IDG Ventures Vietnam TechCon 2009
April 3rd
James Vuong
VP, Investment & Technology
James_vuong@idgvv.com.vn

Why Is
Architecture
so Important?

Startups
are built
to grow

Startups need to learn, change, and improve.
And do it with speed!
Opportunity

Companies should be

Does your
architecture
allow your
company to
achieve those
objectives?

Does your
architecture
allow your
company to
grow fast while
maintaining
the same
performance
and reliability?

Does your architecture allow your company to…
• Learn from your customers and mistakes
• Change your course of strategy
• Continue to improve your product/service offering
And do it with speed !?

What are the
consequences if
you don’t get
the architecture
right?

Time and
money wasted
when you re-
architect to
support your
company’s
growth and
strategic or
product/service
changes.

Lose to a competitor or incumbent because
you can not change fast enough!
You

Make your
customers
unhappy and
they leave!
And go to your
competitor!

What if your mission is:
To serve 20M Internet users by 2010

From where you are now…
how do you get there?

Performance and Reliability
You've already built something that works
well and runs fast – offering a good user
experience and attracting users…

At some point, if your success continues…
This will happen!
Good problem to have? Maybe, maybe not!

Scalability
Can you still offer the same performance and
reliability so not to disappoint your new and
existing customers?

Flexibility/Modularity
How disruptive are changes? Can your
architecture handle changes, minor and
major, with minimal cost on time and money?

Expandability
What if you want to add more
products/services?
What if you want to be a platform to allow
external 3rd parties to add more
products/services?

Portability  Pervasiveness
Now, what if you want your
products/services to be portable and
pervasive?
• Get on other portals or social networks
• Follow the user wherever they are
• Get on the user’s desktop
• Get on mobile devices

Factors crucial for a startup architecture
Performance & Reliability
Scalability
Flexibility/Modularity
Expandability
Portability/Pervasiveness

When you architect,
always keep the end in mind:
To delight 20M Internet users in 2010