Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2015

Yes, I still used a Blackberry in 2009. A “hats off” (see what I did there?) story about big bets and equally grand huevos. And also a “thank you.” ” I first met Shervin (does he need a last name?) No peaceful distractions allowed. Dude with full beard shouts out, “I’m in for $50,000.

Startup 150

Startup Conference Ideas Writing 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 6, 2015

As an active investor in the Los Angeles technology market we’re always seeking to better understand the data and trends of why our market has grown so rapidly since 2009. We look for pockets of excellence where we may have skills that aren’t native in other markets or where our home town may have some unique skills or talents.

Marketing 150

Marketing Newsletter Venture Capital Blogging 150

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 24, 2015

These are all normal things but in this big run since 2009 we’ve all gotten used to nearly 100% follow-on financing rates, valuations only moving up, deals clearly the convertible note caps and low mortality rates. But I can tell you from first-hand experience it was a real issue in 2008-2009 and the psychology persisted into 2010-11.

Marketing 150

Marketing Venture Capital Startup Invest 150

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2010

But I’ll judge the angel class of 2009/2010 on a 7-10 year time horizon. in 2009 the market was completely constipated as investors focused on triage. I was very active in 2009 / early 2010. Bad times are when M&A halts to a trickle and this is when many businesses are rushing to get exits. I avoided much of this.

Invest 299

Invest Angel Technical Review Venture Capital 299

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AUGUST 10, 2009

If you search for her (as of July 10, 2009 at 5:45pm) you will get no result and the text, “did you mean Amanda Choong?&#. It takes a while (a day or more) to get your name propagated in Twitter’s search index. Be patient – it will appear. I’ve posted three people’s examples to the left. Second is Jen Raymond.

Tips 216

Tips Social Media Social Network Santa Monica 216

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2014

I first met Nick Halstead in 2009 when he was running a company called Tweetmeme (the predecessor to DataSift) who had invented the Retweet button and actually helped Twitter develop its early API. I remain as childishly giddy at Nick’s vision as I did in our conference hangout we had in 2009.

CTO Hire 309

CTO Hire Organization Google Course 309

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

As a result I didn’t write my first venture capital check until March 2009 – exactly 5 years ago. I spent my first year developing proprietary deal flow and learning the business and then the Sept 2008 / Lehman Bros collapse / financial meltdown happened. 5 years ago.

Venture Capital 387

Venture Capital Downey Writing Press 387

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 22, 2015

This was 2009 and his understanding of audience engagement was far beyond anything I was hearing from most people at that time. Five-and-a-half years ago I first met Chamillionaire at a tech conference in LA. I saw him on stage at the event talking about how he used social media to engage audiences.

Conference 150

Conference Slides Social Media Summary 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2009

I would argue that the shut-down of September 2009 was equally severe yet there are signs that this “VC Ice Age” has begun to thaw. It helped me avoid chasing deals (and a house) in 2007/08 and it led to GRP’s fastest pace of investment in many years in the first three quarters of 2009 at a time when many others weren’t investing.

Venture Capital 263

Venture Capital Startup Funding Invest 263

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2014

It was 2009 and it was terribly difficult to get any financing (if you can remember a time like that!) We have witnessed one hell of a startup boom from 2009-2014 which has coincided with the boom in accelerators. My good friend Adam Lilling and I started Launchpad more than 5 years ago . We had a specific goal in mind.

Venture Capital 290

Venture Capital Startup Idealab Funding 290

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 1, 2009

In my previous post, The VC Ice Age is Thawing (for now) I wrote about the reasons why the VC market came to a screeching halt in September 2008 and remained largely shut until at least April 2009. As of near the end of September 2009, we’re up 46% since the March 9th nadir (yes, I need to find a way to use one of my SAT words ; – ).

Venture Capital 255

Venture Capital Marketing Startup Social Network 255

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 12, 2013

As more consumers were skipping commercials the idea of authentically integrating brands into media seemed obvious to me and ended up informing a lot of my investments in 2009 and 2010. The idea immediately resonated.

