Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

I started my first company in 1999 and was admittedly swept up in all of this: Magazine covers, fancy conferences, artificial valuations and easy money. Between 2006–2008 I sold both companies that I had started and became a VC. Starting in 2009 I began writing checks consistently, year-in and year-out.

Venture Capital 466

Venture Capital Startup Marketing Pricing 466

socalTECH

OCTOBER 11, 2010

Last week, the University of Southern California 's Viterbi School of Engineering announced that it had established a new, business plan competition, the Maseeh Entrepreneurship Prize Competition ([link] specifically aimed at students in the engineering school. Why a business plan competition, and why in engineering school?

Competition 154

Competition Southern California Mentor USC 154

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

The VC market has right-sized (returned back to mid 90′s levels & less competition). Lower costs to start a business (95% reduction), many more companies created & funded by angels / seed. Just 3 years ago there was talk of institutional investors “not being able to write small enough checks.”

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

But what IS the right amount of burn for a company? Burn rate in case you don’t know is the amount of money a company is either spending (gross) or losing (net) per month. (it Conversely if you’re burning $600,000 per month (yes, some companies do) then you only have 5 months of cash left. Gross Burn vs. Net Burn.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 13, 2020

Outsourcing is defined as contracting the work to another company, usually located in a developing country, like India, China, or Eastern Europe. Saving cost won’t help you if you can’t make the daily innovations required to stay competitive. The same applies to manufacturing and almost any process these days.

Outsource Development 122

Outsource Development Outsource Software Review Technical Review 122

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 31, 2021

The sweeping infrastructure package put forward today by President Joe Biden comes with a price tag of roughly $2 trillion (and hefty tax hikes) but gives startups and the broader tech industry about $1 trillion worth of reasons to support it. Fables of the reconstruction.

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Capitalism is fundamentally about timing, since market competition is about finding opportunities before others. When should you start a company? What company should you start? When should you join a company? Start writing down predictions about people, companies, and markets. When should a VC invest?

Venture Capital 202

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Invest 202

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 10, 2010

However, to a Big Dumb Company (BDC), a startup’s IP is a thing of beauty. Patents held by startups generally have a limited ability to reduce competition. As such, they are hesitant to acquire a company which has not sought formal protection of their IP for two reasons. Intellectual Property (IP) is an ugly thing at a startup.

IP 256

IP Patents Company Companies 256

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

Prorata rights are one of the most important rights of a private market technology investors and yet are seldom fully understood. Prorata investments rights given investors the right to invest in your future fund-raising rounds and maintain their ownership % in your company as your company grows and raises more capital.

Guide 336

Guide Venture Capital Startup Writing 336

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. If you don’t read it and you care about tech & entrepreneurship, you should. If you like the quick summary notes, please check out Adam’s blog on tech, entrepreneurship & VC as a thank you.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

InfoChachkie

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

Too Techie - Tone down emphasis on the technology underlying your venture; an interested investor will perform tech diligence at the appropriate time. The Company. Competition. Who do I write the check to and where do I send it? No VC Fit - Match your venture with appropriate funding source. Opportunity.

Venture Capital 211

Venture Capital Summary Technical Review Template 211

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 1, 2010

A good early-stage CEO needs to be accessible, to be accountable for producing results and should be establishing the cultural norms of the company through direct leadership at all levels. But issues do arise as your company grows. I see two common mistakes in companies (not just in startups, in fact).

Startup 308

Startup CTO Coach Technical Review CTO Hire 308

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2014

If you’re a technology startup you need to excel at product, of course. While many tech startups do this intuitively (say, SnapChat thinking it would be much better if our photos out partying disappeared) it still happens. It’s worth a quick read. My argument is pretty simple. Look at Viddy & SocialCast.

Marketing 379

Marketing Startup SEM SEO 379

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2010

Burstly, a Santa Monica based company, provides an open and free ad management platform that helps mobile application developers better monetize their inventory. As I naturally get asked all the time why we invested in Company A or Company B, I thought I’d just put forth my thesis in writing. What does it do?

Mobile 282

Mobile Invest Company Companies 282

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 6, 2013

TechZulu caught up with co-founder Calvin Schemanski chat about their upcoming launch, their product and why Long reviews suck. myfab5 is a platform that reinvents the restaurant review. Unlike typical review sites, our platform does not use star ratings or long reviews. What is myfab5?

Software Review 79

Software Review Technical Review Writing Startup 79

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2 preamble issues having read the comments on TC today: 1: I know that the prices of startup companies is much great in Silicon Valley than in smaller towns / less tech focused areas in the US and the US prices higher than many foreign markets. There is an inherent value that any company has. I acknowledged this in the article.

Startup 336

Startup Pricing Technical Review Marketing 336

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

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 11, 2012

Tech Reporters: These individuals will write and edit informative and practical articles on a range of topics including Startups/Entrepreneurs, Gadgets, Mobile Tech, Tech in Entertainment, Gaming, Apps & Software, productivity, and cover breaking tech news. Take a look below and give us a shout. Contributors.

