Cambridge Cluster

Great article of an interview with Greylock’s Henry McCance on why they are moving their HQ to Silicon Valley.  And so many lessons for the Cambridge Cluster.  It is sad and depressing that some of the so called movers and shakers of the Cambridge Cluster do not think that spin-outs of companies are important to building a cluster.  It is essential to keep the Thought Leadership motivated and generating the next generation of companies and technologies.

One interesting comment is McCance makes is ““At the margin, there are small things that can be done to make the climate more attractive for startups. An example is to change the non-compete laws that are much more restrictive and enforceable in MA than in CA. ‘Hot’ engineers don’t want to worry about ending up in lawsuits and court if they leave one company to start or join a new company.”  Guess it was a shame(!) that we linked with MIT and not Silicon Valley.

Also depressing in Cambridge that great successes such as Xensource are funded outside the Cambridge Cluster and then the success hushed up in case anyone on the fringes is unhappy.  I guess that this is Britain and no one likes to see a winner especially when they are public sector employees of Cambridge University.  Where else would a great success such as Xensource be hushed under the carpet?  Are there other Xensource type successes of which we have never heard?  Time to get out the business plan resource and start building great companies in the Cambridge Cluster.