Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

Last week a company we enthusiastically backed, uBeam , led by a very special entrepreneur, 25-year-old Meredith Perry , announced a $10 million round of financing. uBeam’s tech does work and I have safely seen it demo’d in the real life many times. Entrepreneurs. ” **.

Technical Review 417

Technical Review Startup Software Review Course 417

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2014

We are often asked how companies get funded, why VCs make the decisions we make and what we’re looking for in entrepreneurs. At Upfront we’re totally fine funding entrepreneurs who have done multiple businesses in the past – in fact we like it. Tech Market Analysis Upfront Ventures' The results? And Seriously.

Funding 373

Funding Technical Review Startup Screening 373

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 23, 2015

If an entrepreneur can’t build a culture of excitement and commitment at a startup, the chances of long-term success are negligible. That’s why they insist on spending a day with your team as part of the due diligence process. As a mentor to entrepreneurs, I often get asked what you can do to build the right culture.

Entrepreneur 102

Entrepreneur Technical Review Mentor Training 102

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2014

Venture Capital is a tricky industry. When the early teams: angels, lowercase capital & first round capital funded Uber they had no idea it would be one of the most revolutionary ideas of our time. Periodically we do portfolio reviews to evaluate whether we have enough diversified risk across the fund. Far from it.

Funding 362

Funding Technical Review Ideas Startup 362

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2014

In case you don’t know – as VCs we have have 2 sets of customers: LPs (limited partners) who invest money in our funds and entrepreneurs (who we in turn give money to and help support them in building businesses we hope will be valuable). Who else is going to tell a VC if he got a bad reference from an entrepreneur or fellow VC?

Customer 341

Customer Custom Venture Capital Software Review 341

InfoChachkie

MAY 9, 2011

This series describes how entrepreneurs can craft company-changing agreements with BDCs, while avoiding Kiss of Death contract provisions. Entrepreneurs should never agree to the following provisions when negotiating with a BDC, no matter how lucrative the potential relationship. Relinquish Press Release Capabilities.

Outsource Development 170

Outsource Development Entrepreneur Press Technical Review 170

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 23, 2015

For some aspiring to be tech entrepreneurs, I often suggest a two-step process, as I argued in this post that “ The First Startup Founder You Need to Invest in Is You.” He or she has worked at some very successful big technology or media companies and went to a great school.

Technical Review 150

Technical Review Startup Venture Capital IP 150

InfoChachkie

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

Most sophisticated investors ignore them, focusing their attention on an entrepreneur's pitch and presentation materials, financial forecast and executive summary. As noted in Entrepreneurs Shouldn't Pitch Their Ideas To Venture Capitalists , most sophisticated investors place their bets on people rather than opportunities.

Venture Capital 211

Venture Capital Summary Technical Review Template 211

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 18, 2010

Full press release with more details is here. Applications are due April 6th, 2010, the form is on the website and the Twitter address is @launchpadlad. Find the best and brightest next generation of entrepreneurs and help them to be more successful. Today we announced Launchpad LA V2. We connected. Launchpad V1 was born.

Technical Review 259

Technical Review Venture Capital Southern California Tech Coast Angels 259

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

I’m an entrepreneur at heart so I’m always inspired when I hear stories about innovation. Seattle should be the envy of any non Silicon Valley tech community in the country. It really wouldn’t take much to turn a great technology ecosystem into a truly electric one. This article originally ran on TechCrunch.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

InfoChachkie

MAY 9, 2011

This series describes how entrepreneurs can craft company-changing agreements with BDCs, while avoiding Kiss of Death contract provisions. Entrepreneurs should never agree to the following provisions when negotiating with a BDC, no matter how lucrative the potential relationship. Relinquish Press Release Capabilities.

Outsource Development 124

Outsource Development Entrepreneur Press Technical Review 124

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2011

The part of the movement that resonates the most with me (in my words) is that entrepreneurs should keep their capital expenditures really low while they’re experimenting with their product and determining whether there is a large market for what they do. This benefits you, the entrepreneur. This is total bullshit.

