Startup Watch: Facebook live broadcast boo boos, being ‘human’ and the world’s largest incubator
The world of entrepreneurship news is a complex one, with people ever ready to give their two cents on how you should be running your business, pitching your business and what’s trending.
Here’s our wrap of how to grow your network, Facebook’s broadcasting boo boos, the ingredients of a good business plan, and some obvious advice.
World’s largest incubator, not in Dubai. Shocker, it’s actually the French who are going to be opening what will be the world’s largest incubator for startups. At 34,000 square meters in size and set to house 3,000 entrepreneurs it’s the perfect solution apparently for startups looking to gain access to Europe, especially after the UK said bye bye to the EU.
It’s who you know, duh. Sometimes it can feel like one is reading advice from the University of the Obvious but it is also beneficial to be reminded of the obvious advice. In this case it’s the importance of the network you can cultivate and how it will help your business/career. Well indeed, being 'human' to all you come into contact with is one of the easiest ways to build a good network. As the saying goes ‘you meet everyone twice’ - and don’t forget it.
Who’s afraid of the big bad AI? It seems people are less scared of a misdiagnosis of breast cancer than a driverless car going rogue. In actual fact it should be the other way around, according to a bunch of researchers in this article. A survey conducted by Britain’s Royal Society says that most people surveyed were worried about a robot causing physical harm, or machines using AI that are in close proximity, than they were about AI being used on a mass scale for things like predictive policing or health diagnosis.
Wamda of the week: Libyan entrepreneurship in a time of war. Yes, even in war zones people are innovative, and not just about where they’re going to get their next meal or some fresh water. With a sharp drop in oil production, oh and that war, innovation is blossoming, from ecommerce to delivery apps. Watch this space.
How to write a good business plan. Four factors critical to the success of every new venture: introduce who’s running the venture and what you’re going to be selling and to whom, showing your strengths and vulnerabilities. We’re not going to tell you the other two though because that ruins the fun of you clicking through to see what else Harvard Business Review advises.
If you love it set it free. Startup founders should learn to give it up a little because research in the US suggests that if you do, good things will happen for your company. “For every additional position of power a founder occupies (being both CEO and chairman, for example, as opposed to controlling just one of those roles), the company’s value decreases by between 17.1 percent and 22 percent,” said the research. It’s a bit like that part in the movie ‘The Intern’ when Anne Hathaway’s founder character is told the board wants a new CEO to replace her but - spoiler alert - she obviously didn’t see this research.
Facebook’s much needed reality check. Facebook has a ‘roadmap’ for building communities and a more informed society but it seems a lot of users want to inform the rest of us about their own abuses, rapes, and even efforts to commit murder. This oped is a look at how the global social network is rather lackadaisical when it comes to acknowledging the troublesome use, and then monitoring of, how people are using it’s live streaming tool.
Feature image via Station F/Jeff Hallenbeck.