Let's round up the stuff we're seeing:
1. Social is completely and totally over funded to the point of lunacy, but monster companies are emerging. Will they consolidate and swallow up smaller players? Someone will need to. This space needs to cool down a little and come back to earth. Facebook at $70B pre? Hope it works! Google has no response to Facebook, Microsoft still clueless, etc. We're rooting for them.
2. Green is changing quickly. Biofuel exits surprised everyone and are providing very good returns for patient investors like KV and Braemar, Lightspeed, KP, TPG, etc. But all we see now are capital efficient plays. We see half a dozen IPO's coming that are pretty exciting companies but new financings look more venture appropriate. Power electronics, plug load power, thermo electrics, consumer related technologies, etc. seem to be getting all the attention. That's good because we can hire killer technology people to run these companies as they're getting bored with traditional technology plays.
3. Virtualization continues to be a monster, so is cloud in general. Next wave is cloud security. Cloud enablement architectures in place now. But security is a gaping hole. Watch for a couple of big security exits in the next six months to renew excitement on the space. Our favorite companies are Tintri, Citrix, Riverbed and a handful of startups. So much room here it's not even funny.
So what's next? We have very cool companies like Weatherbill emerging. Exotic looking plays attacking old and inefficient categories. Saw a company in the food space yesterday that looks quite interesting. The adventure continues.