Development Team Review 374

Development Team Review Technical Review Startup Resource 374

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2013

If you’ve been following the press about VC funds you’ll know this is no small feat. Well, the venture capital industry has changed a lot in the past 20 years … and we have too. Wouldn’t we be a bit hypocritical if we talked with entrepreneurs about innovation and change but we weren’t willing to take it on ourselves?

Funding 343

Funding Santa Monica Venture Capital Startup 343

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 26, 2013

is already well above the dot.com bubble of 15 years ago, although we have slipped a bit this year from the high point of 320 new entrepreneurs out of 100,000 adults in 2011. Thus a record number of entrepreneurs (and employees) are getting rich. Social media is a boon for entrepreneurs and startups.

Startup 109

Startup Entrepreneur Social Media Satisfaction 109

socalTECH

JUNE 23, 2017

The insurance industry today is one of the last industries to fully jump into adopting technology for offering up their products, says Wayne Slavin , CEO and founder of SURE (www.sureapp.com), and just needs some help in getting there. We're here to serve, as a technology distribution platform, to help those insurance carriers become digital.

Southern California 244

Southern California Technical Review Startup Commerce 244

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

Chris Dixon is one of my favorite people in tech and writes one of the few blogs I read religiously. If you don’t read it and you care about tech & entrepreneurship, you should. If you like the quick summary notes, please check out Adam’s blog on tech, entrepreneurship & VC as a thank you.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

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. Prorata investments rights given investors the right to invest in your future fund-raising rounds and maintain their ownership % in your company as your company grows and raises more capital.

Guide 336

Guide Venture Capital Startup Writing 336

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 4, 2014

I think as a tech industry we have bred a culture that places more emphasis on product excellence than managing human behavior. Yet talk with people at Twitter these days and many seem to feel like they are part of a movement – and that doesn’t just come due to product success. Those are the easy cases.

Startup 340

Startup Technical Review Course Press 340

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. Because entrepreneurs often went to lawyers at their earliest stages to get their company registration done. Entrepreneurial lawyers like Don Lee , Dave Young or Ted Wang are good at sussing out which entrepreneurs are high potential. What stage?

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Startup Pricing Invest 347

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2018

My friend Michael Broukhim, founder & co-CEO of FabFitFun and I recently had a catch-up meeting for 3-miles on the Santa Monica “Bird Trail” No company has ever elicited so many questions by friends, colleagues, entrepreneurs, fellow VCs and journalists as has Bird, the company that pioneered the electronic scooter as a service market.

Santa Monica 256

Santa Monica Funding Startup Course 256

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 6, 2014

When you first start your company and raise initial venture capital your board probably consists of 1-3 founders and 1-2 VCs. And here’s an important point that I think modern entrepreneurs often forget: Investors are “co-owners” of your business. Reviewing financial & operational performance. Mentorship.

Startup 325

Startup Sales Technical Review Software Review 325

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2010

They have marked-up paper gains propped up by an over excited venture capital market that has validated their investments. We jockey to make sure the press release has our names on it. Bad times often require more capital but ironically this is when capital is dried up. It is the new cocktail party conversation.

Invest 299

Invest Angel Technical Review Venture Capital 299

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

This was an audience of mostly first-time entrepreneurs. It is great for entrepreneurs and great for VCs. I suppose I should have imagined that this line would get more press than all other comments combined. So here is what I have been telling entrepreneurs privately for the past 6 months. source: Capital IQ.

Pricing 309

Pricing Marketing Startup Venture Capital 309

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 3, 2010

There is a telltale sign of an inexperienced startup entrepreneur. I’m doing due diligence on a company of another entrepreneur in LA whose company was apparently doing very well. I know, I know … technically they can be structured as mergers. They get premature merge elation. I understand this.

Technical Review 276

Technical Review Startup Press Pricing 276

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2017

Machine Learning / AI They discussed many topics ranging from protection of the press to what Mark looks for in an entrepreneur to investing outside of Silicon Valley and of course Trump and sports. He said that he believes AI will have a bigger impact than any technology in the last 30 years. Now there are 4,000.

Artificial Inteligence 105

Artificial Inteligence Study Press Netflix 105

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. Because entrepreneurs often went to lawyers at their earliest stages to get their company registration done. Entrepreneurial lawyers like Don Lee , Dave Young or Ted Wang are good at sussing out which entrepreneurs are high potential. What stage?

