| When it became tight for Western investors and companies in non web related businesses, they turned their attention to the emerging economies in Asia. Now they are beginning to move to Africa as China and India are becoming saturated for non web businesses. What does this tell us in the hacker community especially as the web space in the West is becoming really saturated. Simple, just make your startup to be Africa friendly, if you can't make it your main strategy and you stand a better chance of not entering Techcrunch's deadpool. So what are the advantages of doing this: 1. You will own the largest market share by the time the established web companies choose to come into that market. Eg Baidu controls 70% of the search market in China. Google and others share 30%. Facebook had to play catch up to Studivz in Germany and ofcourse sued them, http://tcrn.ch/cfpc9Y. 2. Based on the above, when the big boys like paypal etc are ready to enter the market, they will be forced to partner with you or buy you outrightly. see http://bit.ly/cESeqo. 3. The IPO's that have been so elusive in the US and europe are more easily attainable over there. After your IPO, you can come back and buy the biased established but struggling web based companies in the West. Remember how Asian companies were cherry picking US companies during the global crises, that will be your game. So make sure you have a strategy for Africa and other emerging economies as you build your web app. Good luck. |