While I had a great time at 2010′s BarCamp event, circumstances meant that I had to miss last year’s “un-conference.” So I made sure I could get there this year.
What is BarCamp and why is it an un-conference? Think of it as a convention for geeks, hackers and entrepreneurs – one that has no set agenda. Picture hundreds of people in a room, each being able to use just three words to introduce themselves to the entire group (in my case “blogger, photographer, unemployed”). At that point, anyone (and everyone) who has come prepared to speak on a topic writes it down, it goes up on a wall and the group divides into various work areas to hear the presentations or debate various topics. And it’s all free.
The crowd is mostly young and I’d say that the greatest majority of people were programmers working for start-ups and entrepreneurs with start-up ideas. While I fit neither of those groups (one guy started a conversation with my by saying, “it looks like we’re the only ones here close to 60″ but I never think about age, mine or other peoples’, in things like this), for me BarCamp is a chance to see a lot of friends and make new ones and also to keep my finger on the pulse of the Hong Kong tech scene.
This year’s event was held at HK CoCoon, a fabulous 14,000 square foot incubation space in Causeway Bay. Their web site says, “CoCoonians are made up of Early Stage Entrepreneurs who have an idea and want to transform it into a reality and Creative Talent such as designers, engineers, photographers, storytellers, illustrators who enjoy working on innovative projects.” Membership costs HK$1,000 per month and you get access to all of their facilities. I’m seriously considering joining this.
I was only able to attend for a few hours in the morning since I needed to get out to Science Park for the Tesla test drive (see previous post) but as always, I had a blast. Here are some random-ish photos from the event.
Here’s someone with the Lytro camera and I hope you can appreciate the irony of this photo being out of focus
This presentation was called What’s Wrong With Facebook? And What To Do About It?
A lot of people were interested in this topic!
Casey Lau from Popcorn Media gave a great presentation on how to do great pitch presentations. When they couldn’t find the proper cables to get his iPad hooked up to the monitor in the room, he was not thrown at all but used this as an additional example of what to expect when you’re doing a pitch.
The first BarCamp was held in 2005 in Palo Alto (no big surprise, eh?) and went global very quickly. Here’s the organizer behind HK’s BarCamp every year, Belle Liu of Beansbox.
While BarCamp is free, there are only a limited number of spaces available. This year I think the capacity was around 5 or 600. But note that this was called Summer BarCamp and not just BarCamp, so perhaps in the future we’ll get more than just 1 event per year. I’m looking forward to the next one!
It’s a bit disingenuous of CoCoon to say they are in Causeway Bay when the nearest MTR is Fortress Hill.
Causeway Bay is commonly known to be bordered by the harbour to the north, Canal Street to the west (beyond which is the area which used to be called Bowrington, before Wanchai swallowed it whole), Leighton and Causeway Roads to the south (beyond which is Happy Valley and Tai Hang respectively), and Hing Fat Street to the east (beyond which is Tin Hau at the southern end and Fortress Hill at the northern end).
Thanks for the Blog entry on yesterday’s event.
(I am the guy who made the crack about being “closer to 60, than 30″)
BarCamp had a great buzz, and it was great to see so many young entrepreneurs participating with such great enthusiasm. No doubt there will be a great deal of innovative new software, and web ideas headed our way.
My only somewhat cautionary comments are:
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+ Where are the customers for these businesses, and where will the investors come from to keep these guys going until they have profit-generating businesses?
+ I would have liked to see more non-web start-ups. Have Hong Kong people forgotten what it is like to “get their hands a bit greasy”… touching something other than keyboards ?
In terms of non-web start-ups, I think there are many reasons for that, not the least of which is the lack of creativity not just in HK but globally. Most people don’t have really unique ideas, they survey the landscape to see what’s working and then either copy it or build on top of it. Doing things like Jon Buford’s doing or Steve Peer (Phottix) are hard. Also, web start-ups are cheaper to do and faster to get to market. That’s all just my opinion of course.
I had a great time at Barcamphk and met lots of smart, fun people. (I’m the guy in the orange shirt making the hand gestures while talking during the Facebook group).
