Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 8, 2017

Opportunity segmentation and competitive environment. List key competitors and alternatives, highlighting your sustainable competitive advantages, such as patents and trademarks. No mention usually means no plan and not competitive. This is your elevator pitch hook, which you must be able to deliver in 30 seconds.

Startup 65

Startup Writing Patents Competition 65

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 31, 2012

Many MBA programs still cater too much to the needs of large, corporate management jobs or prepare students to enter big consulting companies or investments banks. The idea that the course asks students to write public blog posts is a testament to its more modern teaching style. and in a related post about objection handling.

Startup 319

Startup Sales Course Competition 319

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 15, 2010

I give a sneak peek at a blog post I’m writing on the topic next week. Convertible debt is a loan to the company that doesn’t typically get paid back but rather “converts&# into equity when you raise a larger round at a later date. It was a verbal discussion on my post on distributed teams. -

Venture Capital 210

Venture Capital Seed Funding Pricing Southern California 210

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

If you know, VCs end up writing sizable checks into their own funds, which is important in better aligning interests. M&A discussions (where your company is buying or being bought). Therefore of course they need to be more selection when writing checks and can’t spread their bets across 75 deals. founder fighting.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

InfoChachkie

MAY 16, 2011

As an entrepreneur and startup investor, I have helped create companies which achieved two IPOs which collectively raised over $100 million, as well as two acquisitions which totaled $385 million. 5) Allow Partners To Write Your Agreements. Rationale: My company is small, I am super busy and I am not a lawyer.

Startup 242

Startup Outsource Development Outsource Sales 242

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 11, 2016

As a business advisor and advocate for entrepreneurs, I find myself almost always talking and writing about change. With a bit of humor, he provides some serious guidelines for struggling career professionals looking to move up, and new entrepreneurs looking to build a company. Anything less makes you non-competitive.

Startup 93

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Screening 93

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 2, 2014

As the capital needed to start a small business continues to fall, the number of software companies being started is exploding. There’s a lot of uncertainty in startup companies. Now, you’re handling payroll and doing writing as well. You may even discover that you enjoy writing more than crunching numbers.

Startup 102

Startup Social Media Writing Google 102

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 4, 2012

After you have successfully attracted angels or venture capital with your business case, your million dollar product idea, and you have a signed term sheet, there is still one more hurdle to overcome before investors write the check. A good investor can do a lot to help a company, but can't make customers buy products.

Technical Review 94

Technical Review Startup Writing Competition 94

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2010

This happens when the company has been making steady progress but hasn’t built enough “ proof &# to raise its next round of financing from external investors. a loan) that is later converted to equity at the time of the next financing. It starts as a debt instrument (e.g.

Startup 290

Startup Funding Venture Capital Pricing 290

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 is the CEO of Hunch , company that I believe is solving a very big problem that I have been telling entrepreneurs needs to be solved for the past 2 years. I’ve also found him to not be dogmatic either. West Coast”).

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2010

Recently I’ve been debating with a number of young startup companies that are raising money in the next few months, “what is the right about of capital to raise at a startup?&#. It places undue pressure early in the company’s history to “do big things&# when sometimes what is warranted is more prudence.

Startup 319

Startup Venture Capital Capital Competition 319

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 23, 2010

They’re not in search of price fixing or collusion, they’re in search of diligence information about the company. Have you looked at competition? How well financed is the competition? Convertible or equity? It’s called competition. It’s healthy competition. How well do you know them?

Pricing 292

Pricing Entrepreneur Technical Review Venture Capital 292

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 14, 2012

…” I’ll write soon on my views of why I believe Instagram took off as a social network and what I think comes next. What I want to talk about today is one of the insider baseball discussions of our industry this past week: The odd fact of the $500 million financing round completed just before the company sold for a B.

Venture Capital 316

Venture Capital Pricing Social Network Acquisition 316

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 22, 2010

After you have successfully attracted angels or venture capital with your business case, your million dollar product idea, and you have a signed term sheet, there is still one more hurdle to overcome before investors write the check. A good investor can do a lot to help a company, but can't make customers buy products.

Technical Review 90

Technical Review Writing Competition Tips 90

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2010

If I’m interested I get to spend more time with them, if I’m not I don’t have to – A few companies per month come in that have fascinating business ideas that warrant my spending more time trying to understand their people, company, technology and market. I will obviously be judged on my performance.

Venture Capital 312

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Entrepreneur 312

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 21, 2010

When to get a lawyer - If you plan to be a venture or angel backed technology company (what I mostly write about) the best time to start meeting and getting to know lawyers is long before you ever start your company. Many people start companies arse backwards. Our lives are intertwined.

Startup 318

Startup IP Southern California Entrepreneur 318

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

Growth like this, this early in a company’s lifecycle rarely happens. He did it yesterday, “Mark, I’m going to write a blog post following on from your VC’s aren’t dumb. VCs crave the ability to help portfolio companies. He is very pleasant when he calls and writes. Always seek input.

Tips 365

Tips Email Venture Capital CTO Coach 365

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 19, 2010

Most advisors will tell you to write the business plan first (20-30 pages), then distill the key points into a set of Microsoft PowerPoint slides for standup presentations to potential investors. Competition and sustainable advantage. List and position your competition, or alternatives available to the customer.

Slides 94

Slides Competition Sample Sales 94

InfoChachkie

JUNE 4, 2012

As an entrepreneur, I helped create companies which achieved two IPOs and two trade sales totaling $385 million. No one has heard of you, your company or your solutions. Evaluate their sincerity by asking them to accept equity in exchange for all or a portion of their overall compensation. Grant Exclusivity. Fallacy: Yes.

