Back from Puerto Rico to...Florida?

Yes, that's right! I am back from Puerto Rico where Esopo Learning had a warm and enthusiastic welcome from family, friends and professional acquaintances interested in the project. In fact, it is very possible that I will be collaborating with some of them in the creation of future content and prducts, but we better leave that undisclosed for now. Like we say in the island, when you talk too much about things that you wish for but haven't happened yet, those things "se salan" meaning that they get "salted" or jinxed. So here goes my superstitious anti-jinx and prayers that many more things will happen in the upcoming year!

As for the return, you may not know that I have recently moved and instead of going to my usual home in Maryland, I will now be leaving in the sad, unfortunate-looking place in the picture below. Please don't feel sorry for me!

Joke aside, moving to Fort Lauderdale Florida is a great professional opportunity for me on many fronts. On one hand, I will be working for a great education tech company where I not only expect to learn a lot, but also to contribute a great deal. One the other, I will be part of the vibrant Hispanic community of South Florida, where products like Esopo Learning Media's Spanish vocabulary apps for children are needed and demanded the most. I hope to begin promoting the new app Los Colores, and continue developing this project further in this valuable market. If you have any ideas or contacts that my be of help, I am all ears...it's always a little difficult trying to get settled in a new town but with a little help of friends I'm sure Fort Lauderdale will be a great home for my personal and professional aspirations.

See you in the Sunshine State!

Esopo Learning in Puerto Rico

I am happy to bring my new Spanish language learning app to family and friends in Puerto Rico. Next week I will be there promoting Esopo Learning Media...and generally just hanging out with the people I love. Fine.

What? You don't have the app yet? Go get it at: http://itunes.com/apps/loscolores.

That you don't have a child or iPhone/iPad to play it on? Then support this great project by buying a T-Shirt at: http://www.cafepress.com/EsopoShop

Also, we will soon be recording a promo video for the app so stay tuned for that as well!

Esopo Learning Media's Los Colores is LIVE

Done! Well...ok., I'm still adjusting a few things with the iTunes App Store icon but aside from that Los Colores, the first app released by my production company Esopo Learning Media, is LIVE and ready to be downloaded at: http://itunes.com/apps/loscolores.

Right now it is selling for just $1.99 so tell your mom/dad friends and give it a try! This app is a lot of fun and a nice educational game to carry in your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad if you have a child between the ages of 2 and 8. Of course, I created the app so I love it. It's probably not perfect and I definitely will have a lot to learn in order to continue producing more and better educational apps in the future but I trust that customer feedback will be one of my best allies in that process. Here is a brief description of the app but you can learn more about this project which I hope brings more options and innovation to the Spanish interactive education space, at: http://www.esopolearning.com/

Esopo Learning Media presents Los Colores, a fun and engaging way for your child to learn colors in Spanish. This app counts with the following features:

• Aprende (Learn) Module- Friendly cartoon clips will teach your child the correct pronunciation and spelling of colors in Spanish while associating each word with an easy-to-remember scenario. The combination of association and full immersion is one of the keys to learning languages at an early age, yet Los Colores is the only app on the market making full use of this necessary tool for early childhood education.

• Juega (Play) Module- A simple video game of “find the colors” will reinforce the lessons learned in the Aprende Module encouraging your child to find and point out colors in Spanish wherever he or she goes!

Tech Valuation Musical Chairs Game

Who will lose his chair (or should we say shirt) this time?

G+ via Mashable published this fascinating info graphic of social media valuations last week. It is meant to create a debate over whether or not there is a valuation bubble in the social media startup space. From this graph we can observe that only Skype appears to be more or less reasonably valuated (based on its latest Microsoft acquisition) at a ~10x of revenue, considering that it is a company that has been around for a while with a growing customer base and a realistic business model.

The others? Well, we can observe an average of ~40X or revenue. This is of course, if we begin by ignoring those companies that have $0 revenue, zero business model and tens of millions in VC valuations, making their valuation multiples incomprehensible. Um...sorry, I meant to say "infinite". In other words, either VC's know something that the rest of us don't know about the ability of these social media giants to turn user bases into cold hard cash OR yes, we are experiencing a bubble where the oh-so-1999 term of "eyeballs" has been replaced by the apparently hip and cool "users".

