Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

He also nails the reason why venture capital is still necessary to grow large businesses quickly in a world where the costs of running startups have fallen dramatically. “Why do founders want to take the VCs’ money? .” After all, growth equals high valuations and loads of venture capital!

Startup 390

Startup Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review 390

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 25, 2013

But VC is like congress. “I don’t know the exact math, but I hear it again and again: the top 2% of firms generate 98% of the returns in venture capital.” As you can see from the chart their data suggests there are about $25 billion of VC distributions per year in the US. Their data looks at tech VCs.

Venture Capital 374

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Invest Funding 374

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 21, 2014

The company--which develops software-as-a-service which helps local businesses manage scheduling, staff management, point of sale, ecommerce, marketing, and more--said the funding came from Bessemer Venture Partners, Institutional Venture Partners, Catalyst Investors, W Capital Partners and Montreux Equity Partners.

Tech Coast Angels 147

Tech Coast Angels Pasadena Angels Pasadena Venture Capital 147

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 21, 2014

Since 2009 we’ve been in an unequivocal bull market. Venture capitalists have raised increasing amounts of money from their investors (LPs) every year. An impressive number of new VCs have been created – most of them with new seed funds. Have sales bonus plans based on more than just sales targets.

Marketing 354

Marketing Case Study Metrics Sales 354

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

In a world where the economy only heads in one direction (read: 2009-2014) most investors & entrepreneurs forget to pay attention to gross burn. Gross margin (GM) is the amount of profit you make per sale of your product or service taking into account your total costs of selling that product or service.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

This thinking is largely driven by the venture capital industry (and subsequently Wall Street) who are in search of high margin, highly scalable businesses. It’s nearly impossible to get a services company financed by VCs. Why Shouldn’t Most Services Businesses Raise VC? It may be the right answer for you.

Services 332

Services Venture Capital IP Startup 332

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 12, 2013

I am thrilled to announce that we have added Hamet Watt as a Partner at Upfront Ventures. As more consumers were skipping commercials the idea of authentically integrating brands into media seemed obvious to me and ended up informing a lot of my investments in 2009 and 2010. They did development in SF and had the ad sales team in NY.

Invest 340

Invest Venture Capital Startup News 340

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

Kathy Sierra at Business of Software 2009 - Business of Software Blog , May 4, 2010 "In the old days, getting customers was easy. Draw Your Ideas - A VC : Venture Capital and Technology , May 16, 2010 I saw Jack Dorsey give this talk at The 99% Conference last month. You could just outspend. Tesla is not.

Startup 248

Startup Venture Capital Conference Social Media 248

socalTECH

APRIL 1, 2009

billion in the first quarter of 2009, down 65 percent from the $9.1 Interestingly enough the news for Southern California companies was not all bad--two Southern California exits, both sales to Medtronic, made up 30% of the venture liquidity in the quarter. billion generated in liquidity last year.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Southern California Acquisition News 100

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2010

They have marked-up paper gains propped up by an over excited venture capital market that has validated their investments. We haven’t hit that wall yet for three reasons: 1) not enough elapsed time, 2) the VC market is frenzied now, too and 3) we haven’t seen a market downturn since the volume picked up.

Invest 299

Invest Angel Technical Review Venture Capital 299

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 14, 2014

All the data actually suggests with the growth of mobile, inbound sales calls will double from 30 billion to 60 billion in 3 years (source: Kelsey). It’s why the first company I ever invested in as a VC – Invoca – just announced a $20 million funding by Accel Partners. Much more data in the full post.

Email 339

Email SaaS Venture Capital Google 339

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 20, 2015

VC funding. We love capital efficiency until we love land grabs until we abhor over funding until we get huge payouts and ring the bell for more funding until we attract every non-VC on the planet to invest in startups until it crashes and we start the cycle all over again none the wiser. I see it in many young pups.

Funding 150

Funding Venture Capital Startup Marketing 150

socalTECH

JANUARY 14, 2013

The firm said the funding came from Bessemer Venture Partners and DAG Ventures, and will go towards sales and marketing. Convertro raised $5M in a Series A in 2009. Zwelling is a serial entrepreneurs who has had some major successes, including EchoSign (acquired by Adobe) and YLighting (acquired by private equity).

