Re: UKNM: Three cheers Amazon UK

[Aidan Cook]

> Stefan Magdalinski wrote:

> 

> > Re: VC stuff

> > If I remember rightly, this was all there when it was plucky UK-startup

> > BookPages. As was the vastly superior(to amazon US) search capabilities.

> > But would anyone invest in them in the UK?

> 

> Well that's the point, isn't it? Bookpages was distinctly undercapitalised,

> thanks to UK VC's being a useless bunch. Their MD was actually turned down

> by one VC on the grounds that "we've already invested in an internet

> company"...

> 

> Ian Betteridge  News Editor, MacUser UK


This maybe terribly naive, but if somebody in the UK has a good enough

idea, then what is to stop them going to get capital from the US, where by

all accounts the streets are paved with it? Why didn't bookpages get over

there and insist that they could be a european Amazon if properly backed?


For the record, its a lot harder to get VC in the north of the UK than it

is in the SE - doesn't make it impossible to set up a business though

(although it may be that a lot more people in the south lose their cash on

1/2-baked ideas). You go where the money is, and then bring it on home.