It is hard to tell right now but if these valuations turn out to be nothing more than a musical chairs game (where everyone is betting to be the last one sitting when the fun melody stops playing) we can only hope that all these minds and money have at least created some technology of value for society as a whole. Isn't that what this is all about? It should be.

It is easy to get carried away by the market and keep betting up just because everyone else is doing so. What the rest of us must not forget is the relative value of a project in terms of its real outcomes. What problems are these start-ups solving for us? (By the way, I thought this was the VC mantra) How will they change our world for the better? Are they in fact more valuable than life-saving advancements or green tech? Maybe those are hard or unfair questions to ask given that this is a completely different industry but they make perfect sense to me. Social media tech is valuable technology (I am the first one to say it since it has been most of my career) but we should nevertheless put it into perspective with the value it brings to our society.

So what? Their money, their loss right? True. But money wasted in fluff is money that is inefficiently spent on bad projects while drying out potential investments in other needed areas of our society. In an ideal world, financial value should reflect social value. It is too sad that we live in a time where some of the most needed advancements for human kind are deemed unprofitable (laking the sexy high X's) and so we are left funding the glitter and candy stores. Enjoy the fun birthday party while it lasts and the music still plays! Then again, I may be completely wrong and color.com IS life-saving stuff...heck for $41 Million, it may be the reinvention of color itself.

Educational App Research...Results!

Thank you to everyone that participated or helped me spread the survey link for my educational app research among parents. The results are in and although I still have to draft the final report I can already tell you they are pretty exciting and interesting.

First, it looks like educational toys have an edge over mobile apps when it comes to parents' willingness to pay over time and their perception of value. Android apps may not be worth the development costs for many in this vertical and if you are licensing characters, you may be better off creating a full Web-based educational video game. That and much more...

Unfortunately, I can't give everything away at this point because a) I still need to analyze results further and b) results may depend on factors very particular to your app. So, if you are a developer of educational apps and wish to know how much they are worth, contact me. I'll be happy to share my results with you and they may serve you well. I am also consulting for other app developers in verticals outside of education and refining the method to work well for other industries, so contact me even if your app falls within different market. I can help you figure out the value of your app via value-based tools and statistical analysis.

You know where I'll be!

Reneida

An Exercise on Perseverance

In almost all of the conferences, seminars, forums and other gatherings I have attended in the past few years, the same question always seem to pop up from someone in the audience. The question, always directed to the "successful" business person or entrepreneur in the panel goes something like: "What does it take to make it? How did you attain X?". And the presenter, almost invariably will mention (while fighting a pressed need to appear humble despite his or her hero status) a dozen values or so to aspire to. The interesting thing is that about 90% of the time you will hear perseverance among that select set.

But how do you prepare for perseverance? How do you exercise such a thing when you already feel that you are trying hard enough? I have found the answer to be first, very personal and second, relative. It is relative because we persevere in relation to ourselves, our own concepts of "trying hard enough" and our self imposed limits and not those of others. It is personal because only we know the remedy to our lack of perseverance. So there is no point in sharing magic formulas for perseverance because what it takes to keep on rolling despite the punches will be unique to each one of us anyway.

For me, exercising perseverance takes exercising...literally! Working out has become more of a mental routine than a physical one. Jumping on a treadmill and marking 25 minutes of running is always a mental challenge against marking 15. Forcing myself to stay on it through the "mountain trail" as opposed to the "forest walk" mode is an internal conflict every single time. Yet I do it and every once in a while (if I'm feeling really inspired to exercise perseverance) I'll add another 2 or 3 extra minutes to the count once I find myself in the last minute of the run. I try to do that with every machine or routine: add extra minutes/repetitions once I'm just about to complete the original objective. That is the key for me. Because so may times in life we set ourselves timetables and goals only to find them delayed or suddenly unreachable just when we were a hair away from getting there.

