The Global Small Business Blog: May 2006

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Stop Fakes, That Is, Global Intellectual Ones

iStock/Thinkstock

Are you a small business? Well I sure hope so if you are reading this blog. As we are learning, success in a global economy depends more and more on intellectual property (IP) assets. In fact, IP-based businesses and entrepreneurs drive more economic growth in the United States than any other single sector.

Unfortunately, intellectual property has captured the attention of pirates and organized crime. Today, piracy, counterfeiting and the theft of intellectual property pose a serious threat to all U.S. businesses. Industry estimates of the cost of such theft range from $250 billion to 750,000 jobs per year. These threats to ongoing invention and innovation make it important to consider securing IP protection, whether you're a major multinational firm or a 1-person home business.

Stop fakes (fraud) and start taking action. Visit the site here.

Friday, May 26, 2006

Web Sites for Discerning Global Finance Students

iStock/Thinkstock

John Wachowicz, Jr., Ph.D., CPA and Professor of Finance at The University of Tennessee contacted me in response to a letter I wrote in February to the editor of CEO Magazine. (Wo)Man did I sound off! He apparently liked the horn-blowing so much that he decided to link it -- Globetrade.com not the letter! -- to his own educational financial management website. Seeing that John is a Ph.D. and CPA, I paid a visit to his site and found it to be quite good. You might like it too.

Wachowicz's Web World

Thanks John!

Wednesday, May 24, 2006

Brilliance At Its Best

Creatas/Thinkstock

WOW -- what a post! Read it to appreciate it but it's not simple. Here's an excerpt from the ending:

Investment banks like Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley, technology companies like Microsoft and Google and many others are creating captive organizations in many parts of the globe to get access to this local talent pool. Why is this important? Well very few of the thinking workers "trade" on a global basis. Put another way, of the millions of engineers in Russia or India, few of them can move to where the work is -- so the smart companies, who have models where they can create high leverage for thinking work, are moving to that local supply of talent. The challenge is, very few organizations analyze who their thinking workers are, and which ones add the most leverage. Fewer yet ask, do we have the best in the world?

The immortal word of the founder of IBM, Thomas Watson, Sr. , was "THINK." If he were alive today he might say, "THINK! BUT WHERE?"

Catch the post by John Sviokla here: Thinking About the Thinking Class: Outsource low leverage thinking work, offshore high leverage thinking work

Monday, May 22, 2006

An Interview with Thomas Friedman

iStock/Thinkstock

Business Strategies Magazine conducts an interview with Thomas J. Friedman, New York Times columnist and author of "The World Is Flat."

"I've been at the right place and the right time to see a lot of things ... What that's made me is very much someone who is aware of the important role that America plays in the world."

Read the interview here.

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Is Your Business On The Verge of Extinction?

iStock/Thinkstock

Going global is no longer an either / or proposition. Propelling your business globally could be as simple as setting up a Website to market your goods and services.

To find out if your business is on the verge of extinction read the article here. Then let me know.

Tuesday, May 16, 2006

Foreign Exchange Precautions for Exporters

iStock/Thinkstock

Canada perspective: Virtually every business in Canada is affected by the ever-changing value of the dollar. While many of us consider this unpredictability a nuisance, the volatility of the Canadian dollar and other currencies around the world can mean the difference between success and failure for many exporters.

Read the article here.

United States perspective: Exports are improving. The Bush administration hopes a falling dollar will boost export trade by making U.S. exports cheaper for foreigners and goods made abroad more expensive for Americans. The dollar began falling late last year. Since the start of April, its drop has accelerated against a variety of currencies, from the euro to the yen.

Bottom line: Understanding foreign exchange risk is critical to any export venture.

Friday, May 12, 2006

Global Experience Talks

iStock/Thinkstock

"Small companies often are able to respond to market changes more quickly than large firms, giving them an edge as the pace of global change quickens."

Read the article here.