Technical Review 71

Technical Review Software Review Writing News 71

Xconomy

SEPTEMBER 29, 2016

With public interest in artificial intelligence technologies on the rise, five of the world’s largest corporations—vying against each other in so many spheres—are banding together to support research on the ethical and societal issues raised by machines with increasingly human-like capabilities.

Artificial Inteligence 40

Artificial Inteligence Technical Review Technical Advisors Research 40

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

This latest round valued the company in excess of a billion dollars, entering them into the overly-hyped Unicorn Club. In contrast, low-volume, high-conviction investors like Rincon only invests in a handful new companies each year, making it much more costly (in dollars and effort expended) to invest in a loser.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

InfoChachkie

OCTOBER 15, 2012

There are many paths into the VC world, but they can generally be lumped into two categories: (i) serial entrepreneurship, and (ii) tech-oriented investment banking. I define a "VC" as, "a professional investor who deploys third-party funds into relatively early-stage companies." Microscopic Industry. Manipulate Your Odds.

Venture Capital 242

Venture Capital Technical Review Invest RSS 242

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

AngelList 101 : As you know, AngelList is a platform where angels can invest in semi-screened tech deals. 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). So What’s the Big Deal?

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

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? When I was fund raising for my second company we had agreed a company-wide deal with Salesforce.com to use our product.

Pricing 292

Pricing Entrepreneur Technical Review Venture Capital 292

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 8, 2014

Outsourcing is defined as contracting the work to another company, usually located in a developing country, like India, China, or Eastern Europe. Saving cost wont help you if you cant make the daily innovations required to stay competitive. The same applies to manufacturing and almost any process these days.

Outsource Development 95

Outsource Development Outsource Offshore Software Review 95

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2014

It’s super hard not to want to spend more time with these companies. I reviewed a deal for a friend of mine tonight. He wanted to know what I thought of his technology deal. Competition is fierce. I always ask when somebody sends me a deal, for example, are you already a shareholder in the company?

Venture Capital 333

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Email 333

socalTECH

APRIL 29, 2014

A number of teams have recently been looking to turn that vision into reality, as a result of the Qualcomm Tricorder Prize , a $10M competition being run by the X Prize Foundation to create a real life Tricorder. That''s essentially how the Tricoder competition was formed--it''s time for this to happen. Mann implantable device area.

Startup 262

Startup Competition Software Review UCLA 262

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

This is an updated post from my ongoing series on Startup Advice that I learned from founding two companies. . I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. They’re competitive. 15 companies North of $1 billion exit.

Outsource Development 333

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 333

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

This is an updated post from my ongoing series on Startup Advice that I learned from founding two companies. . I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. They’re competitive. 15 companies North of $1 billion exit.

Outsource Development 328

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 328

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 20, 2016

Outsourcing is defined as contracting the work to another company, usually located in a developing country, like India, China, or Eastern Europe. Saving cost won’t help you if you can’t make the daily innovations required to stay competitive. The same applies to manufacturing and almost any process these days.

Outsource Development 53

Outsource Development Outsource Software Review Technical Review 53

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2016

We All Know That Dollars into Venture Have Gone Up … As a starting point, we know that the dollars into venture have steadily rebounded to pre great-recession levels, with just under $30 billion committed to US technology venture capital in 2015. dollars going directly into portfolio companies vs. the funds themselves).

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Capital Marketing Seed Funding 150

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!” Exec Summary: Most companies (98+%) in the world (even tech startups) should be very profit focused. One of them is profitability.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 24, 2016

These exchanges are designed to promote competition between major health insurance companies in those states which, in theory, should lead to more generous health insurance plans that are offered at competitive costs for all Americans. The Future of Medical Benefits is Highly Competitive.

Startup 49

Startup Competition Study Writing 49

InfoChachkie

JUNE 4, 2012

As an entrepreneur, I helped create companies which achieved two IPOs and two trade sales totaling $385 million. Value is created through diligent hard work. No one has heard of you, your company or your solutions. Thus, you have negotiating leverage as long as a legitimate, competitive threat exists. Grant Exclusivity.

Entrepreneur 272

Entrepreneur Outsource Ideas Technical Review 272

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. Value is created through diligent hard work. 5) Allow Partners To Write Your Agreements. 4) Perform China Syndrome Market Analysis.

Startup 242

Startup Outsource Development Outsource Sales 242

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

After my company was acquired by Salesforce.com I was asked to stop blogging and they took over my blog as an asset in the sale of the company. 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.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

socalTECH

OCTOBER 4, 2010

The company provides SAT, ACT, and other similar test preparation courses and related software. To hear about the company, we spoke with Ramit Varma , co-founder of the company. I had worked as a tutor for Princeton Review, and Jake for Kaplan. Each of those three companies now work with around 30,000 students a year.

Software Review 178

Software Review Technical Review Education Startup 178

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series on Start-up Lessons that I learned from founding two companies. I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. They’re competitive. We helped the write out their requirements for a system.

Startup 151

Startup Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review 151