Since 1974, Sofinnova Ventures has partnered with entrepreneurs to secure initial funding, build successful teams, win key customers, and navigate acquisitions and IPOs. Sofinnova invests in early stage information technology and life science companies in Europe and the U.S., typically as early stage, series A, first institutional investors. Their current technology portfolio includes companies such as Openwave, UPEK, Laszlo, HelloSoft, Crocus Technologies, or Streamezzo.

DMR: There’s a lot of talk right now about Cloud computing, different layers of Cloud, and what Cloud actually means. Where do you see Cloud growing?

Brian: As a VC, it’s a segment where there’s a lot of investment. I’m assuming they’ll be some exits in the space because people see it as a hot space. Beyond that I’m not quite sure.

DMR: The way you phrased that it seems very different from what you would tell me from a personal experience.

Brian: Well, from a personal experience: do I want access to my photos in the Cloud, video on the Cloud – basically not stored on my local PC so I can keep track of it there? Sure. Do I want my contacts stored in a Cloud? Sure. As a business, I have no idea what it actually means other than a difference in how people sell software.

DMR: Interesting. So you don’t see any differentiation between Cloud, On-Demand, and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)?

Brian: Exactly, it’s just another term. Before venture capital I worked in a variety of operators. And one of the businesses I ran we called it “ASP (Application Service Provider) business”, which was basically hosted applications. And that, basically, is the Cloud business today. The only difference being that back then the software architecture was Client-Server. So it was more difficult to integrate multiple applications together. And now, to me, the only difference in Cloud is that it’s all a web-based protocol with easy integration to back ends. But it’s all the same stuff. It’s just a business model.

DMR: I see. So Cloud, for you, is a certain business model.