Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

If you truly believe that you, your company and your products are exceptional and your company will be valuable then you’re actually doing them a FAVOR by helping them invest in your startup. If you don’t believe in your bones that you’re amazing then it’s no wonder you don’t want to sell them on making the investment.”

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2017

Every tech or major news journal in the country is preparing to write their Snap, Inc (creators of Snapchat, Spectacles, etc) stories and many of them seem to want a “How does it feel to have missed this investment story.” My job as a VC isn’t to beat myself up or any other partner up for the one deal we didn’t do.

Snapchat 214

Snapchat Invest Technical Review Dollar Shave Club 214

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 2, 2010

This is part of my series on Understanding Venture Capital. I’m writing this series because if you better understand how VC firms work you can better target which firms make sense for you to speak with. It in not uncommon to see a VC talk about “total assets under management&# as in “We have $1.5

Venture Capital 269

Venture Capital Funding Invest GRP Partners 269

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 29, 2010

I’m often asked by people, “how do I get into VC?&# Well, I know 3-4 VC jobs that are publicly available. The chosen candidate will probably have worked for a very reputable firm that is either in technology, consulting, investment banking, media or a startup. Plus, show my you can write! Yesterday.

Venture Capital 290

Venture Capital Technical Review GRP Partners Email 290

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

As a result I didn’t write my first venture capital check until March 2009 – exactly 5 years ago. At the time I pointed out: “If I had realized exits almost certainly it would be because I invested in a company that failed. “I think the best VCs help drive exits alongside their entrepreneurs.

Venture Capital 387

Venture Capital Downey Writing Press 387

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2010

They had received a term sheet from a VC and were wondering whether to work with this firm. This experience made me want to dig into my archives, re-write & publish this piece. I often tell people that raising venture capital is more difficult than getting married. Not so in venture capital.

Venture Capital 298

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Capital Help 298

TechCrunch LA

JULY 2, 2020

When it comes to venture capital, Los Angeles is a city on the rise. In the past year, it’s seen one of the most profitable venture-backed exits of any tech ecosystem (with the $4 billion sale of Honey to PayPal) and investors are minting billion-dollar companies in the region at a torrid pace.

Los Angeles 277

Los Angeles Venture Capital Capital Invest 277

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 21, 2010

In writing anything positive about any of the companies I’m not suggesting that it means that I prefer them to any of their competitors. Also, some of the deals I write about I have actually seen as part of their fund raising process. I just cover the companies that were funded that week. Others I have not. Really!).

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Capital Email Blogging 265

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 13, 2020

Riot Ventures , the Los Angeles-based, early-stage and deep technology investment firm is going out to market to raise a $75 million second fund to finance the development of startups in LA and beyond, according to fundraising documents viewed by TechCrunch. Marcus has a long background in angel investing and company creation.

Los Angeles 126

Los Angeles Artificial Inteligence Invest Angel 126

SoCal Tech Calendar

OCTOBER 31, 2016

Prior to co-founding Foundry Group (link is external), he co-founded Mobius Venture Capital and, prior to that, founded Intensity Ventures. Brad has been an early stage investor and entrepreneur since 1987. Brad is also a co-founder of Techstars (link is external).

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Writing Blogging Activity 100

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2010

I’d rather be Roger Ehrenberg with a thesis around data-centric companies and base my investment decisions on the skills I’ve developed in my career. To some extent Keith Rabois agreed with me about domain knowledge and argued that most of his investments are in the consumer Internet space as a result. Always have been.

Invest 284

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 284

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2011

I recently filmed a show for This Week in Venture Capital in which I talked about how to prepare for a VC meeting: whom you’ll meet, who should attend from your side, what materials you should bring and how you should run the meeting. The “Triple Play&# of VC Presentations. I funded them 8 weeks later.

