Tech IT Easy

I took part in a seminar on venture financing yesterday, at the ABN Amro headquarters in Amsterdam, as part of the New Venture business-plan competition. Some very dry material and not much to report, I’m afraid. I did get some positive signals that this recession will not hit banks as hard as the media makes it out to be, and similarly, equity financing, which makes relatively little use of debt. More on that perhaps when I get sent a copy of the presentation given by Maarten Holleswinkel, from Holland Corporate Finance.

The really enjoyable part is, as always, meeting bright entrepreneurs and inventors, and you can smell the energy in the room, particularly when ideas are being discussed and explored. Last year, I heard that anyone that can create an effective, efficient way to store and transport large amounts of energy will have hit upon a gold mine, and yesterday I happened to meet someone that studied exactly this problem, designing solar-powered micro-sattelites at a Delft company in the Netherlands. The guy went completely nuts on the idea and pretty soon others joined in too. Loved it and I’ll be sure to stay in touch with those guys.

The “Quit Hill”

But the highlight of the evening was definitely when I met a marketeer / artist, called Jan Willem Wartena of urbanjoy.org. He developed this weird park attraction, called “de FLUISTERHEUVEL” (translated: The Quit Hill; see picture) for a park in Utrecht and is a big favourite at the competition.

Google-translated, the “Fluisterheuvel” can be described as:

The Quiet Hill consists of two opposing hills, with parabolic collapsed wall in the form of a half circle, the size of a football goal. When whispering into the focal point of one parabolic, you can hear it in the opposing parabolic as if you were wearing headphones! The unit invites you to play an innovative communicative game, use it as a football goal, a climbing device, and as an open gaming platform.

Talking to him was a real joy because he’s both very kind and constantly talking about different creative ideas. I liked the process in which he came up with the concept of the Quit Hill, which involved first of all, observing how different groups of people, young and old, use the park on a day-to-day basis, and coming up with a contraption that is both fun, multi-usuable, and in it’s own fashion durable and timeless. It’s a great example of what I’m coining a “living portfolio,” and I think is the most effective way for creative types to market themselves.

I decided pretty quickly that he is the perfect candidate for positioning products in a unique communicative fashion, particularly in markets which you hadn’t thought of before. In other words, relevant to most startups! It is the one business card, I’ll be sure to use this year and, who knows, maybe you’re interested in working with him too.

Take care,
Vincent