In late November, I spoke to John Shinal at Vator.tv about the Microsoft Startup Accelerator Program and other ways that the Emerging Business Team can help a startup partner with Microsoft. The full transcript is below, or you can watch the video right here.
John Shinal, Vator.tv : Hi. We're here in Mountain View, California with Dan'l Lewin, the Corporate Vice President for Microsoft and their emerging business initiatives. Dan'l, welcome.
Dan’l Lewin: Glad to be here.
Shinal: And you guys have rolled out what you call the Accelerator Program about how startups all over the world, really, can operate with Microsoft and do business with Microsoft. Tell our startup entrepreneurs, if they want to do business with Microsoft, how do they go about doing it?
Lewin: Sure. What you do is—the first location is on the Web, and it's MicrosoftStartupZone.com, one word—MicrosoftStartupZone.com. It gives a perspective on the kinds of things and the kinds of approaches you should take that will reach out to Microsoft so that we can help put in context your areas of interest and where we can be helpful. And it's organized around portfolios. And the portfolios are based upon the patterns of entrepreneurial investment and venture-capital-style investment.
Shinal: Now, you—Microsoft ordinarily doesn't invest directly. Which—although you vet deals like a venture capital firm would. So talk about how—what happens when you choose to work with someone or choose not to? When the decision is made, what happens then as opposed to a direct investment?
Lewin: Sure. What we end up doing is taking a look at areas of interest where the entrepreneurs are thinking about new market opportunities. We look for alignment in areas of interest around our underlying platform technologies, and we look for areas where we can be helpful in helping the company both align with our technologies, but also, and more importantly, create business value for our end customers.
So, basically, the way you'd think about it is we invest very heavily in resources, in guidance, scalability work, marketing help, and sales and channel help where we can. And there are other times when we can be strong referrals into the venture capital community where companies are doing a second-level or third-level financing and they're aligned with us in some particular way. We can also help with introductions to the venture capital community.
Shinal: Lastly, you don't work with everybody, obviously. So do you make a decision and say, "Yes, we will work with you. This is what we've got going product-roadmap-wise." Or, "Sorry, we can't work with you; you're on your own."
Lewin: Yeah. The triage is pretty simple. You know, can we be helpful? If yes, how? And if not, why? And so the how we help is tied to areas of interest where we have initiative, either technical or market-based initiative. Our experience in the past has been that there are on the order of 200 or 300 companies a year where we can actually do meaningful work and help them, then they would be the ones saying that we helped them; it wouldn't be us tooting the horn. It would be then saying, "Yeah, these guys were really helpful."
From that, there are 100 companies or so that on an annual basis we launch into our Accelerator Program, which is sort of a highlight of the top 100 companies around the world, typically from 15 or so different markets, the US being sort of the leading indicator in Silicon Valley, but clearly we're talking about Tel Aviv and we're talking about Bangalore, India, China, UK, France, etc., where there are significant entrepreneurial centers. So with that, we provide strong marketing air cover and significant value in helping the companies grow their businesses. And that's the key thing, the [Microsoft Startup] Accelerator Program.
It's true. There are lots more companies out there than we could help. And through access to the Startup Zone, you can take a look at the areas where we have interest. And it's typically where we've been helping companies in the past. Those are the clusters in the areas. We'll be clear when we can't help you, and in some cases, you know, we'll pay attention over time if you're doing something that we don't see it today, but we should be paying attention because it looks interesting, but we don't have a way that we can help. So we'll pay attention and monitor those as well.
Shinal: So we're back with Dan'l Lewin in Mountain View, California. And Dan'l, if you could give me one or two examples of some startup partners, either through the Accelerator Program or not, that Microsoft has partnered with, and how you're helping them. I think you mentioned maybe Jajah or Newsgator or someone like that.
Lewin: Yeah, Jajah is a newer company doing some interesting things in and around VOIP and combining calls from local handset software. And they built, again, their platform technology as well as their client side doing a lot of work with Microsoft and our Smart Phone—excuse me—mobile platform asset.
Sequoia-backed company, Mike Moritz is on the board. It's a terrific company growing leaps and bounds in a hot area at the moment. And we've just begun the engagement with them in the last couple of months. So as their success unfolds beyond the normal here's where we are with our product roadmaps and here's how we can help you with the immediate technologies. As their plans unfold and their business starts to scale, we'll be there and understand their need and bring value to the table there to help create business success for them on the other side.
Shinal: Okay, Dan'l. Thanks.
Lewin: Sure. Great.
