Something Ventured:
December 22nd, 2003
By Brent
Holliday
Greenstone
Venture Partners
It's
the time of year to have a smile on your face, so I
thought I'd break from the ordinary this week. With
apologies to Weird Al Yankovic, I thought I'd try a
little creative lyricism with some of my favourite
Yuletide tunes. You may have noticed my passion for
music and especially the lyrics, so it's only natural
that I try and re-write a few of my own.
Here's
how it works. In your head, you have to think about the
song "Let It Snow", picture me in a velour
jacket behind a piano in a smoky bar and then read the
words below:
Oh,
the last few years were frightful
But '04 looks so delightful
The economy is on a roll
Let it grow, let it grow, let it grow
Good jobs, they were a-dropping
Forced engineers to slop at Burger King
Now the resumes are starting to flow
Let it grow, let it grow, let it grow
Well we finally got it right
After three years of real bombs
'Cause the money got really tight
As we all shook off our dotcoms
Now the NASDAQ is surely climbing
IPOs, they won't be denying
What a great time to be CEO
Let it grow, let it grow, let it grow
Now,
think of the jingling sounds of a horse drawn sleigh and
to the tune of "Walking In A Winter
Wonderland", read these lyrics:
Hey
Paul Martin, are you listening
On your laurels, don't be resting
The future's in sight, if you do it right
Making tech grow across the land
Gone away is Jean Chretien
His policies we won't mention
We can't carry on, the way we did with Jean
Making tech grow across the land
To stimulate you could do some tax cuts
And make sure that R&D was really strong
Your peers might say that you've gone nuts
Just say it was your plan all along
Later on, it won't be dire
When technology is on fire
Cause you faced unafraid, the plans that we made
Making tech grow across the land
Finally,
think of warm fires, stiff egg-nog and the crooning tune
of "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas"
and read this:
Have
yourself so very little work stress
It's not worth the fight
Look at what we've been through
Makes your jaw real tight
Have yourself so very little work stress
Make all the effort pay
From now on real profits
Will make the pain go away
Never again
As in dotcom days
Happy gold rush days
Of yore
Working stupid hours
Counting all our stock
Watching their worth
Go through the floor
Now that your goals are somewhat modest
You're not a billionaire
Get out and enjoy a life in BC now
And have yourself so very little work stress, eh?
Letters
From Last Time -
Stop the presses... I was wrong. Never happened before.
Ahem. Turns out that a few of the HR departments around
the lower mainland were awake and did see my
guesstimates at local employment in the last column, How
The Mighty Have Survived.
Creo employs about 1,500 people locally, not the 2,000
previously reported. That still has them number one as
Crystal was also slightly less than the nearly 1,500. I
was told that Crystal employs about 1,350 here. Also, I
had it pointed out to me that the Nortel operations in
Richmond have pretty much evaporated and that they
should have been in the Going, Going, Gone list with
about 150 jobs.
I regret the errors, but knew that my guesses based on
annual reports, press releases and web sites might be
off a bit.
What Do You Think? Talk
Back To Brent Holliday
Something Ventured is a bi-weekly column designed
to supplement the T-Net British Columbia web site with
some timely, relevant and possibly irreverent insight
into the industry. I hope to share some of the
perspective and trends that I see in my role as a VC.
The column is always followed by feedback (if its
positive or constructive. I'll keep the flames to
myself, thanks).
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