Venture Capital 299

Venture Capital Slides Technical Advisors Startup 299

TechCrunch LA

JULY 21, 2020

When Upfront Ventures partner Kara Nortman first met Natalie Portman a few years ago to talk about ways their non-profit organizations All Raise and Time’s Up could collaborate, she never realized they’d eventually be partners on a sports franchise. “We’re venture capitalists.

Writing 171

Writing Los Angeles Equity Startup 171

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2009

When venture capitalists scale back investing activities it can be very swift and leave many companies that are in the process of fund raising hung out to dry. I would argue that the shut-down of September 2009 was equally severe yet there are signs that this “VC Ice Age” has begun to thaw. Short answer – yes.

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Venture Capital Startup Invest Funding 263

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

If you track the venture capital industry it would be hard to miss the conversation going on this week over AngelList “Syndicates.” My favorite new VC blogger, Hunter Walk, weighed in with some thoughtful comments about how Syndicates might actually pit, “ angel vs. angel.” Bowery Capital).

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Generally speaking in venture capital financings the legal documents will specify that only “major investors” (a threshold set in the agreement – which can be $500,000 investor or more). We led an investment round in a company a while ago in which we wrote a seven-figure check and have taken a board seat.

Venture Capital 352

Venture Capital Seed Funding Email Blogging 352

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

This is a post I’ve been dying to write for 18 months. I invested in LA-based Gogii , one of the fastest growing, most exciting mobile social networking companies you’ve never heard of and maker of a product called textPlus. I only recently invested and I only got here through persistence. But I never gave up.

Gogii 310

Gogii Invest Blogging Startup 310

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 25, 2013

But VC is like congress. In the original version of his post, Andy writes. “This essay is dedicated to the great VC’s on my board who I am lucky to work with: Sameer Gandhi from Accel, Jeremy Liew from Lightspeed, and Kirsten Green from Forerunner. . Their data looks at tech VCs. Because they know him or her.

Venture Capital 374

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Invest Funding 374

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 17, 2017

He eventually founded and sold consumer health firm ViSalus to a public company and is now back making investments, in technology companies, as a venture capitalist here at Los Angeles-based HashtagOne (www.hashtagone.com). What's the theme of your investments? That's why we have investments in Heal, Saucey, and FragMob.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review Software Review 100

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 14, 2018

I know all of this because every VC knows this because we’ve all either funded companies that have marketing technology or we’ve seen a pitch with a company that does this. If you haven’t read the other VC fund-raising posts I’ve done as part of this series you can find the whole outline and this first in the series here.]

Funding 239

Funding Venture Capital IP Email 239

socalTECH

JUNE 27, 2013

Despite the increase in startup activity in Southern California, local venture capital funds are still few and far between, and a large chunk of the funding here is still from Sand Hill Road. As you probably know, two thirds of our investments go into Los Angeles. Tell us about the new fund? It''s the single best.

Funding 196

Funding Venture Capital Los Angeles Social Media 196

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. Logic tells me the following: It is hard to make money angel investing. For venture capitalists this isn’t troubling. It was an investment management class. Why should you care?

Invest 299

Invest Angel Technical Review Venture Capital 299

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

I’d rather be Roger Ehrenberg with a thesis around data-centric companies and base my investment decisions on my background. I should say that I agree that naive optimism in entrepreneurs can produce higher beta (upside or flops) and that’s good from an investment standpoint if you’re looking for big returns.

Invest 152

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 152

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Capitalism is fundamentally about timing, since market competition is about finding opportunities before others. When should a VC invest? Start writing down predictions about people, companies, and markets. Between TechCrunch today and my former roles in venture capital, I’ve had the opportunity to practice timing a lot.

