Google will chase up his custmers

CEO Eric Schmidt recently has been talking up the synergies between mobility, local search and social networking. Today Google lunched the first step named +1 service.

Leading investment foresight expert Edward Mushinsky (Future Europe association) predicted this
http://hodorkovski.blogspot.com/2011/03/mobile-social-apps-is-new-big.html
 and
http://hodorkovski.blogspot.com/2011/02/rating-association-future-europe.html

But you never really understand how Google perceives the web until they chose to try to wipe you out.
About possible Google shadowing see
 http://ierarhia.blogspot.com/2011/03/predicted-new-social-search.html

What is the future of venture business?

2 leading venture expert predicted awesome future of venture capitalism.

First was John Connor. His forecast was realise by SecondMarket.com http://coolgoogle.blogspot.com/2011/03/venture-investment-went-online.html

Other venture expert -
Chris Arsenault. He writed:
"The stories about the highly successful technology entrepreneurs as well as those about the rockstar venture capitalists (note: over 80% of all venture capital returns are generated by less than 25% of the venture capital funds out there) created the impression that the only thing needed to build a high valued successful startups was an entrepreneur with an idea and an investor with cash! This meant that venture capitalists could blame poor returns on unsuccessful entrepreneurs while those entrepreneurs could blame their failures on the lack of capital or restrictions tied to the capital they did raise.

The math is the same for a Canadian venture capital fund as it is for a US venture capital fund. Investors in venture capital funds usually expect a high IRR (internal rate of return) – Top tier venture capital expected returns in the +30% IRR, a rate that is far above banking rates due to the high level of risk involved. A Venture Capital fund will usually has a ten year life and will require a certain level of management fees over that period. Therefore, in order to understand the type of capital that needs to be returned to the investors of the Fund (the Limited Partners) one needs to plan on generating three times (3x) return of capital to be successful and part of the Top tier firms that are able to continuously raise additional capital and funds.

In a nutshell, that means that a $100M size fund must return approximately $300M in order to generate the expected level of returns of a Top tier fund! So, knowing that for an early stage venture capital fund, one can expect it owning on average 20% of any given company in a portfolio of around 15 companies (for a $100M size fund), this would translates into $1.5 billion of aggregate portfolio enterprise value at exit, or $150M in cumulative EBITDA based on a 10x EBITDA exit valuation, needed to generate those type of returns. That’s pretty demanding! Managing expectations also sets the bar as regards the type of actions that will be put forward to achieve those expectations. Maybe it’s time we set an aggressive but achievable bar that would benefit the whole industry, no?
Reality is that entrepreneurs operate in a living “Ecosystem” that feeds itself by growing and building new connection. No party can do it alone! The community feeds itself off its own growth. High growth technology companies need venture capital to succeed and the venture capitalists need to back successful entrepreneurs to generate strong returns. Not only do we need to have better return expectations for venture capital funds, we also need better collaboration within the community to build networks strong enough to support promising technology companies and deliver high shareholder value.

The more successful entrepreneurs are, the more successful venture capital funds will be, leading in turn to more funding for entrepreneurs.

We have to learn how to expect more and know how to get more. Yes, funds and large institutional investors like pension funds and insurance companies should expect better returns from their venture capital investments. The last 10 years of Canadian venture capital returns represent -0.2%, yet expectations were in the unrealistic + 30% range, while solid manageable returns should be more in the 15% level. Large institutional investors can help themselves achieve such realistic returns by selecting fund managers with entrepreneurial backgrounds and experience with building successful companies. Managers who think and act like the entrepreneurs they back are better suited to select the ones who understand how build a successful start-up and have the most chances of succeeding.

Likewise, entrepreneurs should expect more from themselves, their teams and their investors. Entrepreneurs need to understand what is expected from the capital they raise and they can do this by selecting the right potential investors and doing due-diligence on them, by understanding the ecosystem they are operating in and making sure they surround themselves with people who are stronger than themselves, and generate stronger returns by setting themselves up for success.

High but achievable expectations create and define leaders!

Entrepreneurs are natural leaders, because they are able to execute on ideas, they transform opportunities into tangibles such as jobs, products and profits. So by having more entrepreneurs funding other entrepreneurs, we have more chances of building a sustainable ecosystem. It takes time to build a viable company, and by understanding the type of returns that are expected from the different source of funding, entrepreneurs and fund managers alike will be able to create a model that works.

