges or “hits a brick wall.”

How to determine passion and path:

1. Know what it is you want to accomplish.
2. Optimize for passion, skill and the market.
3. Inspire through words and deeds.

How to manage corporate culture within a high growth environment:

1. Build a firm foundation needed to maintain growth.
2. Culture should include what you are and what you aspire to become.
3. Corporate values and operating principles should be used to make and guide day to day decisions.

Linkedin has a corporate culture of transformation. “You have to maintain a culture of transformation and stay true to your values,” Weiner said, explaining the company’s employees have been instrumental in guiding its explosive growth.  “Transform yourself, your company, your world.  Create a role model for the next generation of entrepreneurs ” he added.

The Linkedin professional networking site sees two new users sign up a second, according to its latest earnings report.  There are 225M Linkedin members, Wiener said.

Linkedin’s goal is to enable individuals to establish a professional identity and then insights into who that professional actually is.  They aim to deliver “the right content over any device and network type,” according to Weiner.  “Get the right business intelligence in front of people,” he said.

“Linkedin is now the essential source of professional insights, e.g. Linkedin Groups. There is also SlideShare, Pulse and Linkedin influencers to provide more professional insights, he said.

Advice to entrepreneurs:

1. Know what you want to accomplish.
2. Have a plan to do it.
3. Optimize for your passion and skill.
4. Stay focused. (Weiner said he learned the importance of focus while at Yahoo).

Qualities Weiner looks for in job candidates:

1. Technology vision
2. A strong sense of what products work and which don’t
3. Business acumen
4. Leadership
5. Resourcefulness

We’ve included all the key points Weiner made because we believe they provide valuable information to many different types of readers.

Stay tuned for 2013 TiECon -Part II which will cover key takeaways from the Software Defined Infrastructure track.  Sneak preview:  Confusion over what vendors mean when they say  “we support SDN.”  HP and others included Network Function Virtualization as part of their future SDN products. But ETSI NFV is not SDN as defined by the Open Networking Foundation (ONF). Contrast that with the clarity and vision provided by Stanford Professor Guru Paraulker, PhD on the SDN opportunity, which he said was the biggest in last 20 years of the networking industry.