Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

I’m over-paying for every check I write into the VC ecosystem and valuations are being pushed up to absurd levels and many of these valuations and companies won’t hold in the long term. On the one hand, you’re over paying for every investment and valuations aren’t rational. dot-com bonanza. Seed has become an option factory for many.

Venture Capital 471

Venture Capital Writing Invest Pricing 471

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 23, 2023

When do you sell your company? Those of us in the business of calculating (guessing) this mythical peak in value often make the same mistake as our entrepreneurs. Companies sometime run out of cash in the midst of their increasing success, and often find that sources of loans or investment are not freely flowing at the moment of need.

Pricing 156

Pricing Invest Equity Entrepreneur 156

Berkonomics

MAY 9, 2024

Conversely, a fast-growing industry lifts most all good participants, making excellent companies excel even more and grow even faster, like a small plane flying at 150 knots with a 75-knot tailwind. Some great ideas just cannot be made into a product at a reasonable enough price to attract customers. How large is your total market?

Patents 156

Patents Pricing Ideas Marketing 156

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 30, 2021

Therefore, the least you can do is take advantage of some of the self-assessment tools and guides around, like the classic book “ The Entrepreneur Equation ,” by Carol Roth, which highlights personal characteristics and skills required. It helps to work in a similar company before you start your own. Take stock of whom you know.

Entrepreneur 169

Entrepreneur Startup Statistics Guide 169

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 20, 2020

Even if you ignore all the hype around crowdfunding, there can be no doubt that it is a real alternative for entrepreneurs to achieve visibility and funding today. With this model, a startup pre-sells their product early, at a cheaper price, in exchange for a pledge. Product pre-order model. Donation good-cause model. In the U.S.,

Entrepreneur 129

Entrepreneur Outsource Development Satisfaction Equity 129

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 11, 2019

He is regarded by many as the number-one authority on virtual staffing and personal outsourcing, and is himself a successful entrepreneur based in the Philippines. I was impressed with his summary of the top ten outsourcing mistakes made by entrepreneurs, followed by real guidance on how they can and should be avoided. Be flexible.

Outsource Development 121

Outsource Development Outsource Entrepreneur Summary 121

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 8, 2014

Portfolio company support & analysis. Associates often shadow partners at board meetings so that they can help follow up with the company on important initiatives between board meetings. Most associates need some entrepreneurial experience before actually making investments. Portfolio community building. Industry reviews.

Help 365

Help Invest Venture Capital Technical Review 365

Berkonomics

JUNE 22, 2023

Conversely, a fast-growing industry lifts most all good participants, making excellent companies excel even more and grow even faster, like a small plane flying at 150 knots with a 75-knot tailwind. Some great ideas just cannot be made into a product at a reasonable enough price to attract customers. How large a total market?

Patents 286

Patents Pricing Ideas Marketing 286

TechCrunch LA

AUGUST 12, 2022

We gained sort of a cult following because we had healthy meals at an accessible price point.”. Deerman had watched other meal delivery companies, like Munchery and Sprig , close years earlier and had gotten creative with the company’s business model as a result. On days when we did the ‘Positive Popups,’ people loved it.

Invest 175

Invest Los Angeles Startup Funding 175

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 30, 2018

One of the hardest things about the fund-raising process for entrepreneurs is that you’re trying to raise money from people who have “asymmetric information.” VC firms see thousands of deals and have a refined sense of how the market is valuing deals because they get price signals across all of these deals.

Venture Capital 324

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Invest 324

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

With the appearance of do-it-yourself services on the Internet, entrepreneur curriculums at every university, and a wealth of new books on the subject, the need for expensive consultants and business advisors has also been mitigated. Minimize investment in prototypes and tooling. Savings here can easily reach another $10K per month.

