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Fledgling World2Market.com lures MBA students away from school

Friday, September 10, 1999

By JOHN COOK Mail Author
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Internet startup or MBA?

That was the question that faced Michelle Long, Greg Bear and Lani Cooper earlier this summer. The three University of Washington business students, who won $10,000 in the UW's annual business plan competition in May, could either return to graduate school for their final year this fall or pursue their e-commerce dreams. They ultimately chose term sheets over textbooks.

So far, at least, it looks like a wise decision. Their company, known as World2Market.com, this week closed on $775,000 in venture capital from Madrona Investment Group, Arch Venture Partners and Northwest Venture Associates. A second round of venture capital is expected to close before the end of the year.

World2Market, with 20 employees, is growing fast. The company just moved into a new headquarters on Lake Union and named Dan O'Neal, former chairman of the Interstate Commerce Commission, as the interim chief executive.

The company basically works as an e-commerce matchmaking service. It links merchants and artisans in developing countries with the American buying public. The ultimate goal, said 27-year-old co-founder Long, is to provide economic opportunities to local merchants in African, Asian and South American countries.

"Average Americans have not been able to find premium, unique products in one place," said Long, adding that World2Market.com plans to give back to the communities where the products are produced.

For the past year, Long and her partners have been compiling a database of craftsmen and merchants throughout the world. Next month, the site will launch with dozens of gift items for sale.

Long, whose husband, Derek, recently gave up his job at the Federal Reserve Bank to join World2Market, said she has no regrets about ditching school for a Net startup.

"If I had graduated and got a job at this company, I would have felt lucky," she said.

Not everybody is dropping out of the University of Washington business school to start a company. Some students are trying to juggle new businesses with school.

UW seniors Marissa Ng, Sean Reid and Travis Wright founded Collegiate Consulting Services six months ago to help local entrepreneurs with Web design, accounting, fund-raising and a number of other business services.

"If they want something translated into Swahili, we will find someone to do it," said Wright, who is promoting the business through the UW's program in entrepreneurship and innovation.

Unlike large consulting firms such as Andersen Consulting, Wright believes he can provide cash-strapped entrepreneurs with a cheap, but talented, labor source in the form of university business students.

Bob Gallaher, who is using Collegiate Consulting to help write a business plan for his Seattle biotech startup Rainbow Research, said it is a win-win situation for both entrepreneurs and students.

"It gives (the students) real-world business experience and for me, it is a low-cost way to get consulting without spending a lot of money up front," he said. So far, Collegiate Consulting has five clients.

But Wright, 23, has big plans for the company. Collegiate Consulting (www.collegiate-consulting.com) will open branch offices at The University of California-Berkeley and Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, in the next four months. By the end of the school year, he expects revenues to hit $500,000 and have five or six branch offices established.

The entrepreneurial bug also is biting University of Washington professors.

Summer usually is the time when college professors relax, write books or prepare lesson plans for the next semester. But that's not the case with UW computer science professor Dan Weld. Weld is playing a key role in two venture-backed Seattle startups. Nimble.com, a developer of XML database technology, announced Tuesday that it has raised an undisclosed amount of venture capital and AdRelevance, which has created a database of online advertising, is looking to raise $5 million.

Weld, an expert in artificial intelligence and software agents, is the chief scientist at both companies.

"It is a bit crazy this summer," said Weld, who devotes 20 percent of his time to the startups.

Joining Weld at Nimble.com is UW professor Alon Levy, an expert in XML technology.

It is worth paying attention to Weld. His last Seattle startup, NetBot, was sold to Excite in a stock deal now valued at $300 million.

P-I reporter John Cook can be reached at 206-448-8075 or johncook@seattle-pi.com. For more venture capital news, visit www.seattlep-i.com/venture.

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