Age and Entrepreneurs

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These days in the startup world, the entrepreneur is imagined as young and fresh-faced, straight out of college with some brilliant idea and a hip new company.  However, that doesn’t mean that age really has anything to do with a successful company, and people have tried to figure out correlations between an entrepreneur’s age when they launched their startup and whether or not said startup was successful.  Studies have been done by numerous foundations, institutions and universities.  What they have discovered is that the average entrepreneur is 40 when they launch a startup.  People over the age of 55 are twice as likely as people under 35 to launch a high-growth startup, and the average age of a successful startup with over $1 million in revenues was 39.  Ultimately, age was less of a factor in entrepreneurial success than previous startup and industry experience.

The age that successful entrepreneurs launched their companies is wide indeed, ranging from 20 (Facebook and Microsoft) to 53 (McDonald’s).  While experience is a key factor to success, it’s not required; just look at Facebook, Microsoft and Apple (none of these founders were older than 21).  The most important factor for success seems to be how invested you are in the business and how passionate you are about it.  Nonetheless, many investors will be reluctant to invest in a first-time CEO, as they tend to make a lot of mistakes.  However, there are plenty of exceptions to this rule; the largest Harry Potter fan site, Mugglenet, was founded by a 12 year-old, yet has over 10 million unique visitors a month.

While age might not necessarily matter for entrepreneurial success, experience does, and that comes with age.  Smart entrepreneurs who might lack experience could benefit from surrounding themselves with experienced mentors.

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Success With Generation Z

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There’s been a lot of talk about millennials these days, as they graduate from college, go out into the workforce and make a name for themselves.  Businesses have been working to accommodate these millennials, but a truly mindful entrepreneur will be looking even more toward the future, to the so-called “Generation Z”.  I recently came across an article about how businesses can prepare to accommodate and profit from this new generation.  This is especially important, since many of them are starting to come of age as consumers.  One big thing that the article focused on was the importance of online shopping, but there were other points that they addressed.

One thing that the author pointed out was that Generation Z will most likely not have any brand loyalty.  They tend to lean toward companies with superior goods and services, and tend to rely more on their peers’ opinions and recommendations than ads.  While this is problematic for big companies with multi-million-dollar marketing budgets, it’s good news for smaller companies.  The article discusses some of the good business strategies for people trying to get Generation Z on their side.

More so than Millennials, Generation Z will be completely reliant on social media and mobile devices for content consumption, browsing, shopping and interaction with friends.  Because of this, your business strategy needs to focus on this market.  This will include having a mobile-friendly website and a good strategy that will consistently engage with customers through social media.

If you can create a value in your products through superior-quality design and manufacturing, this will elevate the reputation of your company, which is an important attribute to Generation Z.  It won’t be enough any more to create value just through branding, since they will see through this and ultimately call you out.

Generation Z will demand that companies be honest and transparent with them.  Between social media a peer reviews, companies won’t be able to hide from negative press or controversies.  Rather, they should be ready to face these challenges head-on with a well thought out, expedited strategy for dealing with the inevitable conflicts.

What’s unique about Generation Z is that they appreciate individuality while also placing a great emphasis on group acceptance.  It’s a complicated balance, that baffles plenty of people.  Nonetheless, you have to learn to use it.  Embrace new and unique tastes to help your company connect better with this generation.  Your company should think about hiring and listening to individuals from his generation as part of your marketing (when they’re old enough).

You should never assume that the same conveniences of your generation will be enough for Generation Z.  They’ll be demanding the convenience to browse, shop and receive customer service through mobile and social media channels, so that your strategy, whether it’s marketing, operations or human-resource management, needs to keep it in mind.

The collection and use of extensive data has been a big topic recently.  While plenty of companies regularly collect and use customer data to tailor shopping experiences, Generation Z will be a lot more tech-savvy, with a better understanding of how to control the data that they share.  Because of this, businesses will need to respect privacy to a greater extent, otherwise they could risk losing customers to other companies who will.

