Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 21, 2019

Often, we joke together as managers of companies or of people that our goal is “world domination” or “to crush the competition.” But that is a number in a vacuum without at least two other measures: return on investment (ROI) and percentage of net profit to revenue. The three measures of progress.

Companies 120

Companies Company .Net Google 120

Berkonomics

MARCH 30, 2012

There is still abundant money available for early stage investment, but many of the rules have changed, as well as the processes for accessing these resources. Here’s the new truth: It is rare to get anyone to invest in an idea these days. Start here, and then move on.

Funding 192

Funding Entrepreneur Startup Invest 192

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 13, 2010

I have learned lots of lessons over the past 20 years about technology, entrepreneurship and investments. The net result of my posts plus the comments forms a tighter view of my evolving belief system. But I think it’s fair to point out when I believe that the profit motive is a net negative for startups or for our industry.

Blogging 250

Blogging Social Media Writing Startup 250

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 26, 2012

The founders now need a $1M Angel investment to do the marketing for a national NewCo rollout, build a team to manage the rollout, and maybe even pay themselves a salary. The cost approach attempts to measure the net value of the business today by calculating how much it could cost for a new effort to replace key assets.

Startup 108

Startup Invest Patents Outsource Development 108

Berkonomics

APRIL 4, 2019

On the other side, entrepreneurs and CEO’s usually have a natural fear of giving too much information to us investors after the initial investment is received. Requirements created by investment documents. They worry that we will not keep the information confidential and that financial data will find its way into competitors’ hands.

Class 120

Class Course Report Competition 120

socalTECH

JUNE 25, 2009

Nobody in our competitive space can do all of those things, because they simply don't control their own destiny, because they don't own their own technology. They can call us, we turn it into a IP call, and a 10 digit phone number, we then figure out where that user is on the planet, and deliver it over IP, making it a complete on-net call.

IP 165

IP Pasadena Angels Pasadena Los Angeles 165

TechCrunch LA

DECEMBER 8, 2020

With those two funding rounds all equity-based, to buy up property itself and provide $10,000 cash advances to all sellers, Sundae previously also raised a debt fund from high net worth individuals, and it has a “very large” debt facility from Goldman Sachs that it also non-dilutive, Stech said.

Sales 282

Sales Demand San Diego Funding 282

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 12, 2015

Creating intellectual property, including patents, is the key to long-term value and a sustainable competitive advantage. They benchmark their ideas against competition, use metrics to track acceptance, sales growth, and return on investment. Net result and reward. Accountability. Marty Zwilling.

Entrepreneur 101

Entrepreneur Startup Coach Metrics 101

socalTECH

JULY 13, 2009

Mark has also been quite active mentoring entrepreneurs, We caught up with Mark to hear about what kinds of investments GRP is looking at nowadays, his view on the software-as-a-service market, and how best to approach him with a pitch. We invested in Overture, which was sold for $1.2

GRP Partners 157

GRP Partners Southern California Santa Barbara Rustic Canyon 157

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 12, 2010

That’s because a company’s value is a composite of all of the quantitative and qualitative factors that comprise a company: revenues, expenses, risks, growth prospects, quality of the management team, competitive advantages, strength of the intellectual property, and so forth. Detail isn’t important; tracking your progress is.

.Net 89

.Net Metrics Competition Template 89

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 9, 2019

To refresh your memory, angel investors are typically high net worth individuals, accredited by the SEC and willing to invest their own money in a high-potential startup for a share of the ownership. For very competitive environments and disruptive products, you may want to limit your visibility before a high-profile rollout.

Funding 119

Funding Startup Platform Examples 119

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2016

While there is much discussion about VCs starting to pull back on their investments into startups, the LPs we surveyed don’t expect to slow the pace of investment into VC funds themselves – at least for the foreseeable future. The Biggest Area of Concern is Late Stage Investments.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Capital Marketing Seed Funding 150

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2014

Every startup dreams of achieving that milestone, when they can focus more on scaling the business and enjoying their earnings rather than fighting for another investment infusion. Re-investing profits to grow the business is organic growth. Understanding competitive early-mover requirements.

