Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

There are many times when being overly capitalized before you’re ready is a negative. We’re going to start aggressively spend money on marketing our product. Plus, most early-stage M&A fails so this isn’t likely a good use of capital for a young company). We want a strong balance sheet (um, ok.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 31, 2021

The vast majority of those are nowhere up to modern codes. “From the invention of the semiconductor to the creation of the Internet, new engines of economic growth have emerged due to public investments that support research, commercialization, and strong supply chains,” the White House wrote. ” Climate resiliency .

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 11, 2011

I recommend you first review Dharmesh’s article and then listen to Naval’s thoughts. Value Prop Twitter Style : AngelList is the productization of raising startup funding. Venture Hacks is educating entrepreneurs on the game theory of how to raise venture capital. AngelList is the productization of that.

Startup 273

Startup Software Review Summary Technical Review 273

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

There is a battle between entrepreneurs who try to change the world and solve a meaningful problem and those who write take-down pieces with no apparent personal benefit other than attention. And not enough capital embracing these moonshots. Are we right in all of our assumptions and diligence? When we ship product.

Technical Review 417

Technical Review Startup Software Review Course 417

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Huge thank you to Steve De Long for the write up. Yeah, that was when I changed for me…” “…there was so much positive feedback on demystifying this one element of venture capital. If you are outside internet software we are not going to invest. Or, as always, summary notes available below. Is that when it became big?

Venture Capital 288

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Software Review 288

socalTECH

JULY 22, 2016

Rufus Labs is one of a number of hardware startups which have started to proliferate in the community, due to low cost hardware, 3D printing, and crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo. What's your product, and what is it used for? We're focused on a product which makes for a more efficient, safer, workplace.

Technical Review 100

Technical Review Startup Software Review CTO Hire 100

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

I had seen many cycles and decided that since I was going to do it all over again I should write about it. I decided to write about my experience and to be blunt. On December 3rd Brad Feld wrote a one paragraph blog post titled “ Raising Venture Capital &# in which he linked to my blog. That changed very quickly.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2009

This is a story of one of the risks of venture capital. But some companies have entrepreneurs that seem talented on paper, are in a space that seems interesting to investors and are able to raise venture capital early in the company’s existence. Our first big round of venture capital (our A round) was a whopping $16.5

Startup 299

Startup Venture Capital Technical Review Training 299

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2016

This has led VC & entrepreneur bloggers alike to similar conclusions: start raising capital early and be careful about having too high of a burn rate because that lessens the amount of runway you have until you need more cash. But the hardest question to actually answer is, “What is the right burn rate for your company?

Startup 150

Startup Capital Funding Invest 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

Or as I picked up from Bruce Dunlevie at Benchmark Capital (who I’m told took the quote from elsewhere). I plan to write a whole separate blog post about this quote because it’s always stuck with me. I wanted to write a follow up post because it was such an important lesson for me and so eye opening.

Startup 247

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Writing 247

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 12, 2018

Many people will write the history on why Ring became an enormously successful company and why it became a real-world unicorn in a world when many startups are anointed that merely on paper. Why did Ring become an enormous success when it produced a hardware product and the market keeps saying, “hardware is too difficult to scale?”

Startup 247

Startup Pricing Product Marketing 247

socalTECH

OCTOBER 4, 2010

The company provides SAT, ACT, and other similar test preparation courses and related software. I had worked as a tutor for Princeton Review, and Jake for Kaplan. We thought, we could put out a better product than Kaplan or Princeton Review, which would be more compelling, and also would tie in a strong social mission.

Software Review 178

Software Review Technical Review Education Startup 178

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2019

If you buy into the argument that a strong board can actually help you then this post will lay out how to help you have more productive meetings by preparing properly in advance. This can include: Fund raising, product development choices, sales, marketing effectiveness, competition, business development, M&A … whatever.

Startup 226

Startup Slides Metrics News 226

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

I find it amusing when a journalist writes an article about a prominent startup (either privately held or preparing for an IPO) and decries that, “They’re not even profitable!” Have easy access to capital by investors who are committed to building businesses at Interent scale. Is it one product line or multiple?

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

SoCal CTO

NOVEMBER 1, 2010

He had a partially built product. And he was still in the process of raising additional capital, so it was equity only. Bottom line, if there’s significant development, you need capital or a founder needs to go source the equity-only developers. He needed some kind of CTO and as well Developers. It can be done, but it’s hard.

CTO Hire 241

CTO Hire CTO Coach Equity Develop 241

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

I recall being impressed with Jeff, but I was concerned that he was creating a platform, which often requires a significant amount of capital, takes an extended amount of time to establish and can be subject to margin pressure as the enabling technologies become commoditized. Tech Diligence - Consider The Source.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

socalTECH

MARCH 12, 2013

The company--which is in the business of operating a content delivery network (CDN) to accelerate the delivery of web graphics, multimedia, applications, and more to end users-- recently disclosed it more than doubled its revenues in 2012, and has grown to over 230 employees--all due to a huge amount of demand for CDN services by its customers.

CTO Hire 248

CTO Hire Content Networking Web 248

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 8, 2009

Traction can simply mean showing that you’re making progress with customers, product development, channel partners, initial revenue as a proof point, attracting well-known angel investors, winning industry awards / recognition. It is code word for “I’m not ready to invest for whatever reason … I need more proof.&#.

Venture Capital 309

Venture Capital Guide Startup Technical Review 309

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. If a fund has a $25 million fund then you know they aren’t going to be writing $5 million checks!