One example of a successful company working to take advantage of younger generations is Under Armor.  When they started, their goal was to overtake Nike as the top sporting goods company, which was no easy task.  Instead of trying to compete with them head-to-head, Under Armor instead went after youths who had not yet developed a brand loyalty to Nike.  By aggressively going after youth sports, then growing with their consumers to help supply college teams and eventually professional sports teams, they nurtured a large and loyal base of customers, while also making exceptional products.  Many businessmen are concerned about the challenges that Generation Z will pose, but companies with the patience to deal with them properly will benefit greatly from it.

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Situation Escalates in Iraq

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In the past couple years, there hasn’t been that much news about the situation in Iraq; indeed, it seemed like everything had stabilized.  However, in the past couple weeks, the region has once again turned into a battleground, as a militant Sunni group operating out of Syria, known as ISIL, has seized a large chunk of western Iraq in a lightning sweep south toward the capital of Baghdad.  Their ultimate goal is to recreate a medieval caliphate carved out of fragmenting Syria and Iraq.  In response, Iraq’s most senior Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has urged his followers to take up arms and defend themselves against the advance of Sunni militants.  People who are capable of carrying arms, said al-Sistani, should volunteer, to join security forces and repel the terrorists from Iraqi soil.  Those killed while fighting ISIL militants would be hailed as martyrs.

ISIL miltants marching.

Yesterday Obama threatened military strikes against ISIL, highlighting the danger that this group, who have threatened to redraw borders in an oil-rich region, pose.  In the chaos, Kurdish forces have taken control of Kirkuk, an oil hub just outside of their enclave that they have long viewed as their traditional capital.  Just yesterday, after seizing Mosul and Tikrit, ISIL entered two towns in the province bordering Iran.  The two towns, Saadiyah and Jalawla, had fallen to the Sunni insurgents after government troops fled their positions.  In response, the Iraqi army fired artillery shells at Saadiyah and Jalawla from the nearby town of Muqdadiya, sending dozens of families fleeing towards Khaniqin, near the Iranian border.

Yesterday, Obama said that he was considering “all options” to support Iraq’s Shi’ite-dominated central government that took full control after the end of US occupation back in 2011, a full eight years after the Americans entered the region.  In response to a question about air strikes, Obama said he isn’t ruling out anything, due to the need to make sure that these jihadists don’t gain a permanent foothold in either Iraq or Syria.  Nonetheless, US officials said that US ground forces would not be returning to Iraq.  This incident marks a rapid escalation in a conflict that is threatening civil war and the potential break-up of Iraq.

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The Aging Farmer

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The America imagined by Thomas Jefferson was an America of small farmers.  And for a long time, it looked like he was right; the vast majority of Americans lived a rural existence as subsistence farmers well into the 19th century and long after Jefferson’s death.  However, that image has completely changed in the modern era, as America has since turned into a sprawling suburb, and fewer and fewer young people are turning to a profession as farmers.  I recently came across  an article that discusses the surprisingly low number of young farmers in America.

The Census of Agriculture, released every five years by the US Department of Agriculture, discovered that the average age of “principal operators” (the person most responsible for decision-making on farms and ranches) climbed from 57.1 in 2007 to 58.3.  Compare that to 1982, where the average age was 50.5.  Data released just this past week put the average even higher in six states at 60 or older.  Of course, the median age of all American workers, 42.4, is climbing across the board.  By 2020, an estimated 25% of the labor force will be 55 or older.  Nonetheless, the overall trend pales next to the rate that the age of farmers is increasing.  A surprising 10% of farmers and ranchers are currently 75 or older.  This is because farming is a tough business for young people to break into, due to the sky-high costs of prime farmland and necessary equipment such as combines and tractors.  From 2007 to 2012, the number of “beginning farmers” declined 20 percent.  Less than 120,000 of America’s 2.1 million principal operators were younger than 35, and just last month the Agriculture Department announced that $19 million will be set aside for a program designed to help younger farmers and ranchers.

