Handling the Challenge of Going Global

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Huddle CEO Alastair Mitchell faced challenges in taking his UK-business global but not so much that he gave up.  Huddle, established in 2007, is a business tool for project management and document collaboration that started out small and now serves clients such as Kia Motors, Porter Novelli and Procter & Gamble.

How did Huddle make the leap to going global and what did they learn in the process?  It requires a business owner to:  Develop a global mindset, maintain a teamwork across time zones, deal with red tape (nitty gritty) and understand your business before crossing borders.

Read:  Going Global:  How Huddle Handled the Challenge

We're Exporting Stuff

©2014 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

“We're actually making stuff in America now. We're exporting stuff. We're inventing things." - Amy Klobuchar

How Many of the NASDAQ 100 Index's Companies Translate Their Websites?

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One Hour Translation (OHT), a provider of machine powered, human edited translation and interpretation services, recently dug into the NASDAQ 100 to determine how many of the index’s companies translate their websites and marketing material into at least one language or more, which resulted in the following information:

• Only 63% of index companies translate in at least one language
• 45% of the companies translate their website into 7 or more languages
• 51% of the companies translate their websites into Chinese, making it the most translated language worldwide; the 2nd most translated is Japanese (48%)

With the world becoming smaller due to the interconnectivity feature the Internet provides, more small businesses will cautiously begin to translate their websites and marketing material in order to sell to the world and compete on a global basis.

Who's Worth Following on Twitter About E-Commerce?

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Ajeet Khurana, serial entrepreneur, educator, mentor, and angel investor, writes a strong piece on who's worth following on Twitter when it comes to providing expertise in international e-commerce.

Read:  10 International Ecommerce Experts Your Business Should Follow on Twitter.  We, of course, are partial to Ajeet for mentioning one of our favorites, John Yunker (@JohnYunker)

Biggest Growth Year of Your Life?

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For many small business owners, their biggest growth year can come from new customers, a new product launch, an acquisition, exporting, importing or licensing.

For others, like Simon Cohen, founder of Global Tolerance, his biggest growth year came when he became a father.  And with the birth of his daughter, he has decided to give away his company which is worth up to $1.8 million.  Anyone can apply.  All details are outlined in a Q&A session on the company website.

Think I am kidding?  Read:  Global Tolerance founder Simon Cohen gives away company worth up to $1.8 million

If you are an entrepreneur with an understanding of what global leadership means and are ready to re-start a perfectly good company, apply.  Description of the position can be found here.

The Promise, Challenge and Opportunity of Free Trade

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What's there to be pessimistic about on free trade?

The default position portrays trade deals as a threat to American jobs and wages, exposing our economic weaknesses to the world, rather than as opportunities to grow our economy and maximize our strengths.

Find out what Thomas F. 'Mack' McLarty has to say with his opinion piece published at The Wall Street Journal.

Read:  Why Democrats Should Back the President on Free Trade
(Love the 1993 photo in this piece with Larry King, Al Gore and Ross Perot.)

Companies Don't Need Scale to Trade Internationally; They Need International Trade to Scale

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Kati Suominen is founder and CEO of TradeUp Capital Fund, a new equity crowdfunding platform for globalizing companies, and of Nextrade Group, LLC, a consulting firm on leading-edge issues in trade. She is also Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and Adjunct Professor at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, and amid authoring her 10th book, on the future of globalization.

In the article, "Trading Up:  Being Small and Going Global," Kati Suominen says:

"No longer do companies need scale to trade; they need trade to scale. The next generation of exporters will be “born global companies.” Investors should pay attention to this outperforming asset class." 

She goes on to say that as the economy rebounds, companies around the world are seeking growth through exports.

Read the entire important article here.

Full disclosure:  I serve as a partner at TradeUp Capital Fund and on the Board of Directors; Kati serves on our Board of Advisors at GlobeTrade.com.  We think she is brilliant.  And you'll agree when you read her article above.