Tag: Startup Accelerator


100 Days Of Awe: Day Thirty Two – Silicon Roundabout

Day 32: Silicon RoundaboutIMAG4027Silicion Valley is a nickname for an area around the Santa Clara Valley in California known for high tech industry.  In the 1950s William Shockely one of the inventors of the transistor was the first to use silicon as the semiconductor material in the manufacture of transitors but the term itself was not coined until the early 1970s and only came into popular parlance in the 1908s.  The presence of Stanford University and the increased concentration of hardware, software and computer development has fostered a culture of innovation that made it the centre of the dot com boom and continues to inspire startups pushing the technical edge creating a frisson that has a global ripple.

Imitation is the sincerest of flattery so the expression goes so I suppose it is no surprise that the eager and ambitious fancy a little of the Silicon magic wherever they are and London is no exception.  I have curiously been to gatherings at Silicon Hill (West London around Notting Hill Gate) and Silicon Triangle (West London including what is known as the TV Triangle) but the real money is on Silicon Roundabout in East London; it encompasses Shoreditch, Hoxton and Old Street and is riding off the Government’s East London Tech City initiative.  An area more noted for its urban edge, the jostling of gritty side streets and the cacophony of traffic it is a far cry from the green vistas and wholesome homes of the Bay Area but it was no surprise that this is where Henry Chuks ran his inaugural Startup Accelerator Lab meetup last night which drew me out of my West London hideaway.  From the tiny app development unit under the Old Street roundabout, to the Red Dog Saloon, The Breakfast Club, the dinky Vietnamese Cay Tre, Zigfrid Von Underbelly, Mr Sykes The Modern Conceirge and Sh! Women’s Erotic Emporium in Hoxton Square I loved the buzz and the bustle of it.   Electricity Showrooms is as Square Meal puts it ‘a fabulous hybrid of Victorian public house, Moulin Rouge peacockery & basement disco with illuminated dancefloor’.  A world away from Silicon Valley and thank God for that.

100 Days of Awe is a playful project I set up to bring my attention to awe in my daily life. I see awe as wonder, a mixture of amazement and respect.  I expect the experience of awe to be about perception shifting awareness and that demands a reframing of some sort.  I am excited to see what will awe me on this journey.

Anne K. Scott is an imagination technologist, her work to teach, facilitate and deliver innovation for individuals and business.  She is the creator of FindYourMojo a FREE iPHone productivity app. If you are interested in what intuitive coaching can do for you please do contact me.  I support clients all over the world.