The HK tech community has a great advantage in that it’s easy to meet, be social and get connected to people here — easier I think than in other locations. That’s still pretty important. I say this coming from NYC, with a much larger tech community, but one that requires more effort to remain close-knit.
Great meeting you all.
I suspect you are right, Spike.
2-3 Months ago, I met a guy who runs two incubators, and he was coming to HK to try to raise money for his company. He said he had been asked to consider setting up an incubator in Hong Kong. But he did not really see any point. The only two great centers for Innovation he had seen were: the US and Israel (he was Israeli.) The reason was that these two place were both great at spawning INVENTIONS – and were places where new ideas could be readily turned into businesses. (As a footnote: I think the UK is also a good place for invention, but has had less success at spawning successful businesses because they fall apart at the practical, grow-the-business stage.)
I am sure that the enthusiastic (and intelligent!) young folks I met at Barcamp will not want to hear this, but I do suspect:
+ There were plenty of wannabee and me-too ideas at the conference,
+ The “entrepreneurs” may reckon that if they dress the part, and act the part, then they will get funded and grow successful businesses too,
+ There is a woeful lack of mentors who have been through it all before, and really know how to grow a start-up until the business reaches the cash flow positive stage from when long term growth becomes self-sustaining. I don’t know how long HK-based investors will have the patience to feed cash flow negative businesses. If they had a ready exit into a liquid stock exchange for young and growing businesses, it would be easier.
+ I think the good people within organisations like InvestHK (& others) know this, but they are not really sure how to develop the required mentoring and financing capabilities in HK. I understand that are making some heroic efforts to grow these capabilities
Just my thoughts – and I welcome disagreement, and more positive views here, and on a thread on my website / see: http://tinyurl.com/GEI-Inno
Doc – here’s what I’ve noticed.
There are significant issues with the HK education system, which stresses a curriculum that leads to more “traditional” careers but is weak on things that encourage independent thinking and creativity. A good example of this in another area is the past 10 years of HK film – technically they always look and sound great but the scripts are really third rate and there are very few directors capable of simply telling a story.
So, following on from that, any start-up event I’ve attended or group I’ve met, it seems that whatever creativity is there is coming from people who are educated abroad – whether they were born in HK and grew up elsewhere or are here as expats trying their luck. Of course, there is the possibility that this is the profile for sessions conducted primarily in English and that there’s a different profile in Chinese-speaking groups. But somehow I don’t think this is the case.
BTW, I wrote to CoCoon about their entrepreneurs-in-residence program. They’re having an open house Thursday at 6 PM that I want to check out, you might find it worthwhile to go as well?
Hi DrBubb & Spike, here’s a different view, based on my look around HK. Happy to talk with you in person.
- Re wannabees and me-too ideas, I don’t think about that so much anymore. While I do like seeing innovation, execution on a business idea (and time and happenstance) is what builds a business.
- Anyone thinking that acting the part will get them investment will soon find out otherwise. For that matter, I would see some of that in New York, too.
- I’ve found great mentors in HK for startups. In fact, I’ve been really impressed with how willing people are to give their time to others.
- For the guy who didn’t see a point forming his next incubator in HK, that’s fine. The incubator business isn’t for the faint of heart or those who think about making a quick profit.
And regarding creativity coming from the expat community, why not count that as a strength of HK?
Paul
Paul, regarding your last point, you are right to some extent. Research has proven time and again that a large influx of expats and immigrants leads to more patents and more jobs. But I can’t count it as a strength if this is the only area it’s coming from. Obviously it would be an exaggeration to claim that but I think that HK’s education system is in need of improvement. It seems that most of the public debate is around funding for the international schools and what language to teach or not to teach in the public schools. The creativity needs to happen natively and organically as well as via imports, it can’t all be just from one side or another. It’s not a sustainable model, let alone a growth model.
