What kind of business am I starting?

We finally get to the meat and potatoes of this blog. What kind of business will I start?

Well, I have thought a lot about this business in the last couple of years. The idea has been in my head for awhile, but the plan to actually go forward hasn’t. The economy downturn has been a big factor why I haven’t pulled the trigger on this business until now. Buying a new house is another reason. Starting a business with a partner that backed out of the deal was another. The list goes on and on why I don’t start this business. But I can’t make excuses until I am 65 and decide it is time to retire.

I have a concept I call ‘Bernie’s Basement’. When I was growing up, we had a basement. In that basement, I kind of had a clubhouse of sorts where I can do the things I did as a kid. I did some woodworking, I made model airplanes and radio controlled cars. I had a chemistry set where I played around with chemicals and tried to make new substances. I built a pvc pipe cannon that could launch a grapefruit 100 yards powered by hairspray. When I was in high school, I built a gas CO2 laser that theoretically yields 30 watts of lasing power. In the basement I could incubate ideas and could construct the prototypes of things I was interested in.

My ultimate goal is to have a business like Bernie’s Basement where I can incubate business ideas and experiment with projects. As a kid, I never thought about actually making money with things I created. I figured that would just come in time. Now I know better and realize I need to make that part of it happen myself.

In order the build my ultimate company, I need three things. The first is people. I need really, really smart people to convert my ideas into something tangible. Second, I need infrastructure. I need the equipment and the hardware to do what I want to do. Back when I was younger, that would mean labs and other cool (expensive) things. Now that I am older and spent most of my career in information technology, I am going to need hardware to host my work. Third, I need the basic facilities of a business. I need the bookkeepers, the lawyers, the CRM applications, the Accounting software, possibly a building. I want to make it easy to take an idea, provide the proper resources to make it work, and go. I don’t want to mess around with the business part of the business; I want to make the idea the focus of my efforts.

So I have three pillars to the business: People, Infrastructure, and Business Services. This is my starting point. My goal is to build each one independently. Each one of the pillars will be a business of its own. I will start with the most important pillar first.

That is it for now. Next time I will be discussing the first pillar of the business.