Thames and Silicon Valleys and Silicon Dongas

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Thames and Silicon Valleys and Silicon Dongas

On 13 June I posted the message below (Cyberclaim is nigh) here:

The hour of our CyberClaim is nigh!
[Inspired by the article written by George Osborne (Shadow Chancellor) in this morning's Times and a skit about colonialism entitled 'Flags' by Eddie Izzard]

In America, USA two days later on 15th June, Mr Tom Foremski (Silicon Valley Watcher) picked up George Osborne’s article and blogged a response.
In his response to George Osborne’s article in The Times of 13th June, Mr Tom Foremski says:

“The reason there are no British Googles or Yahoos or EBays is the same reason there are no British Apple Computers, Intels or Seagates. Silicon Valley is not something that can be copied, Israel’s Silicon Wadi is the closest copy, and then everything else around the world could be described as being variations on: a business park built next to a university.
What’s different is that here is different.
It’s different because this is a place that tolerates massive amounts of failure. One in 20 startups make it beyond five years, venture capitalists want that ten-bagger, that massive return on investment. But they are prepared to fund ten or twenty startups that fail.
In Britain, Mr Osborne does not have that culture of tolerance of failure. And the rest of Europe is pretty much the same. If you fail once you are a failure evermore.
Here, in Silicon Valley, they let you back into the game, time and time again. I know plenty of people who “made it” but they failed six or seven times before that. This is the only place in the world that has such high tolerance of failure.”

Are the Brits so intolerant of failure? I don’t think so.

They are however intolerant of having someone wasting their investment which is totally different. Provided you show irrefutable proof that the business model was flawed and that the failure was not as a result of a character/personality defect the Brits will give you the benefit of the doubt to have another ‘crack at it’. As will most of the other European countries.

As for Israel’s Silicon Wadi, USA’s Silicon Valley and the future South African Silicon Donga, well, the Brits have the Thames Valley!

And it is at Reading, Berkshire in the Thames Valley where Oracle, Microsoft, JD Edwards etc are based. Brits don’t need domestic silica deposits to provide a name for its computer industry – we buy it from the old colonies and rely on our ancient old man Thames to provide the industry’s locale.

Reading also has a University and it is not too far from Oxford which has hundreds of colleges and is only a 20 minute car or train commute away.

A Brit invented the internet and a Brit will most likely invent another amazing thing that will change the world. With luck the Brits won’t sell the patent or sell the licence like they did the VTOL Harrier fighter jet, but instead will retain complete revenue and development control over it and base it at their Thames Valley.

Not all great things eminate out of Silicon Valley, America USA.