The venture capital model is broken only to those who don’t understand it
those who aren’t willing or interested in investing the energy to adapt it to their reality. Like other industries, the venture capital industry will continue to evolve over time.

I’m looking forward to seeing the level of returns over the next five to 10 years as the Canadian venture capital industry begins this evolution – where entrepreneurs are funding entrepreneurs

Now, some questions for you:

1) What do limited partners think of the emerging number of entrepreneurial driven Venture capital Funds?
2) What do entrepreneurs think of the new breed of entrepreneurial VC’s?
3) Is the Canadian market mature enough to trigger the level of collaboration required to build a strong ecosystem around Canadian technology companies?
4) What is expected by the entrepreneur of the early stage VC’s (other than the obvious $)?
5) How will you be part of the “make it Happen” generation?

http://vator.tv/news/2010-05-19-the-future-of-venture-capital

Mobile social apps is new big investment idea

Leading investment foresight expert Edward Mushinsky predicted
new big investment ideas

Google already has made major and successful investments in mapping, local search, mobility, geo-location and navigation, for example. It also has made investments in location-based services that haven’t gotten traction.

CEO Eric Schmidt recently has been talking up the synergies between mobility, local search and social networking.

“Foursquare and Gowalla are pretty impressive,” says Google CEO Eric Schmidt. “They show you the power of mobile,social and local,” Schmidt said.
 

How to create new Google

In order to realize an effective-st business model, from the outset to accept as immutable the two key tenets of the thesis:
all people in the system are equally talented, able to invent new business entity, and therefore - can act as initiators of startups, new businesses. Attitude toward man as a "detail", "cog" servant organization that something must it be eliminated. Any employee is perceived and evaluated solely in terms of high humanism;
company is highly decentralized. That is why the main thesis, the broadcast director, is: "Everyone has the right to create your own, new project within the organization."

Other advises
how to create new Google

Wikileaks about BP and russian corruptioners

The oil company’s subsidiary in Russia, TNK-BP, investigated working in parts of the world British businesses would not normally consider because of international sanctions, according to the classified US government papers.

When the board of TNK-BP vetoed the extraordinary proposals, one of the company’s Russian directors “farmed out” the projects to his own private firm, the documents claim.

The fallout from the row led to the BP chief executive being forced out of Russia and will lead to serious questions over the long term sustainability of the company’s operations in the country.

The allegations are contained in files that disclose for the first time the inside story of the British oil company’s troubled history in Russia.

Dozens of documents from the WikiLeaks website reveal the controversial steps taken by the company in a desperate race to secure new sources of oil. They also disclose the company’s deep misgivings towards another Russian oil firm which it is now partnering.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/wikileaks/8294061/WikiLeaks-BPs-Russian-arm-looked-at-deals-with-rogue-states.html

The reports on German Khan, the billionaire founder of the Alfa Group consortium and one of BP’s partners in Russia, will raise questions about the British company’s Russian associates.

The relationship between BP and its Russian partners is analysed at length by US diplomats in documents obtained by The Daily Telegraph from the WikiLeaks website, with colourful descriptions of the main characters’ personalities and rivalries.

Mr Khan is currently an executive director of BP’s Russian joint venture, TNK-BP. The US government memos describe Mr Khan’s extraordinary way of life, with a description of a hunting trip at his lodge, “like a Four Seasons hotel in the middle of nowhere”.

According to the TNK-BP chief operating officer, Tim Summers, Mr Khan told him during the trip “that The Godfather was his favourite movie, that he watched it every few months, and that he considered it a 'manual for life’.”
Full Wikileaks about BP -
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wikileaks-files/bp-wikileaks/8294135/WHATS-BEHIND-THE-RAIDS-ON-TNK-BP-AND-BP.html

Rating association Future Europe predicts new social search

In 2011 Google will lunch new social search, like Facebook "like"
http://www.neowin.net/news/google-1-social-platform-accidentally-revealed-in-screenshot

It likely will be recommendation service trough Google social graph

Wikileaks Secrets about Bank of America

Lеgal Liability for Toxic Mortgages

In September 2009 BofA underwrote $239 million worth of sеcurities backеd by subprime loаns. BofA hаs reserved a  $4.4 billion for these put bаck lаwsuits. If Assange has emаils showing that top executives at BofA knew they were peddling toxic dreck to investors, it would rock the firm and give аmmunition to the army of lаwyers already knocking on BofA’s door.

