Silicon Valley is a place for people with ideas. It is a place where the right idea at the right time can yield remarkable returns for investors and entrepreneurs. It is known, rightly, as a place of simmering, sometimes spouting, creative enterprise. How ironic, then, that the venture capitalists who nurture this creativity aren t more creative in their choices of where to meet, eat, and mingle. The best example of this is the phenomenon of the Silicon Valley breakfast.
Breakfast is a prime time here for discussing potential deals.
Il Fornaio in the heart of Palo Alto, and Hobee s in the Town and Country Shopping Center in Palo Alto. Same restaurants, same faces, everyone sitting within earshot of each other, bolting coffee and interviewing entrepreneurs. Take Buck s, for example. It s your basic family-style eatery, with brown leather booth seats and green Formica tabletops. I was there, there was a glass case on the counter displaying the latest book on Silicon Valley by long-ago Apple evangelist Guy Kawasaki.