The entrepreneurial ecosystem will improve by the rise of new start-ups that are designed to help out other start-ups, fellow entrepreneurs and innovators. Globalvations.com is one of them - a vertical search engine indexed and categorized innovations throughout the world, connecting visitors to new technologies, innovative companies, products and business opportunities.

Our ChangeAgent Hubert Wu recently had a chance to interview founder of Globalvations.com, Malik Laibi. Malik says he wants to see Globalvations.com to become the Google of innovations and entrepreneurship in ten years time. Do you think he can make it? Read the full interview transcript below and decide for yourself.

(Globalvations.com is a collaboration between Multilingual Global Marketing (MGM) of Melbourne, Australia and SearchChannel, LLC of Oak Brook, Illinois.)

Interviewer: Hubert Wu (Agents of Change)
Interviewee: Malik Laibi (Founder of Globalvations.com, Managing Director at MGM)

Hubert: What was your story before becoming Managing Director of MGM? Work, study, school etc…

Malik: I was born in Algeria and French educated. After the University (Bachelor Degree in Journalism) I travelled through Europe in the 70s and then settled down in Germany. In Germany (Duesseldorf) I worked for the German Business and Financial daily HANDELSBLATT as International Advertising Manager. Yes I speak fluently French and German besides English and Arabic.

From Germany I then moved to Saudi Arabia where I worked for 13 years in the Media industry (print and TV). In 1997 I came to Australia. That was the time when the internet and e-commerce were just taking off. So I became obsessed with the idea of becoming an internet entrepreneur. My first e-venture was a bi-lingual (English-Arabic) e-commerce venture in 2001, a shopping mall enabling shoppers from the Middle East to buy from Australia and vice-versa. But then came 9/11 and the dream was out. I then set-up an international marketing consultancy helping Australian companies entering the Middle East markets.

Hubert: When exactly was Globalvations founded?

Malik: Globalvations was founded in 2008 and officially launched in July 2009. After the official launch (globally) we were very surprised by the positive and encouraging feedback. I even received accolade from Tony Dyson, the man behind the robots of “Star Wars”, saying “Globalvations is a great resource”.

Hubert: How did the idea of Globalvations come about?

Malik: I am an obsessed market researcher. After a while I discovered that a myriad of innovations from all industry sectors emerge on a daily basis. If we wanted to know the latest innovations from a specific industry sector no source could help, not even Google. And here came the idea to develop a vertical search engine on innovations. Globalvations was born.

Hubert: Many consider entrepreneurship an exciting, yet often notoriously inaccessible concept. The creation of a domain-specific, vertical search engine focussed on innovation is no mean feat and has never in fact been done before. Were you familiar with the industry prior to founding Globalvations, and were you at all intimidated by the fact that you were breaking new ground?

Malik: it is a fact that to be a successful entrepreneur you must fulfill 3 paramount conditions:
1. A new product or service
2. A potential market for this product or service
3. Professional management

So I knew from my own research that:

1. There was no such a service ( a vertical search engine on innovations)
2. there is a potential market (as it is global)
3. We have an experienced team in vertical search (www.searchhchannel.biz)

Hubert: Being the Managing Director of MGM (Multilingual Global Marketing), an international consultancy firm, how exactly has the experience from that role helped in 'taking the edge off' the challenges of founding Globalvations, if at all?

Malik: The digital age has opened up a world of new business opportunities, and has given birth to a networked world where information is quickly and easily accessed, shared or published across a variety of devices from almost anywhere on the planet. A new wave of digital serial entrepreneurs have emerged in the US, Europe and Asia-Pacific, setting-up new ventures with impressive innovative ideas. The list of these amazing ideas, which keeps growing, includes digital marketing, digital printing, mobile search, vertical search, ad networks, ad auctions, mobile content, video advertising, in-game advertising…and the list goes on. In this environment, we founded MGM to help born global start-ups go global. In this environment also we founded Globalvations to maintain our integrated strategy of promoting innovations and entrepreneurship.

Hubert: Have you ever stopped and thought to yourself, “I cannot believe I'm actually doing this!?"

Malik: Yes definitely. When the world economic downturn became pandemic, particularly after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, I was meticulously monitoring the news in various languages (English/French/German and Arabic) and all I could read was “Innovations and entrepreneurship are the emergency exit out the recession”. I said to myself “My God, we are coming with the right product at the right time”. The best things that happened since the launch was the encouraging feedback.

Hubert: The accelerating rate of change around the globe clearly seems to be a double-edged sword: on the one hand, Globalvations will have more and more exciting material to work with. Yet on the other, there's the increasingly daunting task of collecting and sorting it all out. Given the highly varying nature of the term 'innovation,' do you think Globalvations is up to the challenge of achieving this without compromising its results integrity?

Malik: Yes, we were very careful from the beginning about the definition of innovation. We see 2 kinds of innovations:
1. Innovations introduced by start-ups or spin-offs set-up specifically to commercialize these innovations.
2. Innovations introduced by well established companies like for example Pharma giants introducing new medical technologies.

This is why we have the “How does Globalvations work?” section on the Home Page, to make it easy and simple for the user. We know the user is time poor.

Hubert: Where do you see Globalvations in 10 years time?

Malik: To be the Google of innovations and entrepreneurship.

Hubert: What’s the most important thing you’ve ever lost? Did you find it? What advice would you give to people the next time they lose the remote control and find out that it is not, in fact, under the couch?

Malik: Yes my wallet. One day I forgot to take it with me, and I was worried all day wondering whether I really left it at home. Arrived at home, a sigh of relief. I found it. My advice: Do not panic, think and focus.

Hubert: Finally, what's your next project?

Malik: We have a long-term Business Development Program (BDP), focusing on Vertical Media (Off-and online). Globalvations is the first online project from the BDP. The second project is offline and it is a multilingual Specific Directory on innovations. It is the Globalvations Directory. We are presently looking for suitable partners for the worldwide distribution of the directory.

Posted by Tian @ 6.58pm, 15/10/09