Startup Iceland 2016 - The wrap up

President of Iceland, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson

     The fifth annual Startup Iceland conference wrapped up earlier this week, and its focus was on scaling up a business and building's Iceland's startup environment.

     Among the dignitaries was the US Ambassador of Iceland, Robert C. Barber, who spoke briefly on a topic near and dear to my heart -- the importance of protecting your startup's intellectual property (IP) and retaining IP counsel.

    The speakers shared many stories about their experiences scaling up their businesses.  But, there were core concepts: don't wait to launch a perfect product - launch your minimally viable product; you have to understand who your customers are and what they want -- a local presence is helpful; the difficulties involved in scaling up vary depending on what stage your company is at; and technology can permit a startup to disrupt established industries.  The speakers on the investor panel focused on how investors can help build a vibrant startup culture in Iceland, and among the points was that investors need to fund many startups to ensure that there will be at least a few successful fundings.

     Finally, a huge thank you to Bala Kamallakharan and his team for organizing this well-executed conference.

- Henry Park