MEDL Tech - Company Blog

I’m not much for speculating on new products by Apple or any other company but just wanted to leave a comment about the new iPod touch.

There will be a new iPod touch. It only makes sense from Apple’s perspective. Now that they are in the chip design game they must have a ton of A4 chips that didn’t make the cut for iphone or ipad. This is typically how the chip game works. You design a chip, manufacturer it and you end up with defects. The perfectly fabricated chips get used for your top of the line products and then the imperfect chips get used for the lesser products. The defective chips could be slower chips, use less RAM, have less cache, etc. Intel does it, AMD does it and so does Nvidia. It makes sense.

So there’s no doubt that ever since ipad and iphone were announced with A4 processor, Apple’s probably been collecting a ton of imperfect A4 processors. You wouldn’t want to just throw away these chips so why not use them in the iPod touch? Down clock it to maybe 600MHz, turn off a few features and poof! You’ve got a new product. So the new iPod touch won’t come out until Apple knows they have enough chips to meet demand. Once they’ve stocked up enough then we’ll see the iPod touch become available. I’m not sure if the iPod touch will get the Retina Display. I don’t think they can get the prices low enough to validate it. iPhone still has shortages, I think that product line needs all the LCDs it can get.

I still like the iPod touch. I don’t think I’ll ever own the iPhone when I can get almost all the features I want from the iPod touch. I hate being tied down with a contract and it also gives me a chance to try out other cell phones.
I use my iPod touch when I’m commuting on the subway and when I’m sitting down for a longer periods of time I’ll use my iPad.

I thought I might share some things I’ve learned about referrals, whether it be for jobs, work, favors, etc.
Referrals are a tricky thing especially when it’s a friend asking for a referral to a job or for you to pull a few strings so that a certain “something” can happen. When someone makes a referral or recommendation for you, you’ve got a certain level of obligation to present yourself in a positive manner to the person you’re being referred to. By not “representing”, you make your friend look bad and he becomes at risk of losing that connection he used to help you in the first place.



Degrees of Referring



Obviously, referrals are not all equal. Some just help you get the foot in the door and others help you land that job.



Weak Referrals – With respect to yourself, weak referrals/links are the people that you’ve met briefly on the street, at work, at party etc. You have their contact info and if someone mentioned you they’d have to think about who you were. These kinds of relationships may help you get into the door but may have very little influence in the actually decision process. It could mean the difference between getting an interview and nothing, but it doesn’t help in actually getting the job.
It’s funny, some people make a living by exposing their network. During my startup, one guy approached us saying that he could help introduce us to some top VCs he “knew”. Sure he had their emails and stuff but he hardly knew these people or was in good standing with them. What was the catch? This guy wanted something like $5000 to perform non-refundable “due diligence” before he made the referral. You know what? I almost believed this guy until a friend helped out and actually called one of the people on the list that he knew personally. It’s a shame how people take advantage of those in need. (in this case the lowly entrepreneur)



Strong Referrals – Now these are people that you know personally and when you ask them to look at something they will look at it. Often you will ask your friend as a favor to look at something or maybe you say you’ll take them out for lunch. But these kinds of referrals get you somewhere. Because you have a strong relationship, you know not to waste each other’s time. If you did start wasting the other person’s time then the relationship weakens and your ability to refer has less strength. Strong referrals are made at your discretion, not everyone deserves them.

This leads to the the rules. (my rules)
Rules of Referring



1. Referrals are a privilege, not a right, even with good friends.
I have a story to illustrate. There’s a person I know who is older but well connected in the Bay Area. I’ve known him for about two years and have had numerous talks with him. For some reason it’s only recently that he chose to introduce me to some pretty strong connections he has. At first I thought, why couldn’t you have referred me to these people like 8 months ago when I first told you about my business?!? From my understanding, it seems he was waiting for me to take the necessary steps before he felt that I was worthwhile to introduce to the people he knew. I think he was right in waiting.



2. You can’t angry for someone who doesn’t want to refer you.
Referrals are always best when someone offers to refer you. Hopefully you shouldn’t have to ask for a referral because you put your friend in an awkward position if he doesn’t want to refer you. But there are times when you have to ask because your friends may not know how to help unless you ask them specifically. Like I mentioned in point #1, referrals are a privilege. E.g. We all have friends that are hecka lazy and you wouldn’t go referring them until they got their act together.



3. You must earn a referral
Adding to what I said previously, you need to do some work yourself. That may mean improving your resume, doing some research, etc. Basically if you can show that you’ve put some work into something, hopefully your friend will recognize it and be willing to help out. Some people have worked hard to get where they are now and if you want them to help you, they want to see you work hard too. (note: there’s a difference between working hard and suffering)



4. Referrals take time
Give it time, people who have authority are typically busy. Maybe they are figuring out how they can help before they decide to reply to you. You don’t really know what’s going on so be patient. But that being said, keep exploring other options and don’t rely solely one one referral.



Anyways, these are just some of my thoughts

Anyone who’s interested in meeting with me or interested in seeing a demo in person can find me in the Silicon Valley. That’s where I typically am. I’ll try to schedule you in, but I make no guarantees on my availability. Just contact me at info@medltech.com

thanks!
-eric

So let’s talk about networking. It’s a very strange organic concept. It constantly grows and changes as time goes by. You really never know where it will take you. Some days it will lead you to dead ends and other days it will branch out into multiple paths. Much like life, we must keep travelling along a certain path and just hope that the pot of gold is at the end of the path. When you get to a dead end, you have to turn around and just take a different path. The minute you decide to pitch a tent and smell the roses is when your journey takes a pause. Constantly moving is the life of the entrepreneur.