Startup 361

Startup Venture Capital Pricing Technical Review 361

InfoChachkie

JULY 18, 2012

The following guest post is from Eric Greenspan, Founder and CEO of MakeItWork, a consumer facing, in-home tech support service. Entrepreneurs are inundated with success stories, but far less is written about ventures that do not succeed. Most entrepreneurs do not have the guts to publicly discuss a venture gone awry.

RSS 170

RSS Technical Review Capital Email 170

Tech Zulu Event

SEPTEMBER 16, 2013

Silicon Valley may still be the capital of technology with a mix of new (Google, Facebook) and old (Apple, HP) sprinkling the landscape. However, Silicon Valley isn’t the only place to grow technology innovators from the ground up. So many thinkers, developers and entrepreneurs want to bring their idea to life.

Social Network 111

Social Network Social Media Press Technical Review 111

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2010

But more broadly it got me thinking to one of the biggest mistakes tech executives get into in the first place. But you’d be surprised how much tech folks either hold journalists too much on a pedestal or disdain them. Oh, and Demo charges the startups $18,000. Robert’s article is worth reading. Total waste.

Tips 307

Tips Startup Press Blogging 307

InfoChachkie

JUNE 9, 2015

Good news: a quick review of TechCrunch’s March 2015 List of Top 20 U.S. To better understand how the accelerator world has matured beyond Demo Da, I sought out Jason Denenberg, former partner at Angel Capital Group, and current Director of Entrepreneurship at Launch Tennessee (LaunchTN). Convert Graduate-Founders Into Mentors.

Startup 100

Startup Class LAMP Santa Barbara 100

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2011

You do a startup and decide you want somebody to step in and run the company so you can focus on technical excellence. These are the skills I look for in entrepreneurs and leaders. It is the very fabric of what I believe forms the entrepreneur DNA. million, a live product that was featured in iTunes and has gotten rave reviews.

CTO Hire 363

CTO Hire Technical Review Startup Demand 363

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

There is all sorts of advice on the Internet about how to raise capital. I’ve raised money as a “hot company” and I’ve raised capital when no one would return my phone calls. I raised money as an entrepreneur, like you, in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005 for two different companies. Tell a friend!

Develop 366

Develop Development Funding Venture Capital 366

InfoChachkie

APRIL 9, 2012

These entrepreneurs do not risk everything, work outrageous hours and put themselves under extreme pressure because they want to. If it were a decision to be an entrepreneur, then most right-minded individuals would decide to turn back when they encountered the first inevitable startup crises. Entrepreneurs want to matter.

Startup 243

Startup Ideas Entrepreneur Statistics 243

Tech Zulu Event

FEBRUARY 3, 2012

A look around technology industry, perhaps the heart of the global revolution, shows a happily working international community all pushing for the common goal of innovation. With this, Silicon Valley has decided to speak out about the stifling affect of immigration law and the impacts that have caused crippling of the American tech industry.

Technical Review 77

Technical Review Startup Offshore Entrepreneur 77

SoCal Delicious

AUGUST 28, 2012

VentureBeat | News About Tech, Money and Innovation. Venture capital. Entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs. I assumed that the people of Los Angeles were disingenuous attention whores and didn’t know anything about technology.”. MYTH 3: SoCal lacks Fortune 500 Tech Leadership. Whats Hot Menu. Skip to primary content.

Southern California 57

Southern California PHP Technical Review Orange County 57

SoCal CTO

JULY 13, 2010

10 Ways To Be Your Own Boss - A VC : Venture Capital and Technology , June 18, 2010 The folks at Behance and Cool Hunting asked me to talk at their 99% Conference a couple months ago. had two occasions recently to review products which had clear market leadership. Which button do you press? Yes, even bootstrappers.

Startup 175

Startup Venture Capital Slides Blogging 175

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 27, 2010

My company had raised venture capital in April 2001 but we were told that there may never be any more coming. I learned how to get press coverage when we were no longer “hot.&# I learned how to manage costs effectively. I learned how to do a pipeline review with sales people without getting bullshitted to.

Startup 285

Startup Venture Capital Sales Software Review 285