Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

I recently wrote a post on angel financing covering the topic of convertible notes but I realized I was thinking about the issue more from investor perspective and a very narrow topic of how to price the round. This post is for those who want to raise angel money. Market validation – This one is optional but important.

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Angel Funding Venture Capital Startup 291

TechCrunch LA

JULY 19, 2022

The process for retailers and brands to liquidate excess inventory hasn’t changed very much, if at all, and while some retailers were able to build operational infrastructure to service the off-price channels, it continues to be a constant pain point. She went on to write, “Dee and Josh are the exact right team to tackle it.

Product 191

Product Funding Technical Review Equity 191

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). And we all know that Ron Conway is considered the savviest of angel investors and yet by definition not all of his investments succeed. Part 1 – Access to Great Deal Flow – is here.

Invest 288

Invest Angel Web 2.0 SEO 288

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). But while I prefer a certain naive optimism in founders I can’t see the logic that this extends to angel investors. Either downside scenario requires angel deals to be funded further.

Invest 284

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 284

InfoChachkie

MARCH 18, 2013

In order to extract value beyond your Angel investors' cash, you must first assess three important parameters: (i) the relative strength of their personal brand, (ii) their ability to add operational value, and (iii) the amount of care and feeding they will demand from you. Four Common Angel Archetypes.

Angel 217

Angel Technical Review RSS Entrepreneur 217

TechCrunch LA

APRIL 23, 2020

Representatives from the government and the utility managing the power of Los Angeles are proposing a sweeping infrastructure package worth roughly $150 billion centered on the broad electrification of transportation and industry. “Startups and small businesses are the engine of every local and regional economy,” writes Peterson.

Southern California 261

Southern California Los Angeles Rosemead Incubator 261

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

Prorata rights are one of the most important rights of a private market technology investors and yet are seldom fully understood. These tensions seep out in some angels or seed funds publicly or semi-privately deriding later-stage VCs for their “bad” behavior. And sometimes they take part of their prorata right.

Guide 336

Guide Venture Capital Startup Writing 336

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 12, 2023

These things outside your control do happen, but based on my years of experience as a startup advisor and angel investor, I still see too many strategies leading to failure that are inside the entrepreneur decision realm. I believe the old adage that you don’t know what you don’t know until you try to write it down.

Startup 124

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Ideas 124

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

As a result of the IPO window shifting we saw a massive inflow of public-market capital into the latest stages of venture. In this post I set out to explain why the seed market emerged as its own category in the first place and why it’s declined as of late. ( The “A Round” of my startup in 1999 was $16.5

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Invest Seed Funding Startup 328

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2 preamble issues having read the comments on TC today: 1: I know that the prices of startup companies is much great in Silicon Valley than in smaller towns / less tech focused areas in the US and the US prices higher than many foreign markets. You can be pissed off, but I don’t set prices. That’s stupid.

Startup 336

Startup Pricing Technical Review Marketing 336

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 17, 2020

These things outside your control do happen, but based on my years of experience as a startup advisor and angel investor, I still see too many strategies leading to failure that are inside the entrepreneur decision realm. I believe the old adage that you don’t know what you don’t know until you try to write it down.

Startup 174

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Ideas 174

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 27, 2014

I started in 2007 with a thesis that my primary investment decision would be about the team (70%) and only afterward about the market opportunity (30%). Angels have been prolific for years now and they, too, rely on downstream money to cover their bets. You have to decide how hard to help with downstream marketing for your deals.

Venture Capital 374

Venture Capital Invest Press Startup 374

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 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). But I prefer a certain naive optimism in founders but I can’t see that this extends to angel investors. Either scenario requires angel deals to be funded further. Not everybody agreed.

Invest 152

Invest Angel Venture Capital Startup 152

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2013

.” In the article I discussed the downside of raising capital at a too high of a price and referred people to a previous article I had written encouraging founders to raise “ At the Top end of Normal ” as opposed to stratospheric prices. And no amount of explanations, “we raised in a frothy market.

Pricing 302

Pricing Seed Funding Invest Venture Capital 302

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

Some thoughts on raising angel money. When convertible debt first started being introduced as a “faster, cheaper way to get startups funded” they didn’t have pricing built into them. ” And some seed stage investors told me, “I prefer not to fight over price now. I just want into the hottest deals.

Startup 354

Startup Pricing Equity Venture Capital 354

Berkonomics

JUNE 29, 2017

[Email readers, continue here…] My very first investment as a professional angel was in a small startup where the entrepreneur’s vision fueled my imagination in the audio market niche where I had run a business in an earlier life. A small venture firm and a few more angels rounded out the total investment.

Invest 243

Invest Entrepreneur Sales Startup 243

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

The Valley has obsessed with a quick up-and-to-right momentum story because we were thought to live in “winner take most” markets. But markets have changed and I think investors, founders and experienced executives who want to join later-stage startups can all benefit from playing the long game. It literally drove FOMO.

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital Capital Funding Startup 363

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

There is much discussion online and also in small, private groups, about why the price of technology companies – public and private – are falling. It pains me to see the typical (and predictable) responses on Twitter, “VCs want prices to drop!” ” “Sure, prices are dropping.

Startup 150

Startup Company Companies Venture Capital 150

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 15, 2010

It’s a killer CEO, great product, market ripe for disruption, experienced product team and great CMO who has relevant experience from her former life. Given a few more data points I would have liked to have invested but given the market speed it looks unlikely. Investors are writing checks for dots. Dots produce bubbles.

