Echelon Ignite: Thailand kicked off today at Bangkok University with a load of successful entrepreneurs, aspiring small business owners and community leaders sharing their stories and inspiring the youth of Bangkok to get entrepreneurial.
Jakob Lykkegaard, founder of Pagemodo, a Facebook fan page service aimed at developing brand popularity, recounted the story of how he finally found success even though his technical skills weren’t as strong as many of his competitors. He launched fast, tested the market, and exited quickly. The main lessons learned we shared with the eager listeners, “Fake it until you make it, think only of the 80 percent, launch fast, be embarrassed, sell products, not time, avoid long lockdowns, sell to people that can teach (in terms of acquisition).”
Jakob’s advice was followed by the talk by Bjorn Lee on the collective power of startups and the way that a market that might seem flooded with startups might actually act as an “incubator” by connecting the right people for the right project.
One of the important things an entrepreneur must learn is to laugh in the face of failure. A good example of this would be Adrian Stewart’s Edgematrix, a project that had raised $22 million only to be sold for a single dollar. He discussed his current project, Loyalty In Motion, a cloud loyalty service, and shared some insight on what he thinks mobile developers should be cautious of issues such as “locked”app stores, an example being Google Map’s struggles with iOS and something he calls “Valley Politics,” a situation such as Twitter blocking integration features.
The conference is off to a fantastic start and we’re looking forward to hearing more tomorrow. Check back tomorrow for more updates!
