Today, I had (very) early breakfast with a long time friend of mine who has been an entrepreneur for about a year now. I happen to own 5% of the (non tech-related) venture, which he kindly granted me for having provided the actual business idea about one and a half year ago. So after updating me, my friend quite naturally asked for feedback. On the one hand, I believe entrepreneurs are heroes (that I’m jealous of) & that I don’t have the experience it takes to challenge them. But on the other hand, I couldn’t help get angry at some point: I couldn’t believe my friend would wonder why the company didn’t pick up as fast as planned since he seemed to be complying by 2 rules that, as far as my eyes can see, can only be entrepreneurial worse practices. For the record, he accepted that I published a note relating our meeting. Here it is:

• Do your bookkeeping and legal work on your own

He does it all: accounting, tax, legal self advisory using resources available on the web, contract management, etc. to save money. FYI, it’s still a small business (3 employees), but come on, being an entrepreneur doesn’t mean enough work to do probably? It takes many years of studies to become a lawyer or a chartered accountant. These people are experts in their fields (in France, we even call certified public accountants ‘experts comptables‘), and providing financial statements that are accountable with the economic reality of the business + making legal decisions is absolutely strategic in order to build structures enticing growth. So why not focus on being an entrepreneur ie managing the development of one’s new venture, and leave expertise fields to the adequate experts? Frankly, keeping one’s own books and writing contracts on one’s own is the last thing to do when you’re an entrepreneur: these are structuring moves that don’t cost so much after all – if it can help you prepare for the battle best. It’s the old ‘outsource non-core stuff’ thing, what you’re aren’t prepared to do best yourself. I would even go further: go, find and pay for the very best lawyers. They’re expensive, true, but at least you know you don’t have to worry about the contract side of your deals.

• Don’t commit full time

My friend still has a job on top of being an entrepreneur. It’s a sort of part-time job, that pays extremely well, but still, what message does he send to his full-time employees? to his clients? to his wife & children? to his investors? I acknowledge the reasons he doesn’t quit his job are understandable (he’s got 2 babies at home), however the signal sent to the market is extremely negative. Although his company is already profitable and grows at a reasonable rate (2-digit figure vs. 3 digits planned), he basically sends the following message to his different stakeholders: “you have to believe in my company, but look, I’m hedging my positions just in case“. In other words, why would he want someone to believe in his venture more than he does himself? Frankly, one can’t be a part-time entrepreneur: it’s either full-time, night & day, or not. To be fully & intensively or not to be, that is the question.

I deeply hope some people will find inspiration in this post. And if you disagree with me, please let me know. For your information, my friend (that I just talked to over the phone) just started taking corrective action!

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SQL Server being one of the 3 words I pronounce most everyday (alongside with IDEAS & Empower), a piece of news kept me smiling for a few days.

An independent benchmarking organization, TPC (Transaction Processing Performance Council), just released (-H, May 21st 2007) results proving that Microsoft’s database SQL Server 2005 outperforms its archrival Oracle Database by a factor of 2 in terms of value for money, in other words price / performance – a metric that all good CIOs are keen on optimizing.

Here is some rogue comparative data, drawn from the benchmark:

• Microsoft > Oracle in terms of requests per hour (QphH): 60,359 vs. 37,813. Almost a factor of 2 in favor of Microsoft!

• And that’s not it yet. Stressing the system with 3To of data, Microsoft’s flagship database also happens to be 20% more cost-effective than Oracle’s solution: $38 (Price/QphH) for Oracle against $32.60 for SQL Server 2005.

In a nutshell, Microsoft SQL Server 2005 is twice as fast as Oracle’s Database 10g Enterprise Edition, and yet sells at a much lower cost (shareholder speaking: why doesn’t Microsoft raise its prices then?).

I’m quite impressed by Microsoft’s responsiveness. 10 years ago, Microsoft had no competitive solution in critical systems. Today, Microsoft probably has the most scalable and manageable database on the market – that embeds a very appealing BI solution (more on this tomorrow). Who would’ve bet on Microsoft ability to go, fight and win against IBM DB/2 and most of all Oracle? I’m not even mentioning MySQL here as, although it’s very easy to deploy and administrate, the scalability & robustness capabilities of MySQL are severely limited – unless you feel like seeing your TCO (total cost of ownership = product + parameterizing + maintenance & upgrades) growing at snowball rates like Second Life currently does. More and more key accounts are turning to SQL Server 2005: French construction & mobile telco giant Bouygues has just launched an SMS management platform in which SQL Server constitutes its architecture’s database layout; European second biggest bank Crédit Agricole – Crédit Lyonnais just migrated 6To. of critical data from a mainframe/DB2 architecture to a more agile, clusterized SQL Server 2005-supported structure, etc. I could also mention MySpace & Facebook for instance. The stories are just countless.

SQL Server 2005 is now a top of mind product when CIOs think of a quality database. And it’s only the beginning: 2008 will see SQL Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 & a new version of Visual Studio coming out of the wood.

When it comes to Microsoft, there’s one saying I like, and that is Mahatma Gandi’s “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win”. What Microsoft did with MS Dos & Excel just seems to be repeating with SQL Server & XBox. Soon to come in the same vein: Zune & Dynamics.

If you don’t mind (ie unless you think this post really is advertising, and I can tell you it’s not: I’m just being enthusiastic about a product), I’ll make sure I explain what exactly comes with the SQL Server package in an upcoming post, from a Business Intelligence angle. Last but not least, if you feel like trying SQL Server without paying the license upfront, try it’s free (and obviously limited) version SQL Express, available right here.

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