With a recession looming, "Rest of World" becomes critical
IBM and others are driving growth outside the US. This will become even more critical as a US recession becomes a near certainty.
It's also why it suddenly makes a lot of sense to be based outside the US if you're a vendor.
Don't get me wrong: there are many difficulties inherent in starting a business outside of the US. The US is the primary market for just about all software vendors, and will be for the foreseeable future, China notwithstanding. If you want to be a serious software player, you have to compete in the US.
But consider the following:
My employer, Alfresco, is based out of London. In consequence, roughly 50 percent of our revenue comes from outside the Americas (EMEA, APAC). In a troubled economy, I want my revenue to be as broad-based as possible. Having all my customer eggs in one basket (Americas) is a bad policy on the eve of a US recession.
So, should all companies pack up and move to EMEA? Of course not. (Well, unless you want to see really good football/soccer.) But it does mean that US vendors need to be actively plowing the fields of EMEA and APAC. Now.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
2/ A low dollar, should be a reason to spur investment from abroad in to the US. Money flowing in the other direction, doesn't make any economic sense.
Then again... I'm no Stanford MBA, so wth do I know? ;-)
We've become nothing more than a services country.
And it's going to be far deeper that a recession. Our standard of living is going down the tube and were headed for disaster. All the while the companies we put our heart and soul into care about nothing but the almighty YEN/Euro...notice I left out the dollar since it's almost worthless now.
- by Draq Wraith March 13, 2008 11:20 AM PDT
- Hum what is the criteria for this to turn into a pandemic economic depression?
- Like this Reply to this comment
-
(3 Comments)Rumor is we are a bread basket for the world. well our wheat is going through the roof for prices, the worlds oil supplies are over priced, Gold over valued, property over priced and over taxed in the US.
My bets are 9 USD for a loaf of Bread, 5 USD a gallon gas, Electricity boost in price to something unreal.
You see last summer we had a mega drought in the USA, this time around it is not looking better for water sources. So lets see what happens to the price of one gallon of potable water in drought regions through out the world.
D~W