Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Signs of life

Monday, September 13th, 2010

You’d think we had been buried hundreds of meters under Chilean rock, or at least the heavy rain, we’ve been getting in Copenhagen, but that’s far from true. And a good thing too, because things are heating up here in Copenhagen. A couple of weeks ago, Hoist changed its name to Podio, and announced it had received funding from Tommy Ahlers, who also stepped in to take over the CEO position. Having worked for Tommy previously, I can only congratulate Hoist on having him along for, what is going to be a thrilling ride.
Podio made quite a splash of the name change, even making it to The New York Times online edition, and what we heard at the party to celebrate the new name and new organisation was really promising. Crisp pitch, and aggressive plans.

And just today, the news is out everywhere, that Memolane got some serious funding to build “our digital memory” which could mean anything really. Apparently, the project has been re-based from Copenhagen to Silicon Valley, but some of the local power behind the original demo is still on board and still based in Denmark, as far as I can tell.
Eric Lagier, who is heading up Memolane was previously at Skype, and the funding for Memolane comes from the investment arm of Skype founders Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, as well as one of the original Skype investors.

It’s good to see some action, some funding and some attention funneling into Copenhagen. Clearly not the time to give up on Wide Antenna, so I’m going to try to kick it back into gear.

Add your startup to the list

Monday, June 7th, 2010

Hampus Jakobsson is compiling a list of Øresund-startups over here, and you should add your startup there.

If you can make it there, you’ll make it anywhere

Sunday, June 6th, 2010

That used to be the refrain of New York City. However, when it comes to internet startups, New York is much like any other place. Last year Chris Dixon, NY-based cofounder of Hunch, wrote that New York needs its own TechCrunch. A blog to build up the awareness of the local scene. Much like we’re planning to here for the Øresund-region, shortly. A few months later, here’s Dixon’s Hunch co-founder Caterina Fake with another familiar message:

And Matt is absolutely right that what New York really needs right now is a Billion Dollar Company — an eBay or a Google or a PayPal or a Facebook — and an exit that releases all the people working there from their obligations and frees them to go forth and start new companies.

If you were at TechCrunch Nordic week before last, you would have heard something very similar about Copenhagen.
Fake wrote in response to this post, which basically gives in to Valley-envy, enumerating all the reasons not to be in New York, if you’re doing a startup.

The point from a Copenhagen perspective is obvious: If even a vibrant place like New York has Valley-envy, any place can suffer from Valley-envy, which makes our local edition of Valley-envy (“the investors/business plans/techies are not ambitious enough”) seem laughably irrelevant.

Twitterquotes

Friday, May 21st, 2010

Top Nordic VC complained about quality in Danish startups to me today. Too incremental & poor global potential. Let’s change that.

from @arnewinther

New TechStars Global Affiliate in Copenhagen – Startupbootcamp – now accepting applications!

from @techstars

Velkommen til Wide Antenna

Thursday, April 8th, 2010

Velkommen til Wide Antenna, Københavns nye mikromedium for upstarts i internetbranchen. Du kan læse mere om ideen her.