Invest 411

Invest Technical Review Venture Capital Startup 411

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

15 years ago we were at the peak of Internet hype with the launch of many over-capitalized businesses with a market size & opportunity was limited. The VC market has right-sized (returned back to mid 90′s levels & less competition). But markets value high growth over short-term profitability. Where are we today?

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2010

My original thinking from Oct ’09 was, while I didn’t (and still don’t) have a crystal ball I worried that: consumers were over-stretched with debt (and make up 77% of the economy), unemployment would continue to rise, which in turn would drive the stock market south and cut the rate of M&A activity and VC investment even further.

Entrepreneur 298

Entrepreneur Venture Capital Technical Review Startup 298

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 29, 2010

on the entrepreneur side of the table) when I raised at too high of a price. The A round was done in February 2000 (end of the bull market) and my B round was done in April 2001 (bear market). So don’t raise money at a cheap price, but don’t get too far ahead of yourself either. This is minutes 8-11.

Venture Capital 282

Venture Capital Capital Startup Pricing 282

socalTECH

JANUARY 23, 2013

With its latest product release, Los Angeles-based PromoJam is gambling on the first, and made managing and running social promotions much more like inhabiting a social network than running enterprise software. She said that PromoJam is looking to "democratize enterprise social marketing" with the new turnkey system. READ MORE>>.

Tool 190

Tool Services Social Network Template 190

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 12, 2018

Many people will write the history on why Ring became an enormously successful company and why it became a real-world unicorn in a world when many startups are anointed that merely on paper. But why did Ring succeed when the entire market kept saying that Nest was going to be the winner? Here are my views … 1. We weren’t sure.

Startup 247

Startup Pricing Product Marketing 247

TechCrunch LA

APRIL 7, 2019

I think in this age and time, that’s not what we want to get into,” Xinjie Ma, who heads up marketing for rct, told TechCrunch. “We appreciate a lot the support and opportunities given by Baidu and during the years we have grown up dramatically,” said Ma, who previously oversaw marketing at Raven.

Startup 235

Startup Artificial Inteligence Los Angeles Software 235

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

My favorite new VC blogger, Hunter Walk, weighed in with some thoughtful comments about how Syndicates might actually pit, “ angel vs. angel.” AngelList 101 : As you know, AngelList is a platform where angels can invest in semi-screened tech deals. They will have to negotiate price and terms.

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2020

Yet, in the interest of full disclosure, and an honest intent to save future entrepreneurs some grief and money, I would remind you that starting any business has key dependencies on at least five major elements, including product design and delivery, the right people on the team, adequate funding, a sizable market opportunity, and marketing.

Startup 131

Startup Entrepreneur Examples Custom 131

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 2, 2011

I’m sitting at my computer now at 9.00pm writing this – which is an hour earlier than I normally write (there are about 8 women at my kitchen table having a book club (aka excuse to drink wine & gossip so I’m locked in another room writing. They don’t have market power. I enjoy that.

Email 287

Email Blogging Venture Capital Writing 287

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 19, 2011

In my opinion it’s the most natural fit and it would give Netflix a very strong presence in Los Angeles and in TV (obviously subject to getting the right writes from the studios). He defines this as new products that are dramatically cheaper, lower quality, lower margin but larger markets. Incumbents can’t react.

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Netflix Evite Pricing Hulu 329

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2011

This is a blog post I really didn’t want to write. I didn’t want to write it because I have mixed feelings about AngelList. I didn’t want to write it because the bloggosphere doesn’t always do nuance well. So why I am writing it then? AngelList is a great way to market your deal.

Venture Capital 267

Venture Capital Writing Blogging Startup 267

Berkonomics

MARCH 13, 2014

They told me all about why this is such a good idea: hard to manage price discovery in the commercial real estate market; fragmented information about vacancies obtained from landlords and brokers; and the large scale of transactions. They wanted to come to pitch to my angel network. Raising money'

Invest 237

Invest Examples Networking Writing 237

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

And that was evident on today’s Angel vs. VC panel. We need venture debt, factoring companies and public markets. A new group of investors have clustered around writing earlier-stage, smaller checks. If you’re an angel you invest your own money and you have nobody to answer to except your spouse.

Venture Capital 308

Venture Capital Training Startup Entrepreneur 308

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

I find it amusing when a journalist writes an article about a prominent startup (either privately held or preparing for an IPO) and decries that, “They’re not even profitable!” If you have a market lead then raising capital and making investments now will help you as others enter the market.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 5, 2011

Steve Blank , January 25, 2010 10 Tips for Adding Game Mechanics to a Non-Gaming Service - ReadWriteStart , September 21, 2010 Startups & VCs: Learn How to Design, Market, & Eat Your Own. - . - 500 Hats , February 1, 2010 When to Use Facebook Connect – Twitter Oauth – Google Friend Connect for Authentication? First Principles.

Startup 378

Startup Venture Capital Blogging CTO Coach 378

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. Wander is one-such service providing high speed wireless internet in Los Angeles.

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 8, 2014

If you want the full SlideShare deck with many slides not in either post it’s in this link –> The LA Tech Market. Has it begun to mature or is it just better marketed than in was say 5 years ago? Given how efficient markets are when a large market like LA starts to blossom it attracts capital pretty quickly.

Entrepreneur 376

Entrepreneur Snapchat Startup Google 376

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 30, 2014

I think this is a combination of being realists as venture capitalists that outsized returns in our funds must come from taking on bigger, more impactful projects that can move markets. Note: Company headquarters is in Los Angeles with major R&D also happening in Northern Virginia. Could we produce this at cost? Upfront Ventures'

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Technical Review Software Review CTO Hire IP 418