News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on /story/32362. Parent comment

Re: by albrecht on Tuesday July 03, 2007 @08:57PM (#32395)
I thought this was a good article but one of your points touches on one of the reasons why purely engineer-driven start-ups fail: no business sense. I agree that the MBA-types need to stay away from the engineers on a day-to-day basis, but I've seen too many start-ups shoot themselves in the foot because they launch a product without any market research and no understanding of how to make partnerships that will help them scale.

Good luck with whatever you do next.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by staunch on Tuesday July 03, 2007 @09:48PM (#32397)
...why purely engineer-driven start-ups fail: no business sense.

I'm not sure how you managed to draw that conclusion. His bonus point is that the CTO didn't even do work, that's hardly engineer-driven. And they had a Stanford MBA, who was apparently a drain during product development.

Most successful technology startups are engineer-driven. Google is the ultimate example of just how far a couple engineers can go without any "business sense".

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by especkman on Wednesday July 04, 2007 @05:31AM (#32448)
Who was it at Google who had the sense to clone Overture's business model, I wonder.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by nickb on Friday July 06, 2007 @12:35AM (#32708)
It was Omid. He put his job on the line and the company when he bet on AdWords.

http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html#omid

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by albrecht on Wednesday July 04, 2007 @12:07PM (#32469)
An MBA. The average MBA isn't the kind of person you want, but a really bright MBA can be a game changer if they stay out of your hair.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by paul on Wednesday July 04, 2007 @03:59PM (#32497)
Nope. Also, it's not a clone in any meaningful sense.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by far33d on Thursday July 05, 2007 @11:58AM (#32600)
AdWords was invented by Eric Veach, formerly of Pixar, wasn't it?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by paul on Friday July 06, 2007 @03:17AM (#32729)
What does it mean to invent a product? Adwords is just a name. The actual system was built and rebuilt and improved many times. Eric did do a lot to make it a success though -- he's part of the reason why Google makes so much more money than Yahoo.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re: by far33d on Friday July 06, 2007 @03:50PM (#32831)
I guess I was saying invent as in "came up with the thing that differentiates it from everything else out there" - in this case, the auction system.
[ Parent | on HN ]