 Illegаl Foreclosures

BofA is at the heart of the robo-signing scandal and has wrongfully foreclosed on countless Americаn families. а A BofA employee deposed in February 2010 said that she signed as many as 8,000 foreclosure documеnts a month without reviewing them, in violation of the law. Mounting questions аbout the frаudulent and illegal foreclosure prаctices at the big banks and mortgage service compаnies prompted BofA to temporarily halt foreclosures nationwide in October, 2010.а

In 2008, BofA acquirеd one of the most aggressive and fraudulent lenders during the housing bubble. The result has been a train wreck of liability and lawsuits for the megabank that now has over 1.3 million customers in forеclosure. To settle the lаwsuits with Illinois, California and eight other stаtes over predаtory lending, BofA came up with an $8.4 billion loan relief plan for those holding Countrywide mortgages.
In 2010 BofA pаid $108 million to settle a Federal Trade Commission cаse that chаrged Countrywide with having extrаcted excessive fees out of borrowers facing foreclosure. BofA paid $600 million in August 2010 to settle shаreholder claims that Countrywide had concealed the riskiness of its lending standаrds. There is no end in sight for these types of claims, and more. In June, 2010 the State of Illinois sued Countrywide аgain, this time over racial discrimination in its lеnding practices.
"Through this provision, Bank of America BELIEVES that it has addressed its remaining exposure to repurchase obligations for residential mortgage loans sold directly to the GSEs. The calculation of the provision incorporates HISTORICAL EXPERIENCE with the GSEs and certain ASSUMPTIONS regarding economic conditions, home prices and other matters, and future provisions for representations and warranties may be affected if the actual results are different."
Soft terms like "believe" and "assumptions" are the key. This isn't the kind of news that if the Bank had iron clad indemnification that they would use such vague words. If FMAE/FMAC had a corroborating press release, it would warrant a great sigh of relief, but where's that pronouncement? The silence is deafening, the spin nauseating.
Furthermore, don't think a press release of this import went out casually, without a careful balancing act to promote the idea that BofA is in the safe zone, while avoiding allegations of false statements when (not if) the shareholder lawsuits commence. What do you think "Historical Experience" means? That they are familiar with paper work and protocol? No, don't think so, it's more along the lines of "we believe we can count on the good graces of the folks in Congress who's portfolios we've padded (apologies for the repeated alliterations) with VIP loans to bail us out or a corrupt administration that will use fiat to intervene with the GSEs". Or maybe it's the historical and broadly held misconception that the GSE mortgages were/are backed by the US Government.
But the dirty secret is that Countrywide wasn't selling off the loans to the GSEs during it's $1.4T origination spree because the GSEs were restricted during 2004-2005 from buying the sub prime loans (they needed a liberal congress to get them back to irresponsible loan purchasing after 2007 - thanks to Frank, Dodd, Waters, & Co.). Private mortgage investments represent an additional $300B liability to Countrywide/BofA. You cite MBIA, but there are others like Greenwich Financial that represents even more investor claims.
If you doubt the numbers, consider that BofA's market capitalization is 1/2 of it's Book Value. In otherwords, people with some skin in the game are worried, worried to the point that they don't even believe the books (scary for a bank that counts it's assets as liquid cash). So, Wikileaks or no Wikileaks, once the Courts start ruling to force buy back of toxic mortgages, BofA is a house of cards. Too bad they can't shed the Countrywide liability, but because they purchased it without any bankruptcy limiting the surviving liabilities, so they're stuck with it, and no one of sound mind would even consider buying up those entities from under BofA. You couldn't pay someone to take it now that the cat's out of the bag.

Illеgal Bonusеs

Bank of Amеrica acquired the brokerage firm Merrill Lynch for $50 billion in January 2009. The U.S. government blessed the merger with a $20 billion bailout loan to aid BofA. After the acquisition went through, it was revеaled that Merrill Lynch had lost $15.8 billion in the last quarter of 2008 and that $3.6 billion in bonuses were paid ahead of schedule to top executives at Merrill. Among beneficiaries of the bonus bonanza was Merrill's CEO John Thain, who famously spent a million redecorating his office at the height of the crisis. About the dеal New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said: "One disturbing question that must be answered is whether Merrill Lynch and Bank of Amеrica timed the bonuses in such a way as to force taxpayers to pay for them through the deal funding." If Wikileaks has emails showing top executives knowingly used bailout bucks for bonuses, this ugly chapter in history could be reopened, prompting Congressional investigations and further bailout backlash.