Start-up Technology Co Suddenly Recognises the Value of Money

4 November 2001, 17:37 GMT

It was a sudden shock realisation. "We were spending money like water!" CTO Lars Swergensen exclaimed.

Lars Swergensen draws gullible investors to his mountain commune

"I was horrified - I just woke up at 3am one morning, and it hit me that this isn't just 'free money' after all. I mean, it's bound to run out eventually."

"All this time," he explained, "I just saw the money tree as a sort of bottomless pit; a license to extract money from gullible VCs with more money than brains." He sighed. "We had a money well, you know? Any time we wanted, we could just reach in and pull out a bucket of money, and douse ourselves in its liquidy coolness. Beautiful."

His face suddenly became very stern. "But times are different now," he asserted. "The VCs are starting to wise up. They've been burnt too many times by tech start-ups that couldn't be bothered to secure more funding to keep themselves going for another couple of wasteful years at least. When those companies went under, the VCs were angry. They began to ask awkward questions, like where has all my money gone."

"Sure," he added reflectively, "there's still money out there to be had, and it's still a 'dead cert' as there are so many alternative sources - there are plenty more trees in the forest, you know? You just have to know where to look - but it takes more effort now than it used to. Much, much more effort. I just don't know if running my own software company, setting my own company's direction, is worth all that hassle anymore. You just know that sooner or later our current well of money will dry up. And then what?"

"Well that's easy," co-founder Taffy Admiral countered. "We just go back to the VC guys and ask for more. We have a rock-solid business plan, you know."

"Rock solid?" Swergensen exclaimed. "You know as well as I do that that so-called 'plan' has no substance to speak of. It has no basis in reality whatsoever!"

He proceeded to quote extracts from the plan: "Our intention is to produce a profitable company within an appreciable period, which may be anywhere between three and fifteen years. If this goal is not achieved, the company will take recourse to Plan B, which will be formulated at the appropriate time."

"The company will produce e-commerce services to the corporate sector."

"I mean what the hell does that mean?" Swergensen exclaimed.

"Well," Admiral stammered, suddenly unsure of himself, "the software we produce isn't really software, is it? It's... special. I mean sure, it's programmed and it runs on computers, but it scores an entire new paradigm. I like to call it 'virtualware'."

"Ahah," Swergenson replied, relaxing. His shoulders loosened, and his face swiftly lost its transitory purple complexion. "Now that really is an exciting prospect. Virtualware. Is that what we've promised the VCs? I like it. Largely meaningless, empty, devoid of tangible promises, but with the implication of something absolutely huge that will one day take the market by storm, possibly even in our own lifetimes."

"What market?" Admiral suddenly challenged, his expression clouding over.

"What market?" Swergensen repeated. "Well, you know... the market. The... virtualware market. It's huge! I'm sure we could find a Gartner report that will back us up."

Now it was Admiral's turn to relax:

"For our next trick," he enthused, "we just need to find some real, paying customers!"

"Scooby-doo!!" Swergensen laughed, giggling into his expensive beer.

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