Partner of Benchmarking Capital: Internet entrepreneurship is sprint Marathon

There is a saying in Britain: "It's a marathon, not a sprint." "No, not so." This is a sprint marathon.　　"November 23, Benchmark Capital," partner Matt Cohler, in an interview with the foreign phone, said, "You have to act quickly, but that does not mean to make money quickly," I often told the start-up entrepreneurs, but also my own experience as an entrepreneur. Cohler, the youngest partner in Benchmark Capital, is also a former CTO and VP of Operations at Facebook. He is LinkedIn's 2nd employee, Facebook's 7th employee, and is still a Facebook consultant.　　He has worked with the founders of these companies to bring the company from zero to the world class, and these experiences and resources have become important capital for their "benchmark capital".　　Benchmark Capital is one of Silicon Valley's top investment institutions focused on information technology investments, renowned for its harsh investment style and the "long Term greedy" investment culture. As of now, the benchmark capital has been involved in projects including AOL, Twitter, Second Life, Ariba, Juniper NX, Red hat and Tropos NX, many of which have become famous U.S. technology investment cases,　　And in its 1997 investment in ebay, Benchmark capital is more than 800 times times the return on investment returns--ebay in the spring of 1999 on Nasdaq, two years ago, only to invest 6.7 million dollars in the benchmark capital to earn 5 billion dollars.　　Cohler to reporters that the benchmark capital in 2009 into the Bai, which is the agency's first equity investment project in China so far. Big companies are hard to suppress innovative enterprises "21st Century": China's several major internet companies are carrying out "all-inclusive" type of expansion, such as Baidu launched a "Yes" project involved in E-commerce, how do you see this?　　There are actually a lot of startups like Bai in China, do you have contact and comparison with them before you finally choose the people's net? Cohler: On the first question I'll answer you sideways. If you look at the history of science and technology in the United States, innovative companies to a very high degree of concentration, executive power to do a market is the norm, on the contrary, large companies to use brand and capital advantage to successfully suppress innovative enterprises only a few.　　I believe this will be reflected in China too, because the economic law is the same, but it takes time, and it may be taken first by some of the most patient and dedicated subdivision sectors. For the second question, I want to stress that we will not spend too much time focusing on our competitors. For me, it's all about good business opportunities and working with entrepreneurs. We do not discuss overly complex issues, and some companies focus on overly complex issues. I think (Bai) This team and his leader have the right idea, which is to help users buy and sell things quickly. The most effective way to do this, like Craigslist in the United States and elsewhere, is to make a "simple and fast" platform for people to use to quickly address the needs of users.　　This is the most important, and the team is very focused on it.　　21st Century: What was your first meeting with Wang Jianyue (Bai founder and CEO), and where did he attract you most? Cohler: As a venture capitalist, my job is to evaluate investment projects and then invest in capital to help entrepreneurs achieve business development.　　So I usually ask myself some simple but difficult questions, and I think that usually simple things are harder to deal with than complex. Generally speaking, I always ask myself three questions: how to look at the market, the product and the entrepreneur? The first time I saw Wang Jianyue, the impression was that he was smart but also very focused, and had a long vision but a strong executive power, and I think not only in China but also in places like this.　　So the first time I met, I realized that this is the entrepreneur I want to help, I have the opportunity to cooperate. Investing in "Simple good Products" 21st century: Did your 8 partners have an argument before deciding to invest?　　You know, arguing is sometimes a good thing. Cohler: We will have discussions before any investment.　　The most important thing is that we all believe in this leader and his team, and secondly, the question that we have most to discuss is: does classified advertising work in China and is it the right business model? We understand the situation of the classified advertising market in the world, some countries in the newspaper classified ads have a long history, and China is not so, so with such as the United States and Europe, the situation is very different. We've been thinking about this for a long time. In the end, we believe that the most basic needs of mankind determine this is a huge market, and a "simple good product" can play a role in the market, quickly solve people's needs, there is no too confusing and complex things, this model in other regions also in similar form,　　So you can solve it in the same way.　　"21st century": the Internet has many business models, but online classifieds may be a very long-term project, what are your values when choosing a project? Cohler: Our goal is not to recover capital quickly, it takes a lot of years for a great enterprise to develop, and that's what our investors think. In some economic environments, you can quickly recoup your investment, but in most cases it will take a long time. Google was founded in 1997, 7 years after the initial public offering of shares. Facebook was founded in 2004 and is only growing today.　　Founded in 2003, LinkedIn grew today. So we don't expect a quick payback, and we want to help build a big and important company that takes a long time. You have to act fast, but that doesn't mean you can make money quickly. There is a saying in English: This is a marathon, notSprint。 I often tell entrepreneurs who have just started, and my own experience as an entrepreneur is to change the English idiom to "this is a sprint marathon," and the entrepreneur you're looking for is the person who has a long term goal but is able to act fast and stick with it for a while. We think it is hard to find such a person, but this is the person we are looking for, so the most important thing is not to recover the investment quickly, but to get huge profits over the long term.　　[Page] "Sprint Marathon", "21st Century": I'm a bit confused, the Silicon Valley investment community has a well-known principle "one Miles rule", that is, the investment project is not more than a mile of investors, although this rule is now slowly changing, but you are so far away, how to help the Chinese entrepreneurial team?　　You know, money is just the lowest source that VCs can offer to startups. Cohler: Haha, you're right, that's what I often think about. Most of our investments are made locally, but first we trust each other very well, even if we can solve the problem by telephone, and second, because the product is simple, so even if I am far away in California, I can understand how Bai works and the latest situation.　　Indeed, any start-up company will have some basic problems when it starts, and I will give advice to entrepreneurs based on my experience, such as when the team needs to recruit from Silicon Valley.　　"21st century": people Net is your first investment in China, Benchmark Capital will do more and more investment in China? Cohler: Very likely, we are opportunists, if we see a good opportunity, will ask further: this in China, is the right business model?　　If the answer is yes, we will invest.　　21st century: In both China and the United States, what do you think are the big opportunities in the next areas? Cohler: We can talk about this for 1 hours, and I'll give you a few examples. The first is Mobile information technology, now mobile technology and Mobile information technology are integrated, this is the interesting place, before they separate, now completely together.　　Before everyone talked about mobile technology, feeling is about to come true, but feel a little early, I tell you why. Mobile technology needs to have connection points, provided by telecom operators, do not need to worry about which mobile phone they have to build a connection point, as long as the establishment of connection points can be, and do not worry too much about who the visitors, but Mobile information technology is not so simple, the IPhone, Android,　　Too many Internet service providers such as Nokia make compatibility a big problem, and when people don't have to think about it and focus on making good products for the user to choose from, everything is fine.　　Localization is also a huge market, as long as the grasp of the market, there is no doubt that the future is huge, like China's "comment network." In addition, the "Consumer-to-consumer" model of "Bai" is also an important investment portfolio of benchmarking capital, and in the United States and Europe, we see many small businesses are considering using the Internet to develop.