ReadWriteWeb

In 1996, Josh James founded Omniture, a Web analytics company that sold to Adobe in 2009 for $1.8 billion. After selling Omniture, James founded a startup that's been in stealth until today. The new company, Domo (formerly called Shacho), is a business intelligence software-as-a-service and has received $43 million in funding, including $33 million from Benchmark Capital. According to a previous announcement, the angel investors included Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff, Ron Conway/David Lee and Andreessen Horowitz.

So what's the product that's being announced, now that this is out of stealth? I'm not sure.

That was the question I got asked the most during my time in Austin and San Francisco this month. Perhaps it's become the new ice-breaker at networking events. But also people are genuinely curious and unsure about whether the tech scene has entered another bubble. My answer to that perennial question over the years has never been focused on money and the valuation of companies. That's the way most commenters have addressed it over the past couple of months. Rather, I look at the state of product innovation in startups and big Internet companies. Are we still seeing innovation in web products and across market segments? For the most part, I think the answer to that is yes.

Based on the current state of innovation, I'd argue that we are NOT in a tech bubble at this time. We're seeing a lot of innovation in mobile, especially. Also with evolving trends like Internet of Things and tablets. The 'social media' market is one where we are seeing copycat products and 'me too' features, so that market has perhaps jumped the shark. But overall, I'd argue that we're not in a bubble.

There doesn't seem to be a week that goes by without someone lamenting the sorry state of the venture capital market or our favorite exit ramp: the IPO market. Granted, the overall number of offerings in the past 7 to 8 years has been paltry. Notable individual exceptions are Google (2004), SynchronOSS Technologies (2006) and, more recently, Open Table and SolarWinds (both 2009). But let's face it: if yours is a venture-backed company, you have had higher odds of being struck by lightening than going public in this first decade of the 21st century.

Credit crisis. Blah, blah. Cut costs. Blah, blah. Don't you just love it when you get an alarm call from your hotel at 9.15 when your meeting is at 9.00? At ReadWriteWeb we have been sounding alarms about the economy for a year (here, here, here and here...enough already), suggesting strategies to cope with the coming downturn.

But what about now? This is the time to be audacious. The world has changed, totally and irrevocably. Change is the entrepreneur's friend.