Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 6, 2019

I’ve heard a lot of people question whether there is too much money in venture capital chasing too few great deals. Others believe that new business models are emerging that could replace venture capital all together. If you want the whole deck you can find it on SlideShare but I’ve written up a short summary with commentary below.

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Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 13, 2022

The “valley of death” is a common term in the startup world, referring to the difficulty of covering the negative cash flow in the early stages of a startup, before their new product or service is bringing in revenue from real customers. Solicit funds from friends and family. Use crowd funding to build reserves.

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TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

Leonardo DiCaprio is making a significant commitment to the Los Angeles-based investment firm, Struck Capital , as part of the actor’s commitment to building LA into a tech development powerhouse. DiCaprio has already made a number of investments in startup companies that have done very well for the Academy Award-winning actor.

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socalTECH

APRIL 8, 2019

Los Angeles-based fintech venture capital investor Core Innovation Capital is out looking for new investors in its third fund, with a target of $100M, according to regulatory filing by the firm on Friday. As expected, the company has not detailed any information on the new fund. READ MORE>>.

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TechCrunch LA

MAY 25, 2019

Hello and welcome back to Startups Weekly, a newsletter published every Saturday that dives into the week’s most noteworthy venture deals, fundraises, M&A transactions and trends. Let’s take a quick moment to catch up. Haus, like any good consumer startup in 2019, is shipped directly to your door. IPO Corner.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 16, 2023

None normally work for or provide funds for early-stage startups. Typically, their service is to help you invest in stocks, bonds, or mutual funds, much like independent financial advisors. In addition, they will likely take between 3% and 10% of any capital raised. Many investment banks even call themselves “boutiques.”

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TechCrunch LA

MAY 23, 2019

The Los Angeles ecosystem is $76 million stronger today as Fika Ventures , a seed-stage venture capital firm, announces its sophomore investment fund. Fika invests roughly half of its capital exclusively in startups headquartered in LA, with a particular fondness for B2B, enterprise and fintech companies.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 29, 2020

One of the most frequent questions I get as a mentor to entrepreneurs is “How do I find the money to start my business?” On the other hand, there are many additional creative options available for starting a business that you might not find for buying a car, home, or other major consumer item. Trade equity or services for startup help.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 2, 2023

Angel investors and venture capitalists are looking for startups with real products and a proven business model, ready to scale. Yet I still get too many business plans that clearly are looking for money to do research and development (R&D) on a new and unproven technology. Specialized VCs start to jump in at this stage.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 7, 2022

One of the big questions that every entrepreneur struggles with is how much funding they should request from investors in the first round. On the other hand, venture capital organizations typically look for needs that exceed $2 million. Can you justify your use of funds to this investor? What business milestones have you met?

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Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2021

On Funding?—?The The Denominator Effect I recently wrote a post about funding for investors to think about having a diversified portfolio , which I called “shots on goal.” The thesis is that before investing in an early-stage startup it is close to impossible to know which of the deals you did will break out to the upside.

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socalTECH

FEBRUARY 28, 2020

San Diego-based Gretel has raised a seed round of funding, to go towards its development of software which helps developers and engineers access and share anonymized data for developing applications. The funding was led by Moonshots Capital, and also included Greylock Partners and Village Capital.

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Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 22, 2020

One of the biggest myths I have found in the entrepreneur community is that every startup needs one or more outside investors for credibility and success, and perhaps is even entitled to at least one. Draw up a list of the best prospects, and put together your best story for follow-up. But don’t wait for them to contact you.

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socalTECH

OCTOBER 20, 2017

Los Angeles-based Trace , a developer of mobile apps which automatically track your sports activity using sensors, video, and artificial intelligence, has scored a round of investment from Intel Capital. Size of the funding round was not announced. READ MORE>>.

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socalTECH

APRIL 23, 2019

Los Angeles-based March Capital is the lead investor in an artificial intelligence startup, which is aiming at improving employee service, as it further continues its theme of investing in big data, artificial intelligence, and machine learning startups in the enterprise.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

Seed investments are down by any measure (funds, deals, dollars) over the past 3 years in deals < $1 million AND in deals between $1–5 million. Over the past month a colleague ( Chang Xu ) and I sifted through data on the venture capital industry (as we do every year) and made a bunch of calls to VCs and LPs to confirm our hypotheses.

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socalTECH

FEBRUARY 22, 2018

Los Angeles- and Austin-based Moonshots Capital , the new venture investment fund founded by Kelly Perdew and Craig Cummings, is on an investment roll, and has made another investment from its fund. As part of the funding, Craig Cummings, co-founder and General Partners of Moonshots Capital, has joined Complai's board.

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socalTECH

JANUARY 25, 2021

Los Angeles-based Perch, a startup which operates a service that lets users build their credit by paying for Netflix, Spotify, Hulu, and other services on credit, has scored an investment from financial giant Citi, via Citi's new Citi Impact Fund. Size of the investment was not announced. Citi announced the investment this morning.

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socalTECH

MAY 30, 2019

Los Angeles-based venture investor Moonshots Capital is the lead investor in a new startup, Backtracks , a developer of podcast analytics software. in a seed funding round, which was led by Moonshots Capital, and also included Capital Factory, Sputnik ATX, Next Coast Ventures, Bull Creek Capital, and BNSG Capital.