Venture Capital 269

Venture Capital Funding Invest GRP Partners 269

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2010

. - Journalists don’t know enough about your company before the show, don’t have time for proper research, and you will be competing for their time afterward with 49+ other companies that want them to write about you. - Don’t put in the time to getting coverage until your product rocks. Total waste.

Tips 307

Tips Startup Press Blogging 307

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 25, 2016

It says that selling an airplane ticket for $500 and getting paid a $5 fees by the airlines (1% gross margin) is not the same thing as selling $500 of software that you built (>90% gross margin). The questions that a VC mulls before writing a check are precisely the questions you should be asking yourself. Market Size.

Startup 150

Startup Marketing Study SEO 150

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 10, 2010

Even if your company is not acquired and you elect to access the public capital markets via an IPO, the above tenets remain valid. This approach makes sense for the following reasons: You gain a year to write a thoughtful, defensible patent without delaying your filing date. The filing date is often the deciding arbiter in IP disputes.

IP 256

IP Patents Company Companies 256

socalTECH

MAY 18, 2010

As of the last four months, we've had about 200,000 plus downloads, a bunch of great write ups, and a lot of mom bloggers who have been reviewing the app and writing stories on it. How did you end up in the mobile market from last running an enterprise software firm? It's the same business, over and over again.

Mobile 168

Mobile .Net Pasadena Software Review 168

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

He listed all of the product releases that were up coming, the customers that were in the pipeline and where he saw his competition moving. They haven’t launched their next gen product – watch this space. Who can get help get access to their capital? No Dave S. = no knowledge of what BuddyTV is up to for me.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2010

I’m writing this post to make sure you’re all on that same playing field. Fortunately I was mostly a technology consultant, which meant that I coded computers, designed databases and planned system integration projects. He said, literally, I sh*t you not, “well, my report was due and I didn’t have much time.

Statistics 415

Statistics Startup Report Research 415

Tech Zulu Event

OCTOBER 11, 2012

The multi-tiered platform allows for money to be transferred between Facebook friends, the ability to click and purchase any item that you see on Facebook and through the published API’s, developers can integrate and write their own applications on top of the ZunguZ platform. As we know, developers always give their product a code name.

Software Review 92

Software Review Social Network Platform Technical Review 92

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

I will write more about this in the next 2 weeks. It’s like people arguing that there’s a beautiful beach house in 2006 that represents great long-term value due to scarcity of similar property. source: Capital IQ. I spoke about a lot of things during the keynote. If you are interested the Vimeo is here.

Pricing 309

Pricing Marketing Startup Venture Capital 309

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 27, 2010

No rule is ever absolute no matter how it sounds when one writes a blog. My company had raised venture capital in April 2001 but we were told that there may never be any more coming. But in these years I learned how to sell software – necessity is the mother of all invention. There is a lot of long-term value in loyalty.

Startup 285

Startup Venture Capital Sales Software Review 285

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

Product : You should build a product or a prototype. I’m a software guy so I’m sure there are cases where building isn’t feasible. You cannot be just a biz dev type, salesperson, marketing genius or whatever and divorce yourself from product. Great companies are built by having great products.

Angel 291

Angel Funding Venture Capital Startup 291

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

I continue to collect great content that is the intersection of startups, products, online and technology. aka: An Open Letter to the Next Big Social Network) - 500 Hats , November 1, 2010 I've held off writing this post for a long time, because I couldn't quite get my head around all the issues. but: Something is Still Missing.

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Startup Product Technology 175

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2011

Some investors are team focused, others market focused, others seems to look for product / market fit. Only then can I even care about product, market or their nebulous “fit.&#. I want somebody who can inspire you to produce great products but not know your trade better than you do. I love the design of your product.

CTO Hire 363

CTO Hire Technical Review Startup Demand 363

InfoChachkie

DECEMBER 2, 2009

No one wakes up and says to themselves, “I need to buy that product I have never heard of before.” Google’s market capitalization is in the stratosphere for a reason – keyword search advertising is highly effective. Co-Registration (CoReg) – CoReg opportunities arise once a user has registered for a third-party product.

Customer 164

Customer Custom Advertising SEM 164

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 5, 2010

As I write these words I’m aware that I could practically change the words AOL and Facebook for much of this section and with a few factual tweaks it might not be noticeable to the reader which of the firms I was talking about. Was it massively better software, better companies, better markets? It was mostly timing.

Social Network 318

Social Network Networking Web 2.0 Startup 318

SoCal CTO

MARCH 22, 2007

I am in the middle of writing up some of my thoughts on this and will post about it and let you know. We have been using LinkedIn for both sourcing recruits and reviewing backgrounds for recruits. Product Manager Entrepreneur Mark Geller SEO for Startups Startup Version 1.0 And, I dont like to copy and paste.

Blogging 150

Blogging CTO Coach CTO Hire Southern California 150

Frank Addante

JULY 30, 2007

Under Process, Over Deliver So, you need to develop a product? ► 2006 (20) ► December (2) Just Say What it Is 12 Proven Guidelines for Rapid Product Development. ► August (3) Venture Capital - What's the rush? Wireless & Voice Application Software) Exit: technology acquired Lesson: Timing is critical.

Startup 40

Startup Venture Capital Outsource Development Advertising 40

SoCal CTO

AUGUST 3, 2010

5 Lessons from 150 startup pitches - A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks , July 11, 2010 I just reviewed several hundred startup pitches for Capital Factory. The collapse of the IPO market and dysfunctional math in the venture capital community has stacked the odds against you. Not that I blame you! Here’s why.

Startup 217

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Software Review 217