I think mobile web enabled services can be great business but A): it doesn't apply to everything, I think the markets will ultimately get a bit fragmented when the crunch stars to happen. And the other thing is, B): it doesn't necessarily work with everything.
Kevin KinsellaEveryone who is inside of an expanding bubble can't imagine another world where the bubble collapses on them. It's unimaginable because they haven't lived through it.
Kevin KinsellaFor venture capital, one of the original principles is people you want to invest in are people who've done it before with someone else's money. Not people who've just came out of business school.
Kevin KinsellaA lot of the philosophies of the businesses are just 'we're interested in getting customers now and if we're losing money with each customer now that's okay because we have this huge hoard of venture capital that we can subsidise the operation with and once we have the required number of tens of millions of customers and we drive our competitors out of business, then we can start to raise prices and become a proper business.'
Kevin KinsellaYou have to look at the fundamental raison d'รชtre of the business - what is it doing? What's the nature of the business and what are its prospects for success? What are its prospects to break even and then return the sustained profit?
Kevin KinsellaBasically my point of view on unicorns is that private companies which have sky high valuations, it doesn't really mean anything in the real world until it's marked to market. And there's only two ways things get marked to market in venture capital: Either a company is acquired by another company for cash or marketable security, or it goes public, and then it has reporting requirements and then the market will determine the value.
Kevin Kinsella