We all have objectives and most of us work hard toward them but real perseverance is staying on life's "treadmill" for the extra two minutes it throws at you just when you thought you were about to prepare for a nice and easy cool-down. Reflecting on this fact and living it every time I go to the gym is my personal exercise on perseverance, so that I am not caught off-guard when it turns out that I have to work out even harder (whether in life or in business) than I had originally envisioned.

Last night I watched a very nice French movie, "Fauteuils d'Orchestre" or "Orchestra Seats" (although for some unexplainable reason they translated it to "Avenue Montaigne" for the American market) that among some other topics, brushed on the theme of people's perception of perseverance. Without ruining the story for you I will leave you with the movie's closing statement, which meant so much to me, in the hopes that you'll pick it up and watch it someday:

"You have to take risks Jessica. I pushed my way in and you know, Jessica, I had a wonderful life."

What is your exercise on perseverance?

Educational App Research

What have I been doing for almost a month? Well...besides celebrating my April birthday, I have been working hard on the last few weeks of my academic life, as I prepare to graduate with an MBA from University of Maryland in May. Most of you know that of course, BUT in case that you are new and have no idea what all my supposedly "hard work" entails, I'll just mention that among other things, I am running an independent study on educational mobile apps for young children.

If you are a parent or grandparent of young children (0-8yrs) and would like to cooperate with my graduation cause, here's a link to the survey!

http://alexandra.bmgt.umd.edu/SSI/

I will be taking down the survey after May 4th so please fill it out or send to someone who this week. Thanks in advance!

Thoughts from the 2011 Latin American Business Conference at Wharton

First of all forgive the late summary, as this conference happened almost a week ago (March 25-16) but for a diverse number of reasons it has taken me 4+ days to sit down calmly to put my thoughts into paper. With that said, congratulations to the organizing committee of the Latin American Business conference at UPenn for an outstanding job bringing in top speakers, resources and a bright audience to make the event a success after a 5 year hiatus. As a fellow MBA student at Maryland I am impressed and can only hope that we are equally successful in our plans to create a similar event in the DC Area. (More info about those plans will be provided in a future post)

So without much more talk, here's what happened:

Alvaro Uribe and the Three Pillars of Progress: The Wharton conference included a key note speech by the former President of Colombia, Alvaro Uribe, who spoke about the success of his economic policies in the country and how they may apply to other countries in the region. He shared with the audience what he believes to be the secret sauce of the turn-around: security, social cohesiveness, and the universal inclusive right to private property. Sure, there was a lot of political ramble in his speech (after all, he IS a politician) but ignoring the attacks to the left and justification of some questionable past policies, he brought an interesting approach to the "Latin America Problem". He avoided the overused references to corruption that some other experts use to easily dismiss the issues of the region and went deeper into the conversation, emphasizing the importance of building internal security as a means to:

1. Attract investment

2. Retain talent (avoiding the brain drain or emigration of talented professionals due to the threat of crime and instability)

3. Set the base for Social Cohesiveness

This third outcome of "Social Cohesiveness" comes from the investment in education, culture and the arts once the country has been stabilized from the first issue of security. Social Cohesiveness builds on the country's identity and reinforces people's trust in their government. This confidence in turn encourages people to invest their lives in that place, taking advantage of the educational and legal provisions established to start their own businesses and acquire property. Mr. Uribe made a strong case for the reformation of legal and government institutions to promote business efficiency. He also advocated the creation of equal playing fields (legaly and socially speaking) to make private property and the pursuit of entrepreneurial ambitions an inclusive right of all citizens as opposed to an exclusive right of the few able to navigate the system through power and connections.

I definitely connected with this message although slightly disagreeing on the relationship between security and education. While in Uribe's view of the world (probably influenced by the special and extreme case of Colombian violence in past decades) security must be implemented first to attain cohesiveness, I would make the case that these need to be implemented in a parallel way for most other countries in Latin America. After all, most violent groups grow and recruit their followers by taking advantage of ignorance and the lack of opportunities. Therefore security cannot just be about getting rid of the completely rotten apples but rescuing as many people as possible and winning minds with education and access to a decent life. By the way, this is where I believe most left vs right arguments clash in every country in the world.