Entrepreneur 162

Entrepreneur Startup Social Media Outsource Development 162

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 25, 2013

Someone on Quora recently asked me to answer the following question: Why Do Digital Entrepreneurs Hate MBAs? Tech entrepreneurs' consternation with MBAs does not rise to the level of loathing. As noted in Startup Advice From College Dropouts , successful entrepreneurs are often poor students. Look For MBA Outliers.

Entrepreneur 279

Entrepreneur Technical Review Case Study Class 279

Berkonomics

MARCH 25, 2012

For those of us who’ve invested in early stage companies, especially technology startups, we have confronted a universal problem. There are many ways to project the value of a company for purposes of pricing an investment, but all rely upon the revenue and profit projections of the entrepreneur as a starting point.

Invest 321

Invest Startup Email Competition 321

Berkonomics

JANUARY 6, 2022

First, the marginal exit event: Sometimes the end game or sale of the company is not a happy event for the early investors, including the entrepreneur or the founders. Promissory notes come before any equity, and most late equity investments come before early equity investments, even of the same class of security.

Venture Capital 156

Venture Capital Sales Pricing Equity 156

Berkonomics

JANUARY 28, 2021

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve walked away from deals where the entrepreneur insists on a start-up pre-money valuation that is so high, no angel could expect to make a return upon the investment, even with a reasonable sales price for the company down the road. Here’s the “what.”. And here’s the “why.”.

Outsource Development 156

Outsource Development Startup Outsource Venture Capital 156

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 30, 2015

I’m so tired of seeing young entrepreneurs get screwed by their angel investors on convertible notes and I know I can’t convince you not to do it so I’d like to offer one simple bit of advice to help you avoid getting screwed (at least on one part of your note). If you raise at a lower price they will own more than 9%.

Entrepreneur 150

Entrepreneur Pricing Venture Capital Angel 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

Me: At what price? Him: It wasn’t priced. So you did raise with a price. It’s just a maximum price. Convertible notes have both features in them but for some reason entrepreneurs don’t understand it. It’s like we need a finance 101 course for entrepreneurs. We raised a seed round.

Venture Capital 417

Venture Capital Capital Pricing Doc 417

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

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 22, 2011

Feature, not a company. Whether something is a feature or a company is clearly subjective. And sometimes features (say, Twitter) turn into companies. I talked in specifics about a bunch of my investments including Factual , MongoLab , Maker Studios and Gogii (maker of TextPlus ). It has always stood out in my mind.

Company 295

Company Companies Gogii Google 295

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

It is perfectly OK for you to want to grow your company and plan to keep control for you and your offspring, with no intention to sell. Of course, you will find yourself in opposition to your investors and some of most of your board members if you do this after taking outside investment. The advantage of creating an evergreen company.

Equity 156

Equity Course Sales Invest 156

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2010

This is the third article in a series on what it takes to be a great angel investor (and why this should matter to entrepreneurs). 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. That’s what he knows best.

Invest 284

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 284

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2010

I pointed to several Economist articles I had read that mapped historical prices of real estate for 400 years and how on average property values grow at no more 1.5% above inflation yet in many markets in the US & Europe prices were rising at 10-25% per year. Logic tells me the following: It is hard to make money angel investing.

Invest 299

Invest Angel Technical Review Venture Capital 299

InfoChachkie

SEPTEMBER 17, 2012

However, certain questions can be tricky for an entrepreneur to answer. Below are five common questions an entrepreneur will encounter when seeking venture funding. Handled appropriately, these questions provide investors a window into an entrepreneurs’ soul, which minimizes the chances of a future misalignment.

Entrepreneur 253

Entrepreneur Google Invest RSS 253

Berkonomics

JUNE 8, 2017

Email readers, continue here…] Bootstrapping: This term describes your ability to start a business with little investment and grow it using internally-generated funds. You will realize much more from the ultimate sale of your business even if at a considerably lower price than if splitting the proceeds with investors.

