A few days ago, I caught up with Zoe and Gretchen (former Microsoft Recruiters, now entrepreneurs behind JobSyntax) for coffee. Initially, I had envisaged our coffee to be short meet and greet catch up but instead our meeting went to an hour.

Several topics surfaced during our conversations: the required qualities in some of the roles in Microsoft, their life after the company, the business plan behind JobSyntax and the opportunities available in today’s exciting start-ups boom (Web 2.0).

Exciting and generous venture funding opportunities are certainly still out there, lots of innovative ideas have surfaced recently.VCs too had also wised up from the dot com burst and are still keen to invest. These days, start-ups and their executives are often incubated first before they “leave home”, and their funding are now more structured with interim milestones.

For more about upcoming Web 2.0 apps on the horizon, check out this article “Punters converge on web summit” (SMH). It’s a good read.

Related links:

Zoe Goldring and Gretchen Ledgard - What is it like to interview at Microsoft? (2005, Channel 9)

The Economics of Abundance (Chris Anderson, Author of "The Long Tail")