Partner Article

US vs. UK tech scene?

It’s Technology Week on Bdaily. Here, John McGeachie, vice president of sales for Californian digital firm Evernote, looks at the US and UK technology sectors side-by-side.

When comparing the UK and US tech industries, your first thought goes to the basics: the differences in the way people work, the language they use, the currency they pay for services in and the place those services are hosted. However, all these points are all becoming increasingly irrelevant when we look at the reach of a particular idea or technology. This doesn’t matter whether that originates in US, the UK, or any number of Latin American or APAC countries.

Distribution channels, app stores and integration marketplaces gives global reach, this means that borders, regions and time zones have disappeared as barriers of growth for innovation.

Rather than worrying about things such as language and currency etc. focus should be based on understanding what it is you’re solving. Deciding what it is that you do and summing it up in one sentence. Making businesses smarter - making people more productive – it’s universal.

Table stakes for competing and succeeding in this environment are reliable and ubiquitous connections to the outside world. Communication lets you understand the problems that need to be solved. If you’re only able to solve problems discoverable in your immediate surroundings, the innovation space quickly shrinks to an uninteresting size. Internet, mobile phones and video conferencing - all of these things expand the game board and the set of pieces on the board.

When looking at the different global marketplaces in the tech industry, the decision to simultaneously launch Evernote Business in the US and the UK might seem odd at first. In fact, it was an easy decision and one that largely reflects the underlying tech atmosphere in both places.

A big consideration for us was the difference in market places and how the UK business plan and launch compared to the US, Japan and Brazil. We had to consider pricing patterns, demographics, SaaS adoption levels for critical business data. As it turns out, the lazy answer is the right one - it doesn’t matter.

The fuel for the engine is ready access to local talent in a variety of disciplines, which like the US the UK has in spades. These are people who hunger for new opportunities, are excited for a challenge, and can be pulled together to build something unique.

Venture money chases returns, and the smart ones chase returns by looking for ideas. In fact, the brilliant ones don’t even chase ideas anymore - they find proven talent and stick with them.

US vs. UK tech scene? That’s a false choice - the real question is how far can you see and how good are you.

Check out some of the technology week articles, including: Bdaily talks IT technology; the UK tech sector: a health check; the web-developers perspective; Bdaily talks to Care.com; the growth of the UK tech sector; flying ahead in the technology sector; and could UK tech take off in 2013?

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by John McGeachie .