Panels

There were several other keynote speakers that although outstanding are probably not worth writing about since either a) I missed their sessions or b) I did not find them particularly enlightening. In any case, one could choose to attend 2 out of 4 different panels and I chose to attend: "Keys to Success in Latin America" and "Private Equity in Latin America". I can probably summarize the take-aways from both in the following points.

• While Brazil is growing rapidly, it is not the only success story. Other countries such as Chile, Colombia and Argentina are proving to be successful players as well. As a whole, professional opportunities in the region look better than ever for the educated worker.
• The Private Equity industry is alive and well in most of the region thanks to unprecedented government interest/incentives in developing their home-grown enterprises.
• Most private equity takes the form of venture capital and growth capital in a variety of industries, not just tech. Because of the growth stage of these markets, there has not been an appetite or pressing need for investment in distressed companies.
• A large amount of VC investment in the region goes to buying out medium sized family-owned businesses to help them grow to the next level. 3x returns are common.
• There is an increasing amount of Asian investment in the region. Chinese investors in particular are looking to South America in search of resources/inputs for their operations back home.
• Although the majority of VC funding comes from foreign investors, a series of government policies are encouraging regional pension funds and wealthy individuals who used to place their money abroad, to reinvest their money in local funds. This is a great sign for a region that has traditionally seen capital come in but ultimately exit to investors in other countries, leaving too little lasting impact behind.
• We cannot claim total success in a country's economy (regardless of returns) if the majority of the country is still in poverty. Ultimately this situation breeds discontent, inequality and instability. Fostering a middle calls and spreading out opportunities across all social sectors is vital in the long run.
• Personal Business Take: Latin America must be careful about the protection of its resources. International capital is a welcome blessing but could be a curse if the right laws and regulations are not put in place. A potential "economic gold rush" could once again make the region vulnerable to interests that reside outside the region without regard to the infrastructure and healthy progress of its people. The best thing to do is balance international investment with regional/local investment that keeps an interest in the long term well being of each country.
• Personal Political Take: International capital is capricious and frankly could not care less about democracy. It will make investment decisions (rating national bonds, injecting/extracting money in local businesses, etc.) that will affect the well being of the country and a government's ability to implement policy. Yet, these decisions are likely to have nothing to do with the "right thing to do" and be all about returns and what candidate is most likely to implement business-friendly policies. A country may in fact be doomed by simply electing the wrong person (from an investor's perspective) via a democratic process and wake up the day after the vote to a market downgrade. If that is the case, international capital will make the life of that country impossible, effectively sabotaging the country's progress until the next election where people will presumably elect the right person for the job. Everyone will then praise that right person for magically obtaining better bond ratings and analyst reports by the next day without hardly lifting a finger. Their overnight success will be solely due to projecting what the markets ironically refer to as confidence. That's the sad state of the globalized economy that we live in. That's why I am all for well regulated capitalism, with leaders that have enough character to resist these pressures (that arise in every country, developed and developing) without going crazy. I hope that Latin America finds those leaders and keeps them...just not for more than a decade each. That's another story...

Beyond the Business Idea

I have always been a pretty creative person, the type that comes up with good quality ideas on a regular basis whether they are entrepreneurial, social or artistic in nature. However, something that I have found out throughout my MBA experience (via classes, working for a VC fund and engaging with entrepreneurship veterans) is that good ideas aren't enough. Why? Because everyone can get to them even if not as frequently as "creative people" do. Furthermore, with a little help, research and guidance from the pros one can turn an average non-earth-shattering idea into something workable and maybe even special.

So the key is not just in THE IDEA or even in the grand strategy but in their neglected, unsexy cousin: EXECUTION. Being able to deliver and get to the first, second, third and subsequent steps of turning what's in your head into a reality is maybe more important. That is what people ultimately see and experience because nobody can visualize, hear or smell your good intentions. Maybe that is the reason why I recently lost the Pitch Dingman Competition to an idea that seemed rather mundane but with a team that was all set to deliver on it as fast as yesterday. Will they succeed? Maybe not. But just because they are closer to trying it out they will get more immediate attention.

