Legoland and RFID
Here's an interesting article on how Legoland Denmark is using RFID on wristbands to help parents keep track of their children. In the next few years companies will spend billions on RFID for supply chain management, potentially saving hundreds of billions of dollars in costs, according to the Yankee Group.
United Online Acquires Classmates
United Online is paying $100 million in cash for Classmates, the leading service for re-connecting people to their high school friends (in a way, it's a social networking site--it just doesn't utilize the six degrees of separation theory the way the newer services do).
Google Passes Yahoo in Market Cap
Shopping.com IPO
Shopping.com has raised more than $124 million in its IPO, pricing shares at $18, after upping its range to $16-18. The Israel-based company is the 4th largest shopping destination online. It had $42 million in revenue and $3.8 million in net income during the first six months of 2004.
I read yesterday that all Internet IPOs this year are trading above their opening price. It's definitely survival of the fittest.
Connect Magazine
Connect Magazine (which covers the Utah high tech scene) invited me to write a column every month for their excellent publication. My first article comes out next week. It's about the importance of angel investors. Upcoming topics include: tools for 21st century entrepreneurs and search engine marketing. Subscribe to Connect.
Let me know what you would like addressed in future issues.
Utah 100–Fastest Growing Companies for 2004
Mountain West Venture Group honored the 100 fastest growing companies in Utah yesterday at the Grand America Hotel. Senator Bob Bennett gave a keynote speech about entrepreneurship and creating jobs. He complains that most senators are lawyers and don't even understand something as straightforward to a small business owner as a K-1 form and the tax rates associated with partnerships and S-Corporations. As a former businessman, he has tried to raise their awareness of small business issues.
UVSC Lectures on Internet Marketing
UITA Hall of Fame
My favorite annual event in Utah is the UITA Hall of Fame dinner. Last night the latest inductee into the Utah Information Technology Associaton's Hall of Fame was Kevin Rollins, CEO of Dell Computer. The evening was grand.
The UITA Hall of Fame now includes:
Skype: Increasing Returns
More than 28 million people have downloaded Skype, the free voice over IP service from the makers of KaZaA. I use it to talk with web developers and business partners. We haven't yet used the free conference calling service (up to 5 people simultaneously). For that we use www.freeconferencecall.com. There is no added fee for this service--every participant just pays a normal long distance rate. This is a super convenient service.
Turning Comments Back On
A few months ago I had to turn off the comments on my blog because the comment counter from Radio Userland was slowing the site down too much.
Today I've turned the comments back on. Radio Userland CEO Scott Young says the speed issue has been resolved. This is Radio is good blogging software in case you want to publish your own blog on your own domain. It costs only $39.95. Their tech support has always been responsive to me. (Thanks, Lawrence!) In addition to comments, I'm going to be adding a Blog Roll soon.
