What are Micro-Multinationals ?

Startups are increasingly setting up operations globally, whether its a technology startup that has its engineering team in Israel/India or the latest cleantech energy startup, which markets its products in Japan/Germany...startups are going global ! We thought we would explore how these new startups or shall we say "Micro-Multinationals" are pulling this off. So, we will be hosting Trevor Loy, Managing Partner, Flywheel Ventures at Duke's Entrepreneurship Week on Nov 19th from 2:45 to 4:00 pm. One of Flywheel's investment thesis' is that they invest in startups in the US, but have global footprints (Miox, Lingotek, 4Blox etc). So Trevor, is uniquely qualified to talk about this new phenomenon. Details of the event are below:



Event Description: As part of the Duke Entrepreneurship Week we will be hosting a talk by Trevor Loy, Managing Partner of Flywheel Ventures on the topic - "Micro-Multinationals - The emergence of startups with Global footprints".

Why should you attend ?
- To learn about why startups are going global
- To learn how to tap global talent and markets for your startup.

Who will be speaking ?
A few highlights of Trevor's background are:

• Founding member of several VC backed startups (Roxio, Conexant and
• others).
• Board Member, National Venture Capital Association
• Founding member of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program.
• Three engineering degrees from Stanford.

When and Where ?
Date: November 19th
Time: 2:45 pm to 4:00 pm
Location: McClendon Auditorium, The Fuqua School of Business

Trevor's a great speaker, so drop in(no fee to attend the E-Week) and I'm sure you'll find this talk interesting.

Get ready for Entrepreneurship Week at Duke!

Hello all,
Just wanted to share with you all an exciting event that is coming up at Duke next week - Entrepreneurship Week! This event is one of the best Entrepreneurship Weeks in the world with events scheduled throughout the week ranging from visiting local start-ups and VC firms in RTP area to Elevator Pitch Competition (Duke Start-up Challenge). For additional details check out @ Entrepreneurship Week!.

Unleash! it: A collaboration platform for entrepreneurs across the world!

I thought a great way to kick-off this blog would be to have entrepreneurs and start up enthusiasts across the world to collaborate and solve business/start up challenges. I came across exactly such a forum on the Global Entrepreneurship Week's site called "Unleash! it", which is officially defined as an “open-source innovation community, that connects companies to entrepreneurial talent around the world. Any company can present their own challenge and it can be about anything - from how to save money in their supply chain to coming up with a new product or service." So, check out the challenges here and see if you can help budding entrepreneurs with their challenges and in return you could probably get some help for your own start up !

Welcome!

On behalf of current students, faculty members, alumni, and the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Club (EVCC) at The Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, it is our pleasure to announce the launch of our new blog - "Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital: At home and abroad".

"Why" - you may ask are we starting this blog. Our answer is simple: we would like to share with Fuqua, Duke and the broader audience about what is happening in the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital space across the globe. The blog’s global focus is all the more relevant given Fuqua’s recent global initiative to be present in China, India, Russia, London and Dubai. Furthermore, over the long term, some of these locations will host entrepreneurship related activities, so we thought it is only fitting that we get started on educating ourselves about what is happening in the entrepreneurship space across the globe.

Though simple, there are specific themes that we hope to cover in this blog. This leads us to the question of "What" we want to share with you and in turn learn from you. Firstly, we’ll share various entrepreneurship related activities that Fuqua and Duke will be hosting throughout the year in the US and at our planned campuses around the world. Secondly, we believe that the entrepreneurship and venture capital landscape in the US differ from those in countries such as China, India, Israel, Brazil etc. So, we hope to share information about how entrepreneurs in those regions start and fund their companies. Finally, the student community at Fuqua and Duke is very diverse and some of our students have started companies, which are truly global in nature, so we’ll share those entrepreneur’s stories and advice.

In order to make this place worth your limited reading time, we hope to tap, quality sources of information that we come across. Secondly, we’ll ask our brilliant research focused faculty to draw on their research and share their thoughts on the latest trends in entrepreneurship across the globe. Finally, we’ll ask our alumni who’ve made Duke a top-5 university for entrepreneurship and venture capital to share their experiences of starting and funding entrepreneurial ventures.

We are very excited about how entrepreneurs around the world are changing the way business is done and we hope to share their stories and learn from them. We would like to also state that this is a student-run blog and thus thoughts shared here are purely that of fellow Fuqua students. Finally, in the spirit of openness, we request you to share any information that you think can go on this blog.

So, please contact Karthik.Meda (karthik.meda@fuqua.duke.edu) or Tarun Thakur (tarun.thakur@fuqua.duke.edu) if you come across a great piece of information that you think future entrepreneurs can learn from!

Thanks,
-Karthik Meda & Tarun Thakur