Entrepreneur 272

Entrepreneur Outsource Ideas Technical Review 272

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2013

Forcing yourself to write down a plan is actually the only way to make sure you actually have a plan. Ideally, they will have links to distributors you need, or even be investors in your company as well. File a provisional patent, register a trademark, and reserve your company domain names. Ship a minimum product now.

Funding 112

Funding Entrepreneur Startup CTO Hire 112

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 19, 2011

Don’t and you might make one catastrophic mistake that leaves you in the annals of Effed Companies. He is very hands-on and helpful – especially for any company looking into customer acquisition. Big thank you to Darius Vasefi , of EyeOnJewels for the write up. Here’s a summary of our interview.

Acquisition 304

Acquisition Startup Customer Custom 304

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 31, 2012

Forcing yourself to write down a plan is actually the only way to make sure you actually have a plan. Ideally, they will have links to distributors you need, or even be investors in your company as well. File a provisional patent, register a trademark, and reserve your company domain names. Ship a minimum product now.

Startup 104

Startup CTO Hire Press Customer 104

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 16, 2018

Without taking a dime of outside capital, the company has achieved impressive success in a competitive, SaaS market segment, landing companies such as Nike, Intuit, NASA, AutoDesk and PBS. What makes their story more remarkable, in the age of 20-something billionaires, is that both of the company’s founders are in their 50’s.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

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. an investment in your company. Somehow many first-time founders equate “sales” with something that is beneath them.

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

InfoChachkie

APRIL 3, 2012

Did you just meet the shy boy who spent his High School years writing in his journal or the boisterous verbal bully who used her wit to hide her insecurities? Did you play any team or individual sports competitively? Ask candidates to name the other companies they have targeted in their job search. Did they enjoy their jobs?

Entrepreneur 219

Entrepreneur Startup Equity Journal 219

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 17, 2011

Forcing yourself to write down a plan is actually the only way to make sure you actually have a plan. Ideally, they will have links to distributors you need, or even be investors in your company as well. File a provisional patent, register a trademark, and reserve your company domain names. Ship a minimum product now.

Startup 101

Startup CTO Hire Press Customer 101

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 1, 2016

That’s why it’s important to revisit your company’s mission from time-to-time. We try to hire deeply analytical associates to can help companies problem solve and who make us better investors. Take some time to reflect on how well defined you believe your company’s sense of purpose is.

Startup 150

Startup Coach Course Invest 150

From the Venture Trenches

MARCH 27, 2013

Yet despite his ability to raise over $1 billion of private equity and to build an organization that is worth $5 billion as of this writing, Mason was shown the door. What is the company’s use of proceeds? Are you passionate about running the day to day operations of your company and the challenge of growing your business?

Venture Capital 45

Venture Capital Capital Anthem Startup 45

socalTECH

MARCH 6, 2017

After I sold my last company, Shift, in May of 2015, I took some time off to look for the next thing to do. It seem that now, versus a few years ago, it's a lot more competitive to try to get out and acquire a user profitably for an app. You're known as quite the angel investor here in companies (ie.

Media 153

Media Mobile Startup Acquisition 153

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 22, 2010

Forcing yourself to write down a plan is actually the only way to make sure you actually have a plan. Ideally, they will have links to distributors you need, or even be investors in your company as well. File a provisional patent, register a trademark, and reserve your company domain names. Ship a minimum product now.

Tips 88

Tips Startup CTO Hire Press 88

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

I will write more about this in the next 2 weeks. As any historian of bubbles will tell you – there were periods of bubbles in assets as arcane as tulips , South American trading companies , dot-com bubbles & housing bubbles. Ah, but today’s Internet companies have real revenue! I believe that. and profits!

Pricing 309

Pricing Marketing Startup Venture Capital 309

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

There is much discussion online and also in small, private groups, about why the price of technology companies – public and private – are falling. Valuing any company can be difficult because it requires a degree of forecasting future growth & competition and ultimately the profits of the organization.

Startup 150

Startup Company Companies Venture Capital 150

Tech Zulu Event

AUGUST 28, 2012

From LA Demo Day to Silicon Beach Fest to Crowdstart LA to hackathons to Startup Weekends, companies and entrepreneurs alike have joined forces to feed the startup ecosystem. Startup Weekend is a 54-hour frenzy in which a group of strangers can come together to form a company and compete for prizes. domain for the company.

Startup 100

Startup Ideas San Diego Mentor 100

Jason Nazar

APRIL 18, 2009

2 years ago I was running 6 miles a day 3 times a week, and playing competitive basketball and tennis. . It was a little disconcerting to see my closest friends just write me off for the time being as someone who was never free to hang out. But for a long time they did stop calling me, knowing I always turned down plans for work.

Startup 85

Startup Pricing Social Network Writing 85

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 7, 2013

We get a lot more emails from women entrepreneurs who say they are a high net worth in their community and we should come and help boost the number of angel investors in their companies. The women in the program commit $5,000 and invest as a group of woman in a social venture in exchange for equity. That is something I am aware of.

Mentor 84

Mentor Invest Entrepreneur Startup 84

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

I’ve always been a big believer that just a couple of key individuals make all of the difference in a company’s success. 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. Patron Companies. The ingredients are all here.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 8, 2010

This continues my series of posts: Top 30 Startup Posts for July 2010 Top 30 Startup Posts in June 2010 Top 29 Startup Posts May 2010 Startup CTO Top 30 Posts for April 16 Great Startup Posts from March Here they are: How to Minimize Politics in Your Company - Ben's Blog , August 24, 2010 “Who the f@#k you think you f$&kin’ with.

Startup 191

Startup Venture Capital Blogging CTO Hire 191