Boston Startups Very Active in Mobile

But acquisitions are just one aspect of her firm's growth strategy. Her broader advice to companies that want to work with IBM is to build a solid relationship around a customer first. "If you've worked at the same time with a client, or two or three, and it's gone then, at that time you start to scale and have a more strategic relationship," Magid says. And that applies whether it's a data management startup in New England, a sensor-network or smart-grid company in Europe, a software development shop in China, or a smart infrastructure firm in Africa or Latin America.

Wherever she goes, Magid makes use of local angel investors, venture capitalists, incubators, and startup competitions to help filter the companies she needs to get to know. Similar to the VC investment process, she evaluates the management team, the market, the innovation, and the fit with IBM—and if it all checks out, she says, "I give a heads-up to someone in the [software] business unit." At the time a business team will meet with the company to explore ways of working at the same time.

So, what's she seeing around Boston, as compared to the Valley and elsewhere? Magid thinks Boston VCs are more "considered" in their investments compared with their Silicon Valley counterparts. That's hardly surprising. What's interesting is how she sees New England as a "center of gravity" for companies in biotech, sure, nevertheless also in mobile technologies and cloud computing. As particular strengths, Magid points to mobile services, just as payments, ad serving, video, and location-based services, as so then as cloud infrastructure—technologies that enable companies in essence to outsource their IT needs for things like data storage, streaming video, and telemedicine.

—CloudBees, a recently-formed company focused on building a cloud-based platform for software development and production.

Of course, the relationship works both ways—IBM needs to keep its finger on the pulse of innovative startups and their investors. "But they've gotten to know us, and we have a great network," Magid says. "They trust us but."

Business, life sciences, and innovation news — covering Boston, Seattle, San Diego, Detroit, San Francisco, and beyond.