Invest 340

Invest Venture Capital Startup News 340

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OCTOBER 7, 2014

I have come to realize that since the great tech boom started in 2009 and given the massive increase in first-time angels, first-time seed funds, first-time accelerators … there market is just filled with well-intentioned terrible advice.

Seed Funding 399

Seed Funding Venture Capital Startup Entrepreneur 399

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APRIL 17, 2010

MOVIECLIPS : Launched December 2009 in Santa Monica, MOVIECLIPS is a premium online video destination offering audiences the largest and most diverse collection of movie scenes. I spoke with a chap from TicketMaster who looked at Scot’s product and told me that he was really impressed what the team has built.

Company 276

Company Companies Startup Southern California 276

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OCTOBER 21, 2009

2009 has been the worst year for M&A in a decade. Projected IPOs for 2009 are an embarrassing 10 total deals, down from 86 just 2 years ago (it was 265 in the go-go years of 99-00) but at least up from 6 in 2008. If you want to download the document I’ve made it available at my favorite document sharing site DocStoc).

Venture Capital 241

Venture Capital Technical Review Southern California Company 241

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 21, 2014

Since 2009 we’ve been in an unequivocal bull market. Venture capitalists have raised increasing amounts of money from their investors (LPs) every year. An impressive number of new VCs have been created – most of them with new seed funds.

Marketing 354

Marketing Case Study Metrics Sales 354

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

Gogii came in my office in 2009 with three of the most talented founders I had seen. I’m on record all over place saying that 70% of my investment decision is the team & 30% is the market. I have to love both – but it’s in that proportion. games company that sold to EA for $680 million.

Gogii 310

Gogii Invest Blogging Activision 310

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FEBRUARY 14, 2018

Dan talks about a landmark case in 2009 that involved whether it was legal to strip search a 13-year-old girl. Of the 106 judges who preceded her 105 of them were men (Sandra Day O’Connor was the first woman). Now 33% of Supreme Court Justices are women (vs. 8% of VC partnerships, for example). But here’s a story that hit home with me.

Venture Capital 256

Venture Capital Examples Screening Help 256

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 1, 2011

But they weren’t there in 2009 when you were up late nights shitting yourself whether you really were smart for pursuing this idea. If you’re a tech startup person I know you know what I mean. You just closed your last $5 million round and everybody around you is thinking they could have done what you did.

Startup 391

Startup Blogging Venture Capital Writing 391

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2010

Online advertising platform for local businesses; ReachLocal reported over $203 million in revenue for 2009, compared to around $146 million in 2008. Its net income for the 2009 period is $11.66 And we shared our love for Zorik Gordon. million, compared to a $4.47 million loss in 2008. Net income was around $1.4

Clearstone 236

Clearstone Venture Capital ReachLocal Google 236

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 25, 2013

By 2009 had reduced to around $15 billion in capital from LPs. But I became a VC in 2007 and wrote my first check in 2009 – 4.5 And reinventing itself. And some firms will go under. And others will emerge. That’s normal. It’s a market, after all. In 2000 our industry had more than $100 billion in LP money.

Venture Capital 374

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Invest Funding 374

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APRIL 5, 2010

January 2009 where he said in a column on Tax Cuts for Teachers : “One of the smartest stimulus moves we could make would be to eliminate federal income taxes on all public schoolteachers so more talented people would choose these careers. He covered the topic again in June 2009 titled Invent, Invent, Invent. Crazy, huh?

Technical Review 282

Technical Review Startup High Tech Software Review 282

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APRIL 2, 2010

Example: if a VC is on their fourth $200 million fund that they just raised in 2009 then you might hear them talk about $800 million under management. For example, my firm, GRP Partners, has a $200 million fund that was closed in March 2009 and we have 4 investment partners.

