While it is important to have a great idea for a startup, it can also be of great advantage to be in the right place to obtain some of the much needed venture capital funding in order to get a new company off the ground. Thus, before setting out on the startup journey it might be a good idea to understand where the venture capital money is currently flowing. One good place to start in your research is the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA). As a matter of fact the NVCA just recently released a global venture investment trends survey that it undertook with sponsorship from Deloitte & Touche LLP. The survey reveals some interesting facts; for example, U.S. venture capitalists (VCs) have currently less than five percent of their capital invested overseas. This is mostly due to the fact that generally VCs seem to prefer to be near to companies they invest in – after all wouldn't you want to make sure that the money you have invested is being put to good use? Further, the report finds that countries which receive most money from U.S. VCs are China, India, Israel, and Canada. Obviously it should be of no surprise to anyone that China and India made the list given the amount of headlines that startups from these two countries have been getting. But what is more interesting is that VCs choose to invest in what is arguably a very unstable area over in Israel, while at the same time investing in Canada because of the stable conditions. The report also discusses regional investment preferences between U.S VCs and their European and Asian counterparts, takes a brief look at preferred investment strategies, and outlines some potential concerns that VCs have with regards to investing into foreign markets. Overall it is a very quick and easy read and definitely worth a look.

Whether you are interested in startups or want to make sure you get the most out of your career, be it semiconductors or another field, it is better for you to live in a city that is teaming with energy rather than a sleepy small-town, at least according to FastCompany.  There is little doubt that living in a city that is a hub for what you might be interested in can be an advantage. Taking it a step farther, if you are deciding on a college it might be a good idea to apply the same principle, since local candidates usually have an advantage in at least landing an interview and your professors are likely to have better industry connections as well. But with millions of cities to choose from, picking one can quickly become a daunting task, especially if you are not interested in one of the regular destinations like San Francisco and the nearby Silicon Valley. Lucky for you, FastCompany just published their list of Fast Cities 2007. The criteria for the list included the creativity, innovation, and energy of a city. For a short discussion of the criteria, take a look at their article here. The actual list is broken down into many categories including some rather unusual ones such as unexpected oases and creative-class meccas. They’ve also provided a nice little map that locates the cities visually on a map. Additionally, cities that are simply slow or too-fast for their own good are also briefly mentioned. The nice thing about the list is that it is global and thus there should be something for everyone on it.

Startups are exciting, whether you are simply interested in the new technology that they might be developing or are looking to join one early and hope to cash out big through an initial public offering or through being acquired. Maybe you are just looking for ideas for your own startup and browsing through what other startups might be doing might just give you that needed spark that will put you on the right path. In any case, EETimes.com just updated their list of the top 60 semiconductor startups for 2007. The list is not exactly detailed about what each company does, but at least it provides a quick snapshot on each company and a web address. Not that the web address is of much use in some cases; for example, XMOS Semiconductor and Unity Semiconductor have a little more than welcome pages and that’s about it. However, this seems to be an exception as most startups are eager to tell you a lot about their upcoming products and it also seems that most of them are actively hiring. While many of the startups on this year’s list can be found on previous lists, there are several new ones, including: Ambric, Artimi, Athena Design, Blaze DFM, Boston Circuits, Codeplay, Mirics Semiconductor, Nanoradio, Nemerix, Nemoptic, Prime Sense, Takumi Technology, Tilera, Unity Semiconductor, XMOS Semiconductor, and Xoomsys. You can find the complete list of all the selected startups here.