Santa Monica 147

Santa Monica Advertising Equity Entrepreneur 147

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

Having street smarts with no inspirational ability to build teams can yield a great small business but will be difficult to scale into a large VC-backed business. So we as VCs search for entrepreneurs/founders who have the whole package or as much of it as possible. In the book they profile how VC worked in the early days (60s / 70s).

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital CTO Hire 293

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 1, 2011

But they weren’t there in 2009 when you were up late nights shitting yourself whether you really were smart for pursuing this idea. That was back when VCs weren’t so quick to respond to emails. I hope to offer experiences from being an entrepreneur and being a VC.&#. Just like a sales person at the end of a quarter.

Startup 391

Startup Blogging Venture Capital Writing 391

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2010

We held a 90-minute demo session where 150 of LA’s VC’s and senior technology executives watched the LPLA V2 group present in small groups of 12-15 each. The VC’s & executives were then asked to make “commitments&# (in writing) to 3-5 of the companies that they felt they could make some sort of contribution to.

Company 276

Company Companies Startup Southern California 276

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

Gogii came in my office in 2009 with three of the most talented founders I had seen. And Austin Murray runs sales & marketing – a role he also held at JAMDAT. Management, SVP North American Sales and SVP European Publishing. I have to love both – but it’s in that proportion. Everyone always asks why I blog.

Gogii 310

Gogii Invest Blogging Startup 310

socalTECH

APRIL 13, 2009

San Diego-based GreatCall , the telecom firm which runs the Jitterbug cell phone service, disclosed this morning that it is looking to hire over 150 employees for a new, Carlsbad-based customer service and sales call center. The company said it plans to have the 150 positions filled by the time the firm's offices open in May 2009.

San Diego 100

San Diego Venture Capital Services Capital 100

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2014

I first met Nick Halstead in 2009 when he was running a company called Tweetmeme (the predecessor to DataSift) who had invented the Retweet button and actually helped Twitter develop its early API. I remain as childishly giddy at Nick’s vision as I did in our conference hangout we had in 2009.

CTO Hire 309

CTO Hire Organization Google Course 309

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series Pitching a VC. Quick caveats: having fewer investors (3-5) is better than many investors (10-15) and PLEASE make sure you hire a great lawyer who has experience in doing start-ups to avoid pitfalls that will make VC harder down the line. They might be as hard as raising VC. It creeps people out.

Angel 291

Angel Funding Venture Capital Startup 291

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 21, 2011

When I first got into VC I decided I better have some investment themes. Nordstrom sales reps are trained to do this to, but of course they can’t know every customer that walks around the store. To be clear, that is excluding the sales uplift from the calls. 2) Harris Interactive IMShopping Poll (August 2009). (3)

Mobile 329

Mobile Advertising Media Marketing 329

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 25, 2015

The reason I’m thinking about the topic this morning is that several months ago Jason Spievak , the Founder & CEO of Invoca , the very first company I backed when I became a VC, started talking with me about whether he was the right guy to take the company to the next level.

Demand 150

Demand SaaS Startup Sales 150

Xconomy

JULY 21, 2016

Zingle, a Carlsbad, CA-based tech startup targeting the service industry and consumer-facing businesses with its messaging app technology, has raised $3 million in venture capital, according to a regulatory filing earlier this month. The company raised $1 million last year, according to a 2015 regulatory filing.

Technology 40

Technology Santa Barbara Venture Capital Venice 40

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 3, 2012

I thought I would be an investment banker, and I decided I was probably going to move to San Francisco to enter private equity, venture capital, or a startup. The natural progression from venture capital is into startups. It happens that I actually went to high school with Mark Davis of Kohort.

Startup 217

Startup Mobile Venture Capital Resource 217

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 9, 2009

Put your digital audio content up for sale with AudioMicro, simply and securely. VentureDea l - VentureDeal is a venture capital database that provides the latest information about venture-backed technology companies, venture capital firms and transactions in the United States.

Technical Review 40

Technical Review Stickam Web Conference 40

SoCal CTO

MARCH 12, 2007

Maybe its because Im 66", but I think most clothes shopping really stinks and when was the last time that a sales person was actually helpful. Mobile Internet Apple Facebook ► 2009 (32) ► December (3) Startup Software Developers Startup Software Development – Do Your Homework Be.