The sad fact is that farming and ranching is hard, back-breaking work.  There are a lot of young people who would like to experience farming, but unless they have land that’s been in their family, then it’s nearly impossible to break into.  According to Michael Duffy, a longtime chronicler of farm demographics who recently retired, the agricultural numbers aren’t nearly as dire as they sound.  Many farms are passed down to younger family members, and many farms are absorbed by larger farms, a process of consolidation that’s been going on for decades.  Duffy also noted that due to advances in technology, there are fewer farmers needed.

There are also opportunities available for younger farmers, such as selling directly to consumers at farmers’ markets.  The operators of large farms are typically younger than those who tend smaller farms.  The average age of an operator with $1 million or more in sales is 55, compared to the average age of 61 for a farmer with $1,000 or less in sales.

Danish Minecraft Experiment Goes Awry

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People have been talking a lot about minecraft since its release some two and a half years earlier.  The independent computer game, developed by Swedish gamers, allows the players to build structures out of 3-D cubes, much like legos.  Despite the game’s minimal graphics, which look like something out of the 1980s, it has become wildly popular thanks to the creative freedom it gives players and its addictive gameplay; as of early February 2014, it has sold over 35 million copies across all platforms.  To give you an idea of how popular this game has become, the Danish Geodata Agency just created the entire country of Denmark in Minecraft at a 1:1 scale.  The painstaking task, one of the biggest Minecraft creations of all time, was made up of about 4 trillion bricks and a whole terabyte of data.  The replica was built using the agency’s 3D elevation model, and was meant to be used as a teaching tool.

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark: A scene from the game, after American tanks rolled into “Denmark”.

Despite efforts to protect the structure from outside players, players soon started to blow up this virtual Denmark.  The Danish Geodata Agency had disabled the ability to use the “dynamite” item on their Denmark, but had forgotten to disable another explosive tool in the game, the minecart with the dynamite item.  Players discovered this, and started setting off explosives in several different Danish towns, building American tanks and flags on top of the ruins.  According to Chris Hammeken, spokesman for the Danish Geodata Agency, they have no intentions to reboot Minecraft’s virtual Denmark, since elements being broken down and replaced is a major aspect of the game.  However, if buildings are removed and nothing new is created, then they plan to “occasionally” rebuild minor areas of the map.  However, you can download Minecraft’s Denmark map from the Danish Geodata Agency’s website.  It’s so far gotten over 200,000 downloads.  Hammeken claims that The Danish Geodata Agency is actually “very happy” to see players from around the world “creating fancy nice things” and having fun.

Couple Works to Restore Tierra Del Fuego

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Tierra del Fuego, the region that Doug and Kris Tompkins are working to preserve.

I recently came across an article about Doug and Kris Tompkins, two successful entrepreneurs, who last December donated more than 94,000 acres at the tip of South America, where they plan to form the base of a national park.  The land that they purchased some 15 years ago is part of the region Tierra Del Fuego, characterized by high mountains, rare forest and clear lakes and rivers.  The move comes as an intention to nationalize the area for nature and was part of an extraordinary endeavor that has made them the greatest private creators of protected landscapes in history.

At the cost of hundreds of millions of dollars, the couple has so far purchased 2.2 million acres of Chile and Argentina, conserving and restoring it while sensitively providing access and other facilities, so that they can present it to the two countries for national parks.  To date, they have donated 600,000 acres to the government.  December’s addition catalyzed the Chilean government to add 276,000 adjoining acres of its own land.  The resulting Yendegaia National Park, which takes in both the Darwin Range and the Beagle Channel, protects the last frontier of sub-Antarctic beech forest and is the home of such critically endangered animals as the ruddy-headed goose.

Just seven months earlier, the couple donated 37,500 acres of the Andes to swell Argentina’s Perito Moreno national park.  They have also given two entire parks, one in Chile and one in Argentina, since 2000 and are close to handing over three more.  They have brought back tens of thousands of acres of degraded land, reintroduced locally extinct species, revived communities and built roads and trails, camp sites and visitor centers.

