The experience of an international student

I'm taking couple venture capital related classes this semester and find the field amazingly interesting. It gets more interesting when I relate it to what I'm doing now, because the role I'm currently playing as a strategic buyer could well be competing with VCs for investment opportunities in startups, or the people VCs eventually sell their investments to.

I recently had an opportunity to sit at a roundtable discussion and hear VC/PE partners talk about various issues, thanks to lecturer Goldberg. During the discussion, one VC mentioned his fund recently invested in a temporary staffing startup on the creative side, ie, people who create the commercials you have to watch before watching an episode of CSI Miami online. I was shocked again. This time not one second, but one full minute. Because I know VCs only invest in the most innovative, the most unique companies in the world, like Aerogel (mentioned in my last post) or Hotmail back in 1996 when there was no free web-based email services. On the other hand, since my company is in the temp staffing industry, I know it's one of the most established, most slow-moving, most saturated, most boring industries in the country. Yet you take the last industry a VC would consider, and give it some untraditional applications, it becomes a brand new thing full of potential. Or put it in more mainstream business buzzwords, you just created a blue ocean.

Lessons learned: you don't have to invent the next nylon, find a drug that cures cancer, or create the replacement for email to achieve real innovation. Ideas could come from anywhere around you, you just need to think: what are the unfulfilled needs and how can I fill the gap?

To start with, here's an idea I have: I find it quite annoying when I'm sitting in a classroom and hear a dozen people punching the keyboards of their laptops. So can PC makers design a quiet keyboard that target students and business people? Is it technologically achievable? Is there a market for it? Are there any other markets with similar demands?