Entrepreneur 98

Entrepreneur Organization Invest Customer 98

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 2, 2022

The value proposition must clearly define the target customer, the customer’s problem and pain, your unique solution, and the net benefit of this solution from the customer's perspective. Competition. Investors look for a sustainable competitive advantage, like a patent. What is the need you fill or problem you solve?

Sales 102

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 102

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 29, 2009

Banner or AdSense style ads placed either at the top of the page or down the right hand side (often called a skyscraper) would only net Twitter money for users that log into Twitter.com. As we learned from our investment in Overture and the subsequent success of Google, “intent-based&# advertising is enormously powerful.

Ideas 286

Ideas Advertising Google Technical Review 286

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 29, 2011

The value proposition must clearly define the target customer, the customer’s problem and pain, your unique solution, and the net benefit of this solution from the customer's perspective. Competition. Investors look for a sustainable competitive advantage. What is the need you fill or problem you solve? Target market.

Sales 98

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 98

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 14, 2012

The value proposition must clearly define the target customer, the customer’s problem and pain, your unique solution, and the net benefit of this solution from the customer's perspective. Competition. Investors look for a sustainable competitive advantage. What is the need you fill or problem you solve? Target market.

Sales 97

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 97

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 30, 2019

Be sure to net out the opportunity and the solution in the first thirty seconds. In my experience as an angel investor, the perfect pitch length is ten slides, outlining the business problem, your solution, opportunity sizing, competition, and financial projections for the next five years. Make it light, but factual.

Ideas 126

Ideas Slides Sample Examples 126

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 4, 2019

This statement leaves no confusion in the minds of investors, or customers, of what the company does and how it is different (and better) than the competition. Ideally the solution embodies intellectual property that you own, giving you a sustainable competitive advantage. The net value of this solution from the customer’s perspective.

.Net 73

.Net Examples Customer Custom 73

Tech Zulu Event

MARCH 21, 2014

The Bitcoinference served as day 1 of 2 for 500 Startups’ “Commercism” series, with an official agenda that covered industry happenings, social dynamics, and a look into the investment environment. The next portion of the discussion moves into investments into Bitcoin: the currency, technology, and in startups in the space.

Startup 104

Startup Venture Capital Draper Invest 104

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 2, 2012

Many VC firms and investment banks receive as many as ten plans per day, so it’s hard to get them salivating. An Executive Summary is a one page elevator pitch of the whole plan (may be separate from the plan), which gives an investor a net perspective on the key business parameters. Remember, investors invest in people before ideas.

Summary 97

Summary Technical Review .Net Ideas 97

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2011

Many VC firms and investment banks receive as many as ten plans per day, so it’s hard to get them salivating. An Executive Summary is a one page elevator pitch of the whole plan (may be separate from the plan), which gives an investor a net perspective on the key business parameters. Remember, investors invest in people before ideas.

Summary 97

Summary Technical Review .Net Ideas 97

socalTECH

OCTOBER 7, 2009

The firm is co-founded by Jake Steinfeld, of Body by Jake, and ExerciseTV, and has received investment from prolific angel investor Ron Conway and Polar Capital, the investment firm of former Google President Tim Armstrong. We make it a very competitive amount of money, and it's a great secondary or even primary income source.

Media 168

Media Pricing Sites Training 168

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 9, 2012

Projecting the financials should be the last step of your business plan preparation, since it assumes you already know the opportunity size, customer buying habits, pricing, costs, and competition. Your “burn rate” or net cash flow out is usually the single most important survival parameter to a startup. Cash flow is king.

Startup 95

Startup Statistics Pricing .Net 95

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 15, 2013

Projecting the financials should be the last step of your business plan preparation, since it assumes you already know the opportunity size, customer buying habits, pricing, costs, and competition. Your “burn rate” or net cash flow out is usually the single most important survival parameter to a startup. Cash flow is king.