Djokovic Beats Nadal

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Novak Djokovic, shown here, after a successful match.

Recently, I’ve been watching the Sony Open Tennis games, which have been wildly entertaining.  Just yesterday, Novak Djokovic beat Rafael Nadal in the final with 6-3, 6-3.  His game plan was focused on attacking Nadal where he was most vulnerable: returning serve and extremely wide in the Ad court.  Since he first had to navigate saving a break point in the opening game of the match and deal with Nadal’s legendary form, it took him a while to execute his strategy.  However, Nadal was unable to handle the Serb’s onslaught as he attacked his forehand return with both first and second serves.

Nadal’s backhand return motion is compact and easier to block the serve back, while the forehand backswing is larger and more likely to be pressured for time, particularly on hard courts.  Djokovic’s attack was a disruptive, surprise tactic to attack the strength and keep Nadal guessing.  It was also extremely effective to catch Nadal running around his backhand return.

Djokovic seemed to always be ahead in the rallies, and Nadal seemed to be a step slower than normal.  He committed 18 forehand groundstroke errors to Djokovic’s seven, and where these errors were made help understand the inner workings of the Serb’s plan.

A staggering 16 of the 18 of Nadal’s forehand errors occurred standing in the Ad court, where Djokovic attacked with his backhand cross court and forehand.  Of these 16, 10 occurred very wide around the Ad court alley (and sometimes outside it) as Djokovic kept grabbing Nadal out of his comfort zone.  Djokovic is well-known for his backhand down the line, but every one of his backhand winners were cross court in the direction of Nadal’s forehand.  Although both players won 14 points each in baseline rallies during the opening set, it was clearly Djokovic who took the honors during the second set, winning 65% from the back of the court.

Djokovic broke for the first time in the 2-3 opening set as Nadal served.  Djokovic finished at the net with a forehand volley winner on the first point after he crushed a second serve return down the line to Nadal’s forehand.  Djokovic went after the forehand again at 0-15, hitting a short angle backhand cross court winner.  Nadal won the following point with a good first serve that was unreturned, and at 15-30 Djokovic hit a huge forehand down the line, attacking Nadal’s forehand, then backed it up with a cross-court winner.  At 15-40, Djokovic used the secondary pattern of attacking Nadal’s backhand.

Djokovic then won seven of eight points to take command of all areas of the court.  Leading 3-2, 30-0 in the second set, he was feeling it so much that he nailed an old-school slice backhand approach deep to Nadal’s forehand, which the Spaniard in turn missed down the line.  After Djokovic’s primary concerns were humming, he occasionally mixed it up to Nadal’s backhand in an effort to confuse him.  Nadal’s serving was disappointing, as he only won 59% of the first serves and 46% of second serves.  Djokovic constantly began the point returning down the middle with a deep missile which pushed back Nadal and put him in control of both court position and the directional flow of the point.  In the first set, Djokovic averaged landing his return 11.4 feet from the baseline against first serves, which improved to only 5.8 feet from the baseline against second serves, pushing Nadal back.  In his post-match interview, Djokovic said everything went “perfectly” for him.

Tomas Berdych Falls

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Tomas Berdych, pictured here with a triumphant grin, hasn’t been doing as well during the current BNP Paribas Open.

In the past couple of days, the BNP Paribas Open has been going on in Indian Wells, California.  I’ve been enjoying watching the great games going on.  Yesterday, Spain’s Roberto Bautista Agut knocked out Tomas Berdych in the second round, beating the Czech 4-6, 6-2, 6-4.  This is especially amazing, considering that Berdych had won 11 matches in a row this past month and is 16-4.  According to Berdych, this is “the worst match” that he’s had so far this year.

Second-seeded Novak Djokovic was a 7-6 (1), 6-2 winner over Victor Hanescu of Romania during their second-round match.  While the Serbian wasn’t thrilled with his performance, it was nonetheless a victory, even though he still has a lot of practice ahead of him.  Due to ligament damage in his left wrist, the sixth-seeded Argentine Juan Martin del Potro had to withdraw.  Last week, he also pulled out of the Dubai tournament.  Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France dropped out as well after falling 6-4, 6-4 to countryman Julien Benneteau.

