Thoughts On Iceland And Its Startup Scene
I'm in Reykjavik, Iceland, hosting an ArcticEvening event for the local startup scene tonight. I thought I'd do a little write up of the thoughts and discoveries regarding the startup scene up here. First of all, to put things into perspective, you need to understand the size of things we're talking with. Iceland has a population of around 320 000 people and that's scattered across the island. On the other hand, they're a relatively wealthy bunch of people, despite the current economic crisis, with a GDP per capita a little over $40 000 USD for 2008. Talking about the econmic crisis, it is definitely the biggest subject in discussions these days. On my way to meet up with some local entrepreneurs last night, the cab driver said that he's sure there will be something happening in the coming months. According to him, "regular people are tired of paying the mess of the large companies." I can understand his rage completely.
CLARA Listens The Web Talking
CLARA is a Reykjavik, Iceland based young startup specializing in online business and marketing intelligence. The firm offers automatic monitoring and analysis tools for the web. With CLARA's solution firms can keep track of online discussions around their brands, products, and services on the web. CLARA's system brings data together from news, blogs, forums and comments, and other online content. The idea is to allow "listening" to the online discussion as it happens, and being able to see a clear summary to better understand the end customers.
