Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2018

This is a very common scenario when entrepreneurs pitch VCs and frankly is a very common scenario when VCs try to raise money from LPs. At night I had a group dinner where I met 6 new entrepreneurs and hung out with some old friends from law firms, banks and other VC funds. What do I do now? Your job is to break the convention.

Software Review 381

Software Review Startup Email Conference 381

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2013

Understanding “The Funding Angle” I sit at enough board meetings to hear conflicting advice given to entrepreneurs about how to handle PR and announcements at startups. I will add to this as I write more in the coming weeks on the topic. But succinctly this press places a marker in the ground for your company.

Startup 355

Startup Funding News Press 355

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. It should help some entrepreneurs to better access early-stage capital and should allow some angel investors better access to deal flow. million round I might write $1.8 – 2.2 This is the same way VC firms, by the way.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

Berkonomics

JUNE 11, 2015

It’s good advice; the theory being that entrepreneurs can discover the flaws in their business models sooner, make course corrections and move in a more favorable direction. In my case as a young software entrepreneur, I had a different approach: Fail Locally, one customer at a time. I became an entrepreneur by default.

Customer 120

Customer Custom Writing Southern California 120

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. It could be a family, sports, hobby, or TV.

Startup 93

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Screening 93

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2013

I’m very excited to be finally be able to announce that this week we’ve added Sam Rosen to our ranks at GRP Partners in the role of entrepreneurs-in-residence – EIR. He found creative ways to politely stay on my radar screen. I thought Sam might know some talented young entrepreneurs to apply. Jordan Hudson.

Startup 372

Startup Course Ideas Invest 372

socalTECH

MARCH 21, 2014

Terry Kay: We have always been about helping the entrepreneurs succeed, first, and then, we figure out how we get our fair share from that success. The premise was, let''s help companies succeed, and cut ourselves a fair deal, and treat entrepreneurs in a decent way. What does that mean to entrepreneurs? It''s more than money.

Pasadena Angels 162

Pasadena Angels Pasadena Angel Startup 162

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

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. They are likely taking losses on their first project with the entrepreneur so they select carefully.

Startup 361

Startup Venture Capital Pricing Technical Review 361

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

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. They are likely taking losses on their first project with the entrepreneur so they select carefully.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Startup Pricing Invest 347

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

You’re writing a freaking blog post! I do what I wish all entrepreneurs would do. It’s an entrepreneur with whom I’ve been wanting to work for 6 years. It was a young, first-time entrepreneur who wanted to meet. I never get grumpy that people write. If you do randomly write me I have advice.

Email 314

Email Product Startup Writing 314

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2012

I’ve wanted to write a blog post called “Mobile Second” for a long time to make this point more forcefully. The power of large screen real estate. Try writing long reviews of a restaurant. People forgot that Fred also wrote “Web Second.” The power of a keyboard. Fred’s post was right.

Web 334

Web Mobile Startup Software Review 334

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 8, 2016

Business success is all about having the best team, yet the average entrepreneur has little prior experience with hiring people and building top-notch teams. Most new entrepreneurs assume their passion will attract and motivate the right team members. Utilizing unprofessional sources for candidates.

Organization 57

Organization Entrepreneur Satisfaction Screening 57

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 8, 2009

Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of thinking that funding is something you do in “funding season,&# some mythical 2-month period when you’re ready with a great Powerpoint deck and you hit up all of the VC’s at the same time so that you can quickly raise money and get back to the job of building a business.

Venture Capital 309

Venture Capital Guide Startup Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 25, 2010

Any SoCal entrepreneur raising early-stage money should put Rincon on their short list. I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while and was going to use AngelList by Nivi & Naval as the basis for my example and the perfect prompt came yesterday when I read Fred Wilson’s blog post on AngelList.

Guide 293

Guide Funding Venture Capital Technical Review 293

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

If you’re raising a round where a new lead investor would invest $5 million the VC fund must have no less than $100 million and if you’re looking for them to write $15–20 million as the lead their fund realistically should be at least $400 million. Remember, I was an entrepreneur for 10 years before a VC).

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 26, 2011

I have often said that what separates real entrepreneurs from pundits and bystanders is a bias towards getting things done versus over analyzing things. The startup entrepreneur knows that they’re going to be wrong often. I’m not arguing that no screening is required. Great entrepreneurs find a way. But here’s the thing.

Startup 335

Startup Technical Review Framework Entrepreneur 335

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Huge thank you to Steve De Long for the write up. Either it’s a bunch of pictures or screen shots or it’s a bunch of words. If you have time check out the video (or download on iTunes – Episode 27 - and listen at the gym or on your commute!). Or, as always, summary notes available below. Is that when it became big? was starting.

Venture Capital 288

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Software Review 288

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

This is a post I’ve been dying to write for 18 months. OK, that sounds like an interesting business, but nothing to write a freakin’ blog post about? At JAMDAT he designed the most successful mobile games – (Bowling, Bejeweled Multiplayer & Solitaire) and knows what drives engagement on “the small screen.&#

Gogii 310

Gogii Invest Blogging Startup 310

socalTECH

JULY 22, 2016

Gabe Grifoni: I had actually transitioned to the writing side, and focusing on tech. That got me to CES for some technical writing and journalism, and I started checking out the scene. However, that's really a device from the 1800's with a screen, and that didn't seem like the way to go.