Venture Capital 202

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Invest 202

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

VC's love to talk about their successes. Yet most VC's bury their failures under six feet of denial. In the startup world, the former happens when a VC makes a bad investment, and the latter occurs when they miss a great opportunity. In retrospect, our decision was both perfectly rational and completely lame. Unicornless.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 3, 2012

I had this ethical dilemma pop up on one of the first deals I even did as a VC. ” I was learning which VCs I wanted to work with, what stage & check size I wanted to commit do and what teams would be a good fit for me. .” The call from a fellow VC to “look harder” made me decide to request a site visit.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Writing 356

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 6, 2022

There’s no straightforward road for Meta to follow, they have to blaze a trail where others are actively failing and keep the rest of their company together while they do so. I’ve been writing quite a bit about crypto lately, and this week I dug into a particularly interesting facet of the industry called DAOs.

Marketing 246

Marketing Newsletter Technical Review News 246

socalTECH

AUGUST 30, 2016

The Tech Coast Angels , Southern California's biggest angel investment group, says its performance record and returns on its investments are higher than the average angel, in nearly all categories, based on a new academic study. in active investments. According to the TCA, it had a 3.3x average of all angels.

Tech Coast Angels 133

Tech Coast Angels Angel Truecar Southern California 133

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2018

Or if you’re a VC raising from LPs you have to list all of your deals, your investment value, your carrying value, your multiples, your IRRs, TVPIs, DPIs, etc along with net cashflows plus your previous LPAs. These collective sets of documents form the basis of what somebody looking at investing would call “financial due diligence.”

Funding 336

Funding Venture Capital Startup Email 336

socalTECH

AUGUST 20, 2018

Nichols is a former Kauffman Fellow and investment director at Intel Capital, and tells us how his fund--which he co-founded with Atom Factory's Troy Carter--is looking to find companies solving large problems outside of the typical Silicon Valley bubble. Talk about Cross Culture, what your investment areas are?

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Invest Capital Startup 100

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 5, 2010

Last week at an angel investor forum I was privileged to meet Stephanie Spong, who is a Principal with EPIC Ventures, an increasingly rare early stage VC firm. Stephanie: I am a venture capitalist currently based out of Santa Fe, New Mexico, with EPIC Ventures. Stephanie: I love building companies. Marty Zwilling.

Venture Capital 65

Venture Capital Capital Entrepreneur Competition 65

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2013

What I love about writing is that you inadvertently say what many others are thinking and just knowing that somebody else is thinking something similar can be reassuring. Example: Fred Wilson writing his end of 2012 post wrote. “I’ve wanted to write a year end post for days. ” I felt that way exactly.

Writing 313

Writing Venture Capital Blogging Startup 313

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 31, 2021

“The climate-oriented investment in Biden’s new plan would be roughly ten times what came through ARRA,” wrote Shayle Kann, a partner with the investment firm, Energy Impact Partners. ” Climate resiliency . Given the steady drumbeat of climate disasters that hit the U.S.

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 22, 2020

In their passion to succeed, too many entrepreneurs treat friends and family investments as “low-hanging” fruit, only to find out later, after a stumble, that the pain of lost relationships is greater than the loss of their beloved startup. Treat the transaction as you would expect to be treated by an angel investor or VC.

Funding 123

Funding Startup Equity Venture Capital 123

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

Chris Dixon is one of my favorite people in tech and writes one of the few blogs I read religiously. He and I once took different sides of an debate about whether “VC signaling&# in early-stage deals is a serious problem or not. Prior to starting FC, he was co-investing with David Frankel and Eric Paley as individuals.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

otherwise I prefer to invest less and risk less). Plus, most early-stage M&A fails so this isn’t likely a good use of capital for a young company). ” Stay lean and only raise a big round if you DO find product / market fit and which point you want to loosen the belt quickly and raise the capital to do so. .”

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

socalTECH

MARCH 16, 2017

Earlier this week, Derek Norton , a long time advisor to the media, Internet, and technology industry in Los Angeles, announced a brand new venture capital fund called Watertower Ventures (www.watertowerventures.com). I hate to put us into the pre-seed and seed area, so I am saying literally, first institutional capital.

Invest 145

Invest Funding Capital Startup 145