Entrepreneurship lessons from the frontier

There is a lot of hype around entrepreneurship. A pet hate of mine is where the exception is made the rule. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs are the exceptions to the rule. Silicon Valley is an exception to the rule. Normally entrepreneurship is hard work, boring, tough and with a small chance of success. That is why I enjoyed “Out-Innovate: How Global Entrepreneurs — from Delhi to Detroit — Are Rewriting the Rules of Silicon Valley”.

Silicon Valley vs China

Yep, Silicon Valley is important. They used to have a monopoly on innovation. Only twenty-five years ago, 95% of the world’s venture activity occurred in the United States. The vast majority concentrated in the two hundred square miles spanning San Francisco and San Jose. However, China is now home to 35% of the world’s unicorns (a universally used colloquial reference to companies valued at more than $1 billion), up from a mere 4% in 2014. Read “Tech titans from China”.

The Frontiers

There are currently more than 1.3 million technology start-ups globally. International entrepreneurs are quickly eclipsing their Silicon Valley counterparts. Uber has 75 million users worldwide, and China’s DiDi has 550 million users, but emerging market leaders like Grab, Gojek, 99, and Cabify are not far behind across Latin America and Southeast Asia…