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socalTECH

MARCH 28, 2018

Santa Monica-based venture investor March Capital Partners has led additional funding in SpyCloud , a company developing software to prevent account takeovers by cybercriminals, has raised $5M in a Series A funding round.

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socalTECH

NOVEMBER 28, 2017

Los Angeles-based 3Rodeo , a brand venture capital investment firm led by former Hulu executive Noah Heller, says it is targeting investments in startups in Los Angeles. Size of the new fund was not announced. 2017 has been a banner year for new startup funds in Los Angeles as well as Southern California as a whole.

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socalTECH

JULY 7, 2021

Ventura-based advertising technology developer The Trade Desk is launching its own venture capital arm, and has made its first investment, the company said this morning. The company said that the new investment fund, TD7, will invest in open Internet startups.

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socalTECH

JULY 14, 2020

Pasadena-based Guru , a venture backed startup developing wireless power distribution technology, said this morning that it has released a development kit for its technology, which will allow potential partners to trial its millimeter-wave wireless power products. READ MORE>>.

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socalTECH

JULY 23, 2018

Santa Monica-based venture inestor March Capital Partners is again the lead on an investment round this morning, in Silicon Valley-based Xage Security , a new startup focused on industrial internet-of-things (IoT) security. Xage, which is based in Palo Alto, said this morning that it raised $12M in a Series A funding round.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 19, 2020

Venture capitalists (VCs) have long been seen as the top of the pyramid for startup funding sources, but in fact angel investors now fund over twice as many companies, according the Crunchbase. The cost of entry for tech startups continues to go down. Super angels have greater scope to match talent with a startup.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 28, 2021

Entrepreneurs who require funding for their startup have long counted on self-accredited high net worth individuals (“angels”) to fill their needs, after friends and family, and before they qualify for institutional investments (“VCs”). Thus investing in startups should always be approached as a low odds game.

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socalTECH

MARCH 20, 2020

Venice, California-based Robin Games , a startup that is developing mobile games aimed at women, has raised $7M in a seed funding round, the company said on Thursday. The startup, led by Jill Wilson, says it is developing "lifestyle gaming" titles, which run on such platforms as Apple's iOS and Google Android.

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TechCrunch LA

MARCH 25, 2021

The partners at MaC Venture Capital , the Los Angeles-based investment firm that has just closed on $103 million for its inaugural fund, have spent the bulk of their careers breaking barriers. MaC Venture Capital co-founders Marlon Nichols, Michael Palank, Charles King, and Adrian Fenty. Image Credit: MaC Venture Capital.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 17, 2022

Venture capitalists (VCs) have long been seen as the top of the pyramid for startup funding sources, but in fact angel investors now fund over twice as many companies, according to a classic Crunchbase article. The cost of entry for tech startups continues to go down. Mobile and web software apps may cost even less.

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 8, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series called “ Start-up Lessons.&#. I came across this blog post about getting a computer science degree as the best degree for getting into venture capital or working at a VC-backed start up. I paid up for the diploma but can’t say that I saw better results.

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Tech.Co

JANUARY 3, 2022

Well, another year has come and gone, and while we're yet to leave the pandemic behind, it has led to a record number of small businesses starting up. SoLo Funds. Someone with a financial need can post their request, and someone with the necessary capital can accept the request, setting their own terms.

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socalTECH

FEBRUARY 3, 2021

Los Angeles-based Crush Capital, a startup founded by Darren Marble and Todd Goldberg, said on Wednesday that it has raised $3.25M in a seed funding round, which will go towards its own, online streaming series called "Going Public".

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socalTECH

AUGUST 31, 2020

Los Angeles-based Dorian , a startup developing a way for writers and storytellers to create their own games, without coding, has raised $3.25M in a seed funding round, the company disclosed on Monday. As part of the funding, Twitch executive John Howell has joined the company's board. READ MORE>>.

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TechCrunch LA

MARCH 22, 2018

Founded by Steve Poizner last year to accelerate the growth of a startup entrepreneurial ecosystem in Southern California, The Alliance is building a network of investors, entrepreneurs and universities to provide ballast in the south to the dominance of the Northern California tech industry.

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Tech.Co

DECEMBER 28, 2022

With over 305 million start-ups being created every year globally, standing out from the crowd is a huge challenge. We've scoured the startup scene to find out which budding businesses have made big waves in 2022 — and whose growth is showing no signs of slowing down. Sign up to Tech.co's weekly newsletter today.

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socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 6, 2013

In a move which adds some additional capital to the Los Angeles clean technology market, utility company Southern California Gas Company said Thursday that it has created a new, $1M innovation fund to help companies develop clean technology. socalgas company utility investment fund cleantech incubator accelerator laci'

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socalTECH

NOVEMBER 30, 2018

San Diego-based biotech startup ViaCyte , which is developing human cell therapy for treating diabetes, says it has raised $80M in a Series D funding round. The funding was led by Bain Capital Life Sciences, and also included TPG, RA Capital Management, Sanderling Ventures, plus angels.

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