It's big news when Lip-Bu Tan visits Red Herring's offices, which are located in a once-trendy San Francisco dot-com neighborhood. After all, he must be a member of United's Premier Executive 1K club. But despite his frequent international flights, he took an hour to tell us about how his firm, Walden International, just raised a $1 billion fund. That's a lot of dough for even good economic times.
Mr. Tan saw opportunity in investing in Asian high-tech companies long before others did, and he proved naysayers wrong -- you can make money in Asian venture capital. That's how he managed to raise this very large sum despite the fact that most of the venture capital industry is under attack for poor investment decisions and lousy rates of financial returns.
Still, you've got to wonder how Walden will invest that money, especially when it's increasingly hard to find business plans that can eke out a profit -- let alone revolutionize a market. But Mr. Tan seemed pretty confident that his firm would have no trouble investing those dollars in U.S., Asian, and hybrid U.S./Asian businesses.
He claims that Walden has already scored major hits in Asia, achieving triple-digit returns over the past two years -- which is not the biggest feat in light of the U.S. Internet bubble years, but it's certainly a wonder in Asia. And the firm has depth in both Asia and Silicon Valley, or, as reporter Julie Landry notes in our most recent Dealflow Asia newsletter, "this is no ordinary 'six-guys-and-a-receptionist' early-stage firm." If you want to know how Walden intends to spend that cool $1B, check out this link.
WE LOVE OUR NAPSTER Will the court battle over Napster extend to foreign soil? Hard to tell, but it may come to pass. Why? Because foreign Internet users get the dubious award for the highest rates of downloaded songs from the service. At the top of the list is our 51st state, Canada. Argentina, Brazil, and Spain also had a higher percentage of online users exchanging songs on Napster than was common in the U.S.
On a heavier note, Autonomy (Nasdaq: AUTN) became the first high-profile European software company to attribute its revenue warnings to lower demand in Europe, rather than the usual "troubles in the U.S." Founder Mike Lynch said Autonomy was caught off guard by a large number of multinationals that suddenly began to postpone orders during the last few weeks of March. So it now looks like neither Europe nor Autonomy will escape the slowdown. Hey, we warned you weeks ago about Autonomy.
In other European news, on the ever-popular subject of third-generation (3G) mobile networks, Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and other mobile phone makers are being turned into bankers for European telecoms strapped for cash after bidding for expensive licenses. Although Nokia's stock was battered after it announced several billion dollars' worth of vendor financing deals last week, Red Herring's Dan Briody argues that it looks like money well spent. How else is Nokia going to pursue 3G contracts if it doesn't lend money to networks like the UK's Hutchison 3G or Orange to help them build out their networks?
BILL'S WHEREABOUTS Whatever happened to Bill Clinton? Well, he's not hanging out at a Chappaqua, New York, coffee shop, that's for sure. He's on a tour of India with a number of successful Indian-Americans, many of whom are -- not so surprisingly -- living in Silicon Valley. But they're not there to gaze at the white marble of the Taj Mahal. Rather, they're visiting not-so-pretty earthquake-ridden areas. Mr. Clinton is leading the new American India Foundation, which wants to raise $50 million to rebuild some of the 1,000 damaged villages. So far, they've raised more than $8 million, so the group needs good fund-raising skills like the former president's to reach its goal.
Mr. Clinton, who met with adoring crowds everywhere he went, vowed to come back to India for the "rest of my life." Still, he couldn't escape controversy. He took some hits for agreeing to give a speech at a Fortune magazine seminar in Hong Kong while a U.S.-China political tug-of-war continued. Maybe seeking suburban bliss north of New York City's intensity isn't such a bad option.