While disappointing, I see this setback more as a lesson than a defeat. I see it as a challenge to just do it, go for it and don't even ask for permission. I will have to organize intelligently to implement, produce and deliver beyond the "grand plan" and into tangible reality. I will need to prove that I can make things happen without giving up. That takes time and attention to detail. That takes effort and emotional stamina. But I have to firmly believe that whatever it takes...I have the chance and ability to obtain it.

Stay tuned. It is a process.

Location, Location, Lo...Never Mind

Where will you live the day that location ceases to matter in your work, career or educational choice? That day is coming, so start thinking about it.

I left Puerto Rico when I was 18, with exactly 2 checked in bags and the inspiration to attend college in what was then (and still is) one of the best Undergraduate Marketing programs in the U.S. So I went to University of Florida where to my surprise, some of the largest core courses in the curriculum were already recorded or streamed online so you would not need to attend the classroom. Upon graduation, I moved to a different town in South Florida to pursue what became my first marketing job, only to find myself moving (again) 2 years later to be with my now husband, who had just found a great career opportunity in Maryland. None of us had lived there before or knew anyone in that state but we figured it was a good move.

Three years later, now as a graduating MBA student, I see many on my peers taking off and making big moves across the nation and even the World to pursue their dreams: taking specialized positions in particular companies and industries. In fact, there is a chance that I may be doing the same soon, but that is not the point. The point is that in a few decades, this career-shaped-lifestyle of moving where the action is and that has popularized such terms as long-distance relationship, may come to an end or at least, a slow down.

The following articles and online resources may give you a taste of the future that I am talking about:

1) K-12 Education: http://www.fastcompany.com/1728471/change-generation-bill-gates-favorite-teacher-wants-to-disrupt-education

• Imagine a K-12 education turned up-side down. Lectures/lessons are taken at home (as homework) and class time is used for 1-on-1 tutoring and assistance with practice exercises. Since the lectures are online, they can be standardized across a state or even the nation so all children see the same teacher in front of the board via videos. What would that do to our All-American obsession to find THE best school district for our children? It may not disappear it, but may decrease its influence factor.

2) Higher Education: http://academicearth.org/

• What if you could attend Ivy League courses while staying in your hometown University? Would you be interested in the opportunity to save on living expenses, staying at home and telecommuting while participating of an equally prestigious curriculum? If so, what would that do to the large amount of higher education institutions out there and their mission? Would they form virtual consortium's or partnerships to share materials/resources, decrease expenses and focus on research and other activities? This is sort of a chain reaction type of thing, where we would have to figure out what the university of the future looks like.

3) Work: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/digitalnation/

• Sure, you can stay at home and work. In fact, for most office jobs today you could work from wherever you would like given the amount of collaboration and virtualization tools emerging. The trick is that you will also be competing for that job against people from EVERYWHERE, not just those willing to live in Maryland. In other words, you will have to be better than your neighbor and all those "other" guys sitting in Asia, Europe, Latin America, etc. We are already seeing this more and more, but it will only continue to grow and further influence how we perceive the job market.

So what will this mean? Among all sorts of macro-economic phenomena that can result from lifestyle virtualization (effects of decreased immigration and widespread outsourcing) we will see a new way of perceiving our communities and the places we live in. Cities will need to strive for much more than attracting office jobs and big companies. They will need to focus on creating healthy and attractive living environments for recreation and social life once education and work places become more flexible.

Obviously, not everything will change. You cannot virtualize agriculture, waste management, energy production, etc. However, for the rest of us sitting in front of a desk and a computer, life will never be the same. Where will you live the day your company/school stops influencing your geographic location?

Pitch Dingman Competition Rescheduled

Due to Maryland weather conditions (snow) and power outages in the area, the Pitch Dingman competition where I was supposed to present Esopo Learning Media tomorrow has been rescheduled to February 25.

