philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

How Samsung Is Getting Its Mojo In Silicon Valley

The pitch: Join us and free yourself of startup stress, because with a billion devices worldwide, we’ll probably partner with you anyway.

On tree-lined University Avenue in Palo Alto, Calif., where a large sign still denotes a defunct Borders bookstore, a handful of young engineers are funneling cutting-edge software ideas to a technology behemoth in South Korea. You might not know it if you walked past, but this is the Samsung Accelerator, an 11,000-square-foot, open-plan office with many empty desks. “The Next Big Thing” is painted in large letters on one wall.

“We’re a very hardworking, intense company,” says Eun in between meetings at the accelerator a few weeks later, dressed in jeans and clutching his ever-present Galaxy Note. “Once we make a decision, it’s just boom, boom, boom, boom.”

Entrepreneurs who join the accelerator can expect a steep learning curve. Samsung is an octopus with tentacles in processors, OLED screens and memory, and its fast-and-loose experimentation can be maddening for suppliers. When Steve Jobs announced the measurements of a new iPad two years ago, Samsung shut down its own tablet project and had a thinner design ready in a month.

“Historically a lot of the innovation in software and services has tended to come from smaller groups of people working together,” says Eun, “not necessarily large companies. We want to make sure we aren’t missing things.”

See the full story here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2013/10/30/how-samsung-is-getting-its-mojo-in-silicon-valley/?curator=MediaREDEF