Startup 95

Startup Pricing Statistics .Net 95

InfoChachkie

JULY 28, 2015

We boiled our alternatives down to the following: IPO – To bolster our negotiating position, I engaged an investment bank to explore the public capital markets. Do Nothing – Taking no action was the potent competition faced by Citrix. Such companies, if they are able to complete a transaction, usually sell at a discount.

Companies 100

Companies Company Santa Barbara Pricing 100

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 22, 2011

Projecting the financials should be the last step of your business plan preparation, since it assumes you already know the opportunity size, customer buying habits, pricing, costs, and competition. Your “burn rate” or net cash flow out is usually the single most important survival parameter to a startup. Cash flow is king.

Startup 92

Startup Statistics Pricing .Net 92

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 11, 2013

The reasons here are a lot more complex than the meltdown of key investment banks in the US a few years ago, so don’t expect a big recovery anytime soon. Thus, there is tremendous pressure to increase current earnings, and little appetite for strategic investments. Startups going public are laid open to competitors and critics.

Startup 97

Startup Report Entrepreneur Statistics 97

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 7, 2013

Men have dominated the world of investment. There were only 22% women who invested in 2012. Natalia Oberti Noguera is on a mission to help change the demographic of investment with her Pipeline Fellowship. TechZulu speaks with Natalia about Pipeline Foundation and her goals to change the face of business and investment.

Mentor 84

Mentor Invest Entrepreneur Startup 84

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

In the startup world, the former happens when a VC makes a bad investment, and the latter occurs when they miss a great opportunity. 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

SEPTEMBER 13, 2016

Thus, cast your research net beyond VC-backed companies to fully understand a school’s ability to foster viable businesses. Are funds available to invest in student businesses? Is there a venture competition with cash prizes? Ask: How many businesses were started in the past five years by students, alumni and/or professors?

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Class Patents 100

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 23, 2013

As an employee of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets from 1999-2003 and of the Indianapolis Pacers from 2003-2008, I learned first-hand from the likes of Rod Thorn, Byron Scott, Jason Kidd and Larry Bird about the importance of leading by example and keys to assembling a championship-caliber team. Any competition in LA? Events pay a listing fee.

Social Network 92

Social Network Networking Training Summary 92

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 22, 2021

I was happy to see quantified evidence of this in a new book, “ Winning on Purpose ,” by Fred Reichhheld, creator of the Net Promoter system of management, in concert with Darci Darnell and Maureen Burns. Use metrics to assess needs and growth economics. Regularly invent new ways to delight customers.

Custom 114

Custom Customer Satisfaction Metrics 114

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 17, 2015

Try working at Goldman Sachs, the exceptionally successful investment bank where its employees regularly work evenings and weekends and travel at a moment’s notice to client meetings in far corners of the country or world. So where do I finally net out? You travel at the pleasure of your boss. Why should I expect less?

Startup 150

Startup Demand Organization Social Network 150

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2011

The founders now need a $1M Angel investment to do the marketing for a national NewCo rollout, build a team to manage the rollout, and maybe even pay themselves a salary. The cost approach attempts to measure the net value of the business today by calculating how much it could cost for a new effort to replace key assets.

Funding 98

Funding Startup Patents Outsource Development 98

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 26, 2016

Every startup dreams of achieving that milestone, when they can focus more on scaling the business and enjoying their earnings, rather than fighting for another investment infusion. Re-investing profits to grow the business is organic growth. Understanding competitive early mover requirements.

Startup 58

Startup Organization Invest Customer 58

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 16, 2016

People are even talking about “decacorns" -- investable companies with net worth now exceeding $10 billion -- like Dropbox and Pinterest. Seed-round investment. This term refers to an initial venture-capital investment, often wrongly sought to seed early product development. Could your startup be the next one?

Startup 57

Startup Software Review Equity Invest 57