Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2019

I became a VC 12 years ago in 2007 when the pace of deals was much slower. If I use Invoca as an example: we handle tens of millions of phone calls for customers who want to drive sales calls into call centers. I had just left Salesforce.com where I was VP, Products, after they had acquired my second startup. Why does that matter?

Venture Capital 223

Venture Capital IP Startup Google 223

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2010

The “private sale” market phenomenon was started in France by Vente-Privee (literally means “private sale”) and was replicated in Germany by BrandsforFriends. Gilt Group is currently the largest private sale web site in US. Configurable from desktop-based web-based UI. Founded in 2007. Time will tell.

Venture Capital 240

Venture Capital Startup Platform Technical Review 240

socalTECH

JUNE 17, 2009

Greg Brogger: I founded BrightHouse in the middle of 2007, along with Scott Painter. Towards early 2007, Scott and I had taken Zag to a level of some measure of stability, and we were thinking about the next thing. We came to it, because we'd been around private equity, and it's always surprised me how inefficient the marketplace is.

Startup 124

Startup Zag Venture Capital Equity 124

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 22, 2009

Club Cooee uses a freemium service model, with the upsell focused on the sale of virtual goods. The client installs at just 3MB, but the downside is currently that the service does not support incoming text messages or Web interfaces. We'd like to see these options added in the future.

Seed Funding 40

Seed Funding Social Media Conference Equity 40

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

We have built SocialStay for scale so I think the ‘chasm’ is both a function of time and sales. You don’t need much… But what you do need is sales. In the beginning, when there is nothing, it’s easy to make promises or throw around equity. Social is not a hype movement; it is part of the web’s DNA. Write it down….

Startup 233

Startup Design Mobile Social Network 233

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

I spoke about how Amazon Web Services deserves far more credit for the last 5 years of innovation than it gets credit for and how I believe they spawned the micro-VC category. I know that most people who are close to them tend to deny their existence, as we saw in the great housing bubble of 2002-2007 and the dot com bubble of 1997-2000.

Pricing 309

Pricing Marketing Startup Venture Capital 309

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 31, 2011

One investor played chicken with me by threatening not to approve my next-round financing unless I gave him more equity. My SVP of Sales & Marketing quit 30 minutes before an important board meeting. It was 2007. It was well past the Internet boom, well into Web 2.0, And I had all the VCs play head games with me.

Entrepreneur 384

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital Ideas 384