Often times you’ll approach an intersection that can branch into 50 different paths. You can only take one or maybe explore two or three. But you can’t explore all of them, this is often the temptation of networking. I’ve found that there are numerous opportunities out there in the Bay Area to network. You could basically go to a different networking event on everyday of the week. Some are free, some cost money. It’s good to try out a few of the paid events. It’ll give you a chance to meet other entrepreneurs and hear their sales pitch or just hear about whatever problems they might have. But these events are costly, it ranges from $15-20 per event, varying if you have membership with host organization or not. I really don’t understand how entrepreneurs can afford this. I guess there’s bills to be paid. Sometimes it’s nice to attend random networking events but for the most part you need to do some research and see if the event you’re attending are worth your time.


So I went to 2 paid events. I’m not sure if they were worth it. I met some other entrepreneurs and talked with one VC. It was my first taste of pitching to a VC. The VC didn’t really help that much, I think he just wanted to use me as an example for other entrepreneurs to prove a few points about starting a business. So the advice was very non-specific. It’s interesting how VCs will always be very critical about your business idea but they always try to end on a good note. Despite how crazy your idea might be, there’s the slight chance that you will become successful and they want to make sure you’ll consider them for future rounds of funding. Speaking of which, VCs hate being the first person to invest, despite the possible high return they always want someone else to take the first step in investing.


Anyways, back to networking. I think I’ve collected about 50+ different business cards from actual talks and meetings. I don’t think it’s a lot but it’s not small. I have around 2-3 meetings a week to pitch my idea or just to talk with industry experts. As tiring it might be to do networking, it can also be fun. You never know who you’ll meet and who you’ll get introduced to. I’m amazed how nice people are in general. There’s a lot of people out there willing to help out the small guy. It seems like everyone I’ve met wants to see the small guy succeed. Despite the fact that the person I talk with may get no monetary benefit from helping out, they still find joy in helping someone else succeed. I’d like to think that this is the case in other parts of the world (or US), but that probably isn’t true.


So one of the most recent people I’ve talked to was a friend of a friend of a friend. (3 degrees if your counting). I almost didn’t talk to the 2nd degree person because he explicitly said he couldn’t help but was willing to hear my idea. I really didn’t feel like talking to him either because I didn’t want to waste my time talking with someone who couldn’t be of help. But it turns out this guy may be the most crucial person I’ve talked with. After I talked with him on the phone he decided to refer me to another friend that he thought could help. I guess he wanted to talk to me first before he referred me. Anyways, I talked to his friend and she has been amazingly helpful. Btw, she is the first woman I’ve talked with. Apparently she is well connected in the startup world and she doesn’t even work in a startup. She just knows these people. It was funny, while I was talking with her, she was just constantly scribbling down names of people that would be interested in hearing about my idea or people that could help. And slowly she’s been introducing me to these different people on her list. And she just does this out of the goodness of her heart, well that and she likes my product. If people like your product, they will go out of their way to help you succeed.


The other day, I was reading an article about video graphics and saw the usual quotes from industry experts. I decided to lookup one of the industry experts on Linkedin. He was connected to someone I had met at a previous networking event, so I decided to send an email to the industry expert and see what would happen. I didn’t expect much, but low and behold he replied in a few days. We met up and he loved my idea as well. He said he would help introduce me to people if I wanted the help. I haven’t taken him up on the offer yet, but only because I’m Canada right now. Soon as I get back to California I’ll probably taking him up on his offer. Oh, so apparently when you get referred to someone, you need to reply or be ready to meet them as soon as possible. As soon as possible meaning in the next few days, not next week. I talked to the industry expert on a Wednesday, I told him I’d be flying back to Toronto on Saturday. He asked if I could fly to LA before I went to Toronto! You think he was trying to help the airline industry or something. But that makes me wonder, perhaps in the future I will have to do these last minute flights to “wherever”.


Well anyways…these are just a few thoughts on networking. The main point is, keep talking to people regardless of how crappy or depressed you feel about the business. Anyone willing to listen to you, you should talk with them. You don’t know if the next person you talk with could be the person that could make everything happen. They might have a rich uncle some where, could be close friends with Mark Zuckerberg(of facebook fame) or maybe their dad knows Bill Gates. As ludicrous as this may sound, it can happen. Hang in there.

It’s strange. I’m starting to get a lot of pressure to make this company successful. Although it’s not really bad pressure, it’s kind of positive pressure if you wanna call it that. These days people really want me to succeed. Despite all the criticisms that I get from people, the same people hope that things will still work out. So now I feel like I need to keep persevering. Not because I need to fulfill other people’s expectations but because people believe in me and share in the same vision.


I met with a big company yesterday. The person I was meeting with gave me some harsh remarks (which is ok) but then commended me on what I’m trying to do and said “you cannot fail”. Strong yet effective words.


So this is something I learned from an MBA class about leadership. It’s was taken from a TED presentation about success. I’m finding all the 8 tips are essentially for a startup to succeed.
The Keys to success: (”The 8 to be Great”)





Passion – Do it for love not money.
Work – All successful people work really hard. Successful people have fun working.
Focus – Dabbling is ok at first but eventually you need to focus.
Push – Continue to push yourself, push through shyness and self-doubt.
Ideas – Everybody is creative. Listen to people. Be curious. Look around. Write it Down.
Improve – Continuous to improve. Practice, practice, practice.
Serve – Serve others something of value
Persist – Persist through time, no overnight success. Persist through failure and CRAP (Criticism Rejection Adversity Prejudice)