John Isner, the only remaining American from the original contingent advanced after a 7-6 (5), 6-3 victory over Russia’s Nikolai Davidenko.  Despite an ankle injury earlier in the season, the 6’10” American says he feels fine.  He claims that he wasn’t too hung up on upholding “American honor” either.  At this point in the tournament, he’s more concerned about his own advancement than he is about his American teammates.

The World’s Underground Wonders

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I recently came across an article about some of the most amazing underground wonders around the world.  Unfortunately, I haven’t been to as many of them as I’d like, but they all sound astounding to me.

On the island of Palawa in the Philippines is Puerto Princesa, an underground river that runs five miles underneath a limestone karst mountain and connect the Cabayugan River to the South China Sea.  Through underground guided rafting trips, you can see several large underground chambers, some of which are as wide as 390 feet and nearly 200 feet high.

The stone walls inside the Thrihnukagigur Volcano in Iceland are filled with a psychedelic sort of pattern.

Since the Middle Ages, the Turda Salt Mines in Transylvania have been excavated by generations of miners.  It’s currently a subterranean museum and recreation center, complete with basketball hoops, a mini-golf course, Ferris wheel and underground lake.  The mines even have halotherapy spa facilities, which treat respiratory problems through ionized air, pressure and humidity.

For the past 4,000 years, Thrihnukagigur Volcano in Iceland has been dormant.  Over the course of this time, the magma in the volcano somehow drained away, leaving behind amazing mineral coloration.  Visitors to the volcano enter the maw via a cable car nearly 400 feet down.

On the eastern border of the Chapada Diamantina range in northeast Brazil, the Poço Encantado (Enchanted Well) is a massive underground lake, with a natural window up above.  But just referring to it as an “underground lake” doesn’t do the Poço Encantado justice.  The water is so clear that you can see over 200 feet to the bottom of the lake, filled with ancient tree trunks and rock formations.

Back in 2000, La Cueva de los Cristales was discovered in the Naica Mine in Mexico, after water was pumped out of the small chamber.  The gypsum columns there are some of the largest natural crystals in the world.  Unfortunately, visiting this wonder is rather difficult, due to dangerous conditions: the chamber has near 100% humidity and reaches temperatures as high as 136 degrees, thanks to a pool of magma underneath the cave.

The glowworm caves look like something out of an episode of Star Trek or Star Wars.

After Peter Jackson filmed the epic “Lord of the Rings” trilogy in New Zealand, the oceanic island has since become the place to go for anything fantasy-related.  But there was one great feature of the island that Peter Jackson didn’t put into his epic blockbuster trilogy: the Waitomo Glowworm Caves a couple hours south of Auckland.  The caves are filled with New Zealand’s indigenous glowworm, the arachnocampa luminosa, which gives off a subtle blue glow that makes the underground caves look like something out of a sci-fi film.

Greenbrier, a swanky resort in south-eastern West Virginia, looks nondescript enough.  However, in 1956, the government built a bunker there to house Congress if a nuclear war were to break out.  The fallout shelter, since declassified, could house more than 1,100 people behind 25-ton doors.  The bunker was equipped with such features and facilities as a power plant, decontamination chambers, communications equipment, meeting rooms and a great hall for joint sessions.

Across the pond, as German fighter planes dropped bombs down onto England’s major cities during World War II, the British built a secret underground bunker in London.  Occupied by ministers, military personnel and Winston Churchill himself, the Cabinet War Rooms saw extensive use from the start to the end of World War II.  Much of the bunker has since become a museum, preserving many of the various artifacts used in that era, such as large maps full of pinpricks and even the swivel chair that Churchill used.

A screenshot of the morbid Capuchin ossuary.