Let me give you an example of what I’m talking about. The government had an idea to create a tech center in Hong Kong and so we got the notion of Cyberport. Good start! And then what did they do? They gave the land, without competitive tender, to the son of the richest man in Hong Kong. Who then proceeded to build not just 4 office buildings but also a hotel, a shopping mall, and some of the most expensive apartment buildings in town. Cyberport sat there for years, a tech center in name only, attracting tenants only via offering comparatively low rents. They were not doing what people like you and Jon are doing. So many wasted years because everything was done in typical HK fashion by sons of billionaires and accountants. The park is a place for mothers and helpers from Bel Air to bring kids during the day. The Atrium of the shopping mall is used for selling TVs and wedding packages. Oh, and the restaurants there all seriously suck. I’ve seen signs in the past year that they’re starting to get it and are working more proactively with the tech community which is nice but should have come sooner and larger. (The WETA exhibition was a good touch, should be a lot more like that.)
Hi Paul,
It is good to read your comments. And I will give you credit for being “closer to the coalface” for start-ups, especially web-based start-ups, than I am. Much of my experience is in non-web areas, and in London. So I am conveying an impression from what I have seen in HK, rather than commenting from deep knowledge. It can be dangerous from intuition rather than expreience, but I remain open-minded, and have welcomed comments in reaction to mine.
I am happy to read that you have found many good mentors operating here, and that will be a key success factor.
As an ex-banker, with my deepest experience in the area of finance, my ongoing concern about HK would be the “missing rungs on the ladder”, that I spoke about in my Exotic Entrepreneurship Talk at Barcamp. What do I mean? HK is a good place to start a business. Formation costs are low, and there are talented people available here. (Like you, I value the mix of expats and locals involved in start-ups.)
The first US$10k-100k might be relatively easy to raise from friends and family, and it can be well-spent. But after that, it becomes more problematic. From what I have seen, there are some Angels active in HK, but many of them (like me) soon find that their available capital gets spent, and then they are “constipated”, and invest more, until they can find an exit for existing investments.
VC’s are not too active at that stage: US$100K – $1000K, and they may want to see revenues, or even cash flow before investing. So the available VC capital can also be quickly “used up.”
What would be nice, is if there was a Junior stock market serving companies with a market cap of say US$5mn – 25million or more, where VC’s could sell some of their stock, to replenish their capital availability. GEM was supposed to be that, but it has not worked out so well.
Eventually, when a company is big enough and profitable enough, it might list on HK’s main board, but that is very expensive and far, far away from the start-up stage.
In creating these missing rungs, success breeds success. So if start-ups grow through that full live cycles, and big money is made by: Founders, Angels, VC’s, and Investment bankers, they will all have realised profits and be looking for their next opportunity.
One thing that makes Silicon Valley so effective, is those past successes and all the capital that they have generated, and the valuable experiences gained by potential mentors.
(Fits here? – The problem for science grads, per SCMP article):
HK A DESERT FOR SCIENCE GRADUATES, Professor says – from SCMP
Money invested in training innovators and engineers is wasted without jobs in the city to exploit their talent, says PolyU academic Zheng Yongping
( by Adrian Wan / adrian.wan@ — scmp.com )
“Hong Kong are wasting its heavy investment in training science and engineering students because such talents are not valued in a city where banks and property developers make the real money, several academics have warned”
HIGHLIGHTS from article
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+ “We attract talent… but cannot keep it here… There’s a mismatch.” Prof. Zheng
+ After 10 years, Zheng has watched ALL his non-local grad students leave HK for jobs elsewhere
+ Students get science scholarships, but there isn’t much in it for HK
+ Singapore has a requirement that grads stay for 3 years; no such rgmt. in HK since there are few jobs
+ Tung Chee-hwa wanted to broaden out HK’s industries*, as a hub for science and technology
… including a science and technology park and a Traditional Chinese Medicine Centre
+ The Innovation and Technology Fund gives funding to science research: from HK$483mn (’07) to $783mn (’12)
+ But jobs are stuck at 23,000 – 24,000, per official figures
+ “Nobody, including the government, believes we can achieve anything in innovative technology…
… It is only because everyone else is doing it, the government has to do it.”
+ Crazy rules: HK$100k subsidy for Patent application grant, but you must confirm you have not had patents before
+ “More money should be given to promising ideas, rather than spreading it widely.”
+ Small Entrepreneur Research Assistance Programme: provides grants of up to $6mn
+ Up to end April: HK$390mn has been given out for 355 projects, with 5% of Gross revs to be returned, to repay
+ Alternative might be to require job creationm rather than a royalty