Venture Capital 266

Venture Capital Class Invest Equity 266

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

He is regarded by many as the number-one authority on virtual staffing and personal outsourcing, and is himself a successful entrepreneur based in the Philippines. I was impressed with his summary of the top ten outsourcing mistakes made by entrepreneurs, followed by real guidance on how they can and should be avoided. Be flexible.

Outsource Development 138

Outsource Development Outsource Summary Training 138

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

What price? Because entrepreneurs often went to lawyers at their earliest stages to get their company registration done. Entrepreneurial lawyers like Don Lee , Dave Young or Ted Wang are good at sussing out which entrepreneurs are high potential. I tapped my friends at big tech companies (Salesforce, Google, Oracle).

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Startup Pricing Invest 347

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

This is the second article in a series on what it takes to be a great angel investor (and why this should matter to entrepreneurs). Just ask the people who poured money into once “hot&# companies like RazorGator or Friendster. lots of brand names piling on) can lead to group think and price creep. Obviously.

Invest 288

Invest Angel Web 2.0 SEO 288

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 11, 2021

Venture capitalists sometimes make an error in directing their portfolio company CEOs to push resources to the limit and scale the business to immense size quickly, all to seize market share. It was true for Amazon and other visionary companies that grabbed market share during the early Internet era. But beware.

Venture Capital 156

Venture Capital Social Media Invest Marketing 156

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 23, 2013

One of the toughest decisions for a startup is how to price their product or service. The alternatives range from giving it away for free, to pricing based on costs, to charging what the market will bear (premium pricing). In this more traditional product pricing model, the price is set at two to five times the product cost.

Pricing 116

Pricing Product Custom Customer 116

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 8, 2014

” It’s the most common refrain I hear from investors and even entrepreneurs these days. ” I hear it when I visit LPs (the people who invest in VCs) all across the country, “Yeah, I haven’t been out there for a few years but I keep hearing that something is going on there.” But even this is changing.

Entrepreneur 376

Entrepreneur Snapchat Startup Google 376

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2023

Most entrepreneurs relish being their own boss, but find the transition to “ownership thinking” to be more difficult than anticipated. Incidentally, if you never thought of yourself as being an A-Player employee, you probably will struggle even more in the competitive entrepreneur world.

Entrepreneur 85

Entrepreneur Custom Customer Competition 85

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

I had a picture in the office of my first company with the logo above and the capital letters JFDI. (In In case it’s not obvious it’s a play on the Nike slogan, “Just Do It.&# ) I believe that being successful as an entrepreneur requires you to get lots of things done. Good entrepreneurs are wrong often.

Entrepreneur 414

Entrepreneur Technical Review Slides CTO Coach 414

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 19, 2022

Even if you ignore all the hype around crowdfunding, there can be no doubt that it is a real alternative for entrepreneurs to achieve visibility and funding today. With this model, a startup pre-sells their product early, at a cheaper price, in exchange for a pledge. Product pre-order model. Donation good-cause model. In the U.S.,

Funding 141

Funding Startup Outsource Development Satisfaction 141

TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 7, 2020

Launched by Karen Rodgers O’Neil, a longtime marketing executive, and Daniel Perrone, a serial entrepreneur and technology executive whose previous company, BroadMap, was acquired by Apple; The Shed hopes to take the rental model that Home Depot has turned into a billion dollar business line and take it to the masses.

Startup 285

Startup Product Demand Los Angeles 285

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2010

Every investment so far in this YC batch (and there have been a lot) has been done on a convertible note.&#. I’ve written about the topic of convertible debt at length before specifically about how angels & entrepreneurs should think about pricing. a priced/valued preferred stock financing)?

Equity 319

Equity Pricing Venture Capital Entrepreneur 319

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. ” 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

NOVEMBER 9, 2020

Most entrepreneurs relish being their own boss, but find the transition to “ownership thinking” to be more difficult than anticipated. Incidentally, if you never thought of yourself as being an A-Player employee, you probably will struggle even more in the competitive entrepreneur world.

Entrepreneur 159

Entrepreneur Custom Customer Competition 159