Penati on Silicon Valley 10 years ago
Luca Penati, managing director of Ogilvy’s global tech practice, first arrived in Silicon Valley 10 years ago. We asked Penati what he remembers about the region during that time.
Most people were still using Altavista and Netscape. The word “social” was rarely used, and never before “media” or “networks.” But at every Starbucks - from Santa Cruz to Pleasanton — everyone was talking about the next big thing. Everybody had an idea, a business plan. Everyone was able to “get funding.” Companies were changing their names, often adding a .com to the brand so their valuations could go up. Apple was launching the iMacs, then the iPod. It was boom time, things were crazy.
I had just arrived from Italy and my country had never seen such madness, at least not since the Renaissance! We would a few years later with the World Cup in 2006 — but that’s another story.
Most of the PR professionals I knew left their “boring” corporate or agency jobs to join a dotcom. The mirage, the hollow promise of becoming an instant millionaire was just too tempting to turn down. I was new to this market, loved my job, and was not interested in putting it at risk. And then, the bubble burst. And were in the middle of it. People who a few months earlier had left to get rich were calling me to get their jobs back.
