Can Europe compete with Silicon Valley when it comes to smart young web start-ups? When so much of the venture capital money is still based in Palo Alto and Mountain View, it's hard to start a business in Shoreditch or Stuttgart which can take on the world. But in the last week I've met two - Huddle and Soundcloud - which seem to stand a chance, both by offering fairly simple utilities in the internet "cloud".
Huddle
Huddle is a company based in south London providing office space to users all around the world. No, not a property company, because the offices used by Huddle's customers are in a web browser. The aim is to allow organisations large and small to have an online space, where staff and clients can share documents, calendars, even a virtual whiteboard. You sign up and are then presented with your first "workspace", described in the blurb as " a secure space that you can share with others and use to manage a project, team or client relationship." So then you can invite colleagues to join you in your online office, editing documents, scheduling meetings,