San Clemente Basilica in Rome is steeped in history; built in the 12th century on top of a fourth-century church, itself built over a first-century home that stands next to a second-century temple dedicated to the all-male fertility cult of the sun god Mithras.  A 10-minute walk from the Basilica is the church of Santa Maria della Concezione, underneath which is a grim ossuary where the bones of 4,000 Capuchin monks were used to artistically decorate the space with chandeliers, coats of arms and archways.

For forty years in the first half of the 20th century, the eccentric immigrant Baldassare Forestiere built a subterranean home and garden in Fresno, CA, inspired by the ancient catacombs of his native Sicily.  Using nothing but farming tools, Forestiere dug about 10,000 square feet of rooms, a chapel and even an underground fishing pond.

Protesters Clash in Crimea

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A elderly Tatar man, with flags waving behind him.

In the Crimea region of southern Ukraine, tensions have been erupting in the past couple weeks.  With Yanukovych no longer President, the region is divided between a pro-Putin Russian majority and a pro-Ukrainian Tatar minority.  On Wednesday, thousands of Russian and Tatar protesters clashed in Simferopol, the region’s capital city.  Tensions, previously nationalistic, developed a religious undertone, as the predominantly Muslim Tatars shouted “Allahu akbar”, which is Arabic for “God is great”.

The conflict in Ukraine, with Russia on one side and the west on the other, is eerily reminiscent of the Cold War.  Protests erupted in Ukraine after Yanukovych flaked out of a treaty with the European Union in favor of a bailout from Vladimir Putin.  On one side, Ukrainians protested the move, while the eastern and southern regions of the country, which are predominantly Russian, were pro-Putin.  Since Ukraine gained independence in 1991, the Russian majority in Crimea has been secretly wishing that Russia would annex their homeland.  Many of them are distrustful of Ukrainian nationalists, since some of them formed alliances with Nazi Germany during World War II.  Tatars, on the other hand, have no love for Russia; during World War II, Stalin deported many of them were deported en masse to Siberia and, since returning to Crimea, have little desire to become a part of Russia once again.  While most of the people on both sides have no desire for an armed conflict, small militant groups have been getting more and more active.  Pro-Russian groups have been creating “self-defense” units, while hard-line Cossack organizations, descended from the warriors who worked to expand and secure Russia’s borders, have no desire for peace.  While the Tatars are known to be peaceful, and have historically shown little interest in Islamic extremist movements, a small number of militant Tatars have started to talk about calling for a jihad.

No doubt, the protest’s religious undertones is disconcerting to the Russians, who have spent the past 20 years quelling Islamic separatist movements in the North Caucasus.  Since the ousting of Yanukovych, Putin has been ordering surprise military exercises on the Ukrainian border, furthering tensions between his country and the United States and betraying his desire to keep Ukraine under Russian influence.  It seems likely that Putin will stage a military intervention in Ukraine.  This expansionist policy, combined with the tensions in Crimea, pose two huge challenges that the new regime in Kiev has to face.

Yesterday, Russia’s military put tens of thousands of troops on Russia’s western border on alert for an exercise scheduled to last until March.  The Russian minister of defense also mentioned plans to tighten security at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, located in Crimea.  He insisted that Russia was only testing its military’s readiness to respond to a “crisis situation”, and not related to events in Ukraine.  In recent days, Russian military vehicles are making their presence felt on the streets of Crimea.  Road blocks flying Russian flags appeared on the main highways leading to Sebastopol, a Crimean city dominated by the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet.

While Russia prepared for possible military intervention in Ukraine, American Secretary of State John Kerry warned the Russians doing so would “cost them”.  Kerry also was considering offering Ukraine a $1 billion package of loan guarantees, as well as aid to the Ukrainian government, to help deal with the economic crisis.  So far, the Russians have yet to recognize the legitimacy of the new Ukrainian regime, denouncing their actions as “inflammatory and divisive”.  While Russian officials have been talking, however, Putin himself has yet to comment on the crisis.  However, the clamor of the ethnic Russian majority in eastern and southern Ukraine might lead Russia to intervene.