Technical Review 100

Technical Review Startup Software Review CTO Hire 100

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. Ernst & Young – World Entrepreneur Awards – FINALIST (Annex.13).

Software Review 92

Software Review Social Network Platform Technical Review 92

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. Write things down. We helped the write out their requirements for a system. I hate losing. I don’t want to lose next time. Be gracious.

Outsource Development 333

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 333

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. Write things down. We helped the write out their requirements for a system. I hate losing. I don’t want to lose next time. Be gracious.

Outsource Development 328

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 328

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2011

A huge shout out to Ricky Wong of NYCSteals for helping me with the write-up. He knew he was an entrepreneur because he couldn’t stop thinking about ideas. You are also less likely to be an entrepreneur when your personal obligations, like family and mortgage pile up. And when there is a spark, go for it.

Startup 286

Startup Venture Capital Web Ideas 286

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 14, 2014

Only naive people believe that but for inexperienced entrepreneurs you can be fooled into the narrative by the press who sometimes write stories without the actual data. The reduction in screen size has made the economic model of Internet advertising totally inefficient. PHONE CALLS. Enter phone calls. Not so fast.

Email 339

Email SaaS Venture Capital Google 339

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2010

The VC’s & executives were then asked to make “commitments&# (in writing) to 3-5 of the companies that they felt they could make some sort of contribution to. Walk into any Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf in Southern California and you can’t miss their digital screens.

Company 276

Company Companies Startup Southern California 276

Steve Reich

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

They have to be aggressive, and they have to be willing to write a check. Getting Angel funding can be a challenge–you have to submit a business plan/presentation, survive the screening process, and then deliver a compelling presentation. Everyone makes their own decisions, and sometimes with very individual criteria.

Tech Coast Angels 40

Tech Coast Angels Angel Pasadena Angels Startup 40

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 10, 2010

Want to take a year pursuing your dream to write a screenplay, travel through Asia, run a triathlon or start your own fashion line? When a new email comes in you see the little pop-up in the bottom right-hand corner of your screen and like Pavlov’s dog you feel an adrenaline rush and need to read that email.

Startup 295

Startup Email Technical Review Course 295

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2010

Writing down your weight from your scale is obviously a manual process and it’s tedious. WakeMate has you record things like the last time you had caffeine before sleeping, your last meal and when you last had computer or TV screen time. We’ll see. Enter Withings. Pretty cool stuff.

Technical Review 278

Technical Review Software Review Startup SoCal 278

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2011

I talked about this in the TWiVC video but I didn’t do a good enough job of writing it up in the summary notes in the post. In reading the comments on Bijan’s blog and having discussed this so many times, I know some entrepreneurs only want to talk with VCs that think that Powerpoint causes leprosy.

Venture Capital 299

Venture Capital Slides Technical Advisors Startup 299

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2009

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. We helped the write out their requirements for a system. Something happened and it was clear to me that this IE issues was just a smoke screen.

Startup 151

Startup Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review 151

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2011

Phillip Stevenson who is currently a Wharton MBA (and whom I was trying to talk him into being an entrepreneur). After dinner with a film distributor dear friend of mine, Janet Brown (check out FilmBuff ) I caught an interesting screening of a new film, Surrogate Valentine with Gary Chou of USV.

Ideas 294

Ideas Startup Marketing Pricing 294

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2009

This is part of my new series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. I wanted to also post the series here to have it as a resource on my blog for future entrepreneurs who stop by. If you haven’t spent time over there you should.

Entrepreneur 338

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital Google 338

Tech Zulu Event

JANUARY 30, 2012

For those who still might be wondering what Spotlight: LA Tech is all about, It’s a screening room for new technology homegrown in our region. We write and create our own content for the game. Everything happens in the browser (no software to download) and the finished product looks amazing on large screens!

CalTech 91

CalTech Company Companies Idealab 91

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 21, 2012

That users get the PIN code, enters it into the registration screen, and if they typed in the right code, they can complete registration and get access to all of what a service provider gives them. We take that number, and send them a one-time PIN code. Steve Jillings: We have really big stuff coming in 2012.

Marina Del Rey 238

Marina Del Rey Startup IP Examples 238

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 19, 2011

Yet a critical mistake I see many entrepreneurs make is that they hand over too much control to their third-parties. They’re also good at screening candidates. As an entrepreneur I have one company to sell. They do a routine task over-and-over again all year long that we do only periodically. Recruiters. You name it.

Venture Capital 319

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Outsource 319

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2010

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. He has many of the attributes I look for in an entrepreneur and importantly he has deep domain experience in ad management. I’ll explain in detail below.

Mobile 282

Mobile Invest Company Companies 282

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 31, 2010

So I thought I’d write a piece on how to not suck when you give a presentation. Nobody wants to read your text on a big screen. Don’t write sentences on the – only key words to help you remember what you’re going to say. It is not sufficient to write yourself notes and read them before hand.

Startup 362

Startup Twiistup Slides Screening 362