I was extremely excited about taking on this opportunity tomorrow and getting started on new projects for the company in 2011 so needless to say this is tough. In any case, I know this is all for the better. Maybe the extra time will allow me to practice more, get some additional outside advice and ensure a victory on February. Who knows? Only God, I guess. "Paciencia y fe" like they say in "In the Heights"...

Thank you to all those who have supported me so far and were thinking of attending tomorrow. I apologize for the inconvenience and hope you can still make it for the new date!

Pitching Dingman this Friday

For those of you living/working/spending time in the DC Area this Friday. I will be pitching my business idea (that is actually a business in progress already) at the Pitch Dingman Competition of the University of Maryland. If you would like to know more about me or my business come out and support my presentation in front of experienced investors!!

There will be an audience award based on popular votes, so let's make sure that it goes to Esopo Learning Media. Be there! Here's the info:

When: January 28, 2010 @ 11am (It will only last one hour)

Where: 1505 Van Munching Hall, University of Maryland College Park

For those of you who will not be able to make it, I'll let you know how it goes on my next post. Thanks in advance for your support.

*UPDATE 1/27/11- The competition has been changed to room 1412 of Van Munching Hall.

Magazines 3.0 Continued

Well, it has taken me a loooong time to follow up the last blog, but please stand by me as I get used to the idea of doing this regularly. In any case, as promised here are a few thoughts regarding the possibility of new revenue models for online magazines, namely pay-per-section/pay-per-column, mixed premium content.

The Problem: For those who need a refresher on why I am questioning the present model to begin with, it is not just about the decreasing revenue and returns of the industry as a whole making this issue evident. No- It is about the convenience that as a consumer of content I would get of making my own premium-content magazine subscription out of only those sections/keywords that I actually care about from existing sources. Don't we do that with CD's now, as in pay-per-track instead of per album? Haven't we been doing this with free content via RSS feeds and Twitter for a long time now? These days online, we simply consume content by unit and pushing the old bundling trick to consumers may be asking too much.

The discussion: I think it is important first and foremost important to make a distinction between free content and premium content. People will always, invariably refuse to pay for what they can already get legally for free somewhere else. Therefore, when I talk about magazine content, I am not talking about those articles that editors already give away for free online. Many good, smart conversations have spiraled around that type of content towards a dead end. (Thanks to Kevin Li for the tip via Brazen Careerist BTW) I am talking about the premium content: industry reports, special reports and subscription-only sections that people cannot access for free. I am talking about that 18% of content that people are already paying for online and that would likely be higher if pay-per-section options existed. (See: R. Marya's Mashable post "65% of Internet Users Paid for Digital Content"). Subscriptions (bundled options) would not need to disappear either. Those will always be attractive to a portion of the population and a smart pricing policy would give bundling discounts to this consumer segment of subscribers, while pay-per-section people (just like pre-paid mobile phone users) would pay a slightly higher price per unit in exchange for their lack of commitment.

The Barriers: People point out to a variety of barriers to this model, mostly around consumer behavior. "Readers do not know what they want to read so you cannot pre-filter news for them" some say. Ask that to StumbleUpon maybe? But without sarcasm, you can actually build a system (much like the paid content of today) where readers get to see a small portion of the article only and choose whether or not they want to see the rest. "Do you want to read it all? No problem, it will only be 25 cents"...or whatever price is right. In my opinion, the biggest hurdle to this model is actually on the supply side. People will want a centralized location to pick sections from different magazines and other publications and pull them all into one personalized queue, much like they get to do on Netflix or iTunes. And, just like iTunes discovered, the biggest challenge to this is getting all the publishers of content to agree on their distribution platform and pricing model.

By the way, has Apple done this yet? Maybe they have and I just don't know about it. I would not put it past them, especially after their incursion into the publishing world with the iPad. Now that I think about it, they may very well be heading the way of the pay-per-section model to un-bundle and disrupt yet another media form. We are just waiting for them to announce it any day soon.