MyShape 150

MyShape CTO Coach Southern California CTO Hire 150

socalTECH

OCTOBER 17, 2017

Nimble's software connects to your email, social accounts, and more, and helps you track your customers, sales prospects, sales pipeline, and much much more. Jon Ferrara: I'd like to tell you a little story on how I scaled Goldmine in Canoga Park, bootstrapped with $5,000 without a dime of venture capital. Explain that?

Startup 113

Startup Canoga Park Email Google 113

Tech Zulu Event

JULY 16, 2012

.” Founded in 2007 by Ravishanker and a small group of computer science graduates from the University of California, Irvine, the University of Southern California and Harvard University, CallFire has achieved just under $10 million in sales, is profitable and has built that substantial user base–all without venture funding.

Venture Capital 89

Venture Capital Cloud Computing Class Education 89

Tech Zulu Event

AUGUST 13, 2010

Bootstrapping enterprise, marketing, Sales. . In 2009 my art blog www.johntunger.com earned $188,138 in gross sales from 205,839 unique visitors. Entrepreneurism / Monetization Funding, psychology , vc. . Entrepreneurism / Monetization music, Revenue, Sales. . Entrepreneurism / Monetization business, Sales. .

Guide 69

Guide Startup Venture Capital Entrepreneur 69

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 12, 2010

We had a special edition of This Week in Venture Capital this week shooting out of the Next New Networks offices in New York. Our guest was Mo Koyfman of Spark Capital. Topics we discussed in the first 45 minutes of the video include: What is VC like in NY? Metrics: 2.5mm members, 1,000 brands, 2,500 sale events to-date.

Venture Capital 217

Venture Capital Capital Metrics Competition 217

Tech Coast Venture Network

MARCH 9, 2011

Last year, venture capitalists and angels who co-invested with them placed $7 billion into seed and early-stage deals, an 11 percent increase from 2009, according to the most recent PricewaterhouseCoopers/National Venture Capital Association MoneyTree report. million in angel and venture capital.

Tips 100

Tips Capital Tech Coast Angels Screening 100

Tech.Co

MARCH 8, 2018

Andrew leads Daimler US’s M&A Technology and Venture unit, which is responsible for all VC related investments. Mateusz (Mat) Kaliski, Associate at Rubicon Venture Capital. Marissa Lowman, Investor at Village Capital. Marissa leads the Education Practice at Village Capital.

Technical Review 70

Technical Review Startup Software Review Entrepreneur 70

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 17, 2010

First, I’d like to quote (paraphrase) Brad Feld speaking at Twiistup in LA in 2009, “I keep hearing people in LA talking with a chip on their shoulders about building a tech business here relative to Silicon Valley. Funding is different – In Silicon Valley you have mega venture capital funds and many of them.

Company 290

Company Companies Technology Startup 290

socalTECH

OCTOBER 29, 2008

I figured out that it was easier to be close to our venture capital shareholders. is mainly some sales and delivery engineers. The sales guys are to promote and help develop our company here in the U.S., and the delivery engineers to help support sales by our sales team. Bruno Uzzan: We opened in the U.S.

Startup 100

Startup Advertising Los Angeles Sales 100

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 5, 2010

Two weeks after Brad’s post I was at the 140 Conference in LA and I held open office hours for any entrepreneur who wanted to spend 15 minutes talking with a VC about their business. He covered the topic again in June 2009 titled Invent, Invent, Invent. The world’s best brains are on sale. Crazy, huh? Let’s buy more!&#.

Technical Review 282

Technical Review Startup High Tech Software Review 282

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 16, 2011

But before you jump on the bandwagon, you should consider the advice I saw recently from the maven of venture capital, William H. In 1999, there were 486 IPOs nationwide; just 10 years later, in 2009, there were only 63. Draper III, in his new book titled “ The Startup Game.” The market is moving back up, but slowly.

Social Media 89

Social Media Media Draper Startup 89

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 10, 2010

Obviously if you’re in a customer support role, a sales role or a customer service industry this can be impossible. Next post: two “4-Hour Workweek&# like hacks I started in 2009 to try and take back control of my life that are saving me hours. Where I’m more disciplined is on Twitter.

Startup 295

Startup Email Technical Review Course 295