Venture Capital 269

Venture Capital Funding Invest GRP Partners 269

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 3, 2012

But it was early 2009 and not many companies were getting new financings at all so I thought they should take the deal. Since I didn’t originally source the deal I let my co-investor set the terms and negotiate the deal with my consent. The company agreed on a price but felt it was a bit lower than they had hoped for.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Writing 356

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2015

This was until about 2009 because most the investments in companies came from one, maybe two, sources. If you add the pre-money valuation (let’s say $8 million) to the amount of money you’re raising (let’s say $2 million) you get the post-money valuation.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Invest 150

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2010

Self-reported 60mm daily unique as of Dec 2009, games played by 250mm people a month (AppData). -Online social game network; make their own games (FarmVille, Mafia Wars, FrontierVille) in addition to allowing third-party developers to access network. Pincus said FrontierVille is most successful launch (1mm+ daily users in < 1 week).

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital Google Web Sites 225

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2011

The biggest media attention in our industry went to the so-called “super angels&# during the 2009/10 timeframe and while I don’t believe there is such thing as a super angel I believe that much media attention was deserved. Spawning of Micro VCs.

Venture Capital 334

Venture Capital Software Capital Startup 334

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 14, 2014

source: Harris Interactive IM Shopping Poll (August 2009)). SOME INTERESTING DATA. 77% of online shoppers want live assistance available with their purchases so it’s not surprising that 52% of shoppers re-evaluate or abandon shopping carts because of the lack of live assistance. That alone is pretty compelling.

Email 339

Email SaaS Venture Capital Google 339

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 25, 2015

When we first funded the company in 2009 we knew there was a big opportunity to help businesses automate marketing through phone channels. Its a big to-do list and one that demands someone experienced in operating at this sort of scale.

Demand 150

Demand SaaS Startup Press 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2010

But if 2011 & 2012 look more like 2008-2009 than 2010 then one of the most important skills of angel investors will be whether they can get their companies financed (or ramen profitable, but this is harder to sustain over a long period of time). and now they’re all buying their way into innovation and talent.

Invest 284

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 284

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

The “big boom” in startup financing started around March 2009?—?more more than 5 years ago?—?and and hasn’t abated.

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

It’s been high tide since 2009 so an entire batch of entrepreneurs don’t know what low tide even looks like. It encourages a bit too much FOMO (fear of missing out) and over-valuation in companies and a desire to do huge financing rounds to be perceived as the “knock-out winner.”

Startup 390

Startup Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review 390

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 26, 2022

If I look back to the beginning of the current tech boom which started around 2009, we often wrote a $3–5 million check and this was called an “A round” and 12 years later in an over-capitalized market this became known as a “Seed Round” but in truth what we do hasn’t changed much at all.

Startup 408

Startup Venture Capital Writing Invest 408

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 21, 2011

2) Harris Interactive IMShopping Poll (August 2009). (3) And I’m obviously betting that telephones will act as telephones. And that people will still want calls. (1) 1) eMarketer. (2) 3) Credit Union Times. (4) 4) eMarketer. Image courtesy of Fotolia.

Mobile 329

Mobile Advertising Media Marketing 329

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

Imagine if, say, Autodesk had purchased it in 2009 for $100 million? Of the first four investments I made as a VC in 2009, two have exited and two (Invoca & GumGum) still are independent and likely to produce $billion++ outcomes . Case in point, Procore just went public and is trading at an $11 billion valuation. Maker Studios?—?sold

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital Capital Funding .Net 363

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

I joined GRP Partners in 2007 before they raised their current fund (we closed a $200 million fund in March 2009). If the person I hired wasn’t cut from the same cloth as an entrepreneur, then how could I expect him to be able to see inside the mind of entrepreneurs? I Practice What I Preach. I told them it was now or never.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital CTO Hire 293

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 20, 2015

If one entered between 2009-2015 he or she is no doubt in the “hazard” phase where one need to be careful about thinking he know more about the industry than perhaps he do. It’s kind of a truism for life and certainly our industry. I see it in many young pups. They enter the industry knowing that they know nothing.

Funding 150

Funding Venture Capital Startup Marketing 150