Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2014

I had dinner this week with a top new customer at one of our enterprise software investments. I wish I did more enterprise software investing because when I attend meetings like this I realize that this is my core DNA – rolling out business software solutions to customers. You can’t. Many people advise against this.

Customer 341

Customer Custom Venture Capital Software Review 341

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 20, 2020

I think that’s a largely flawed fight to be picking and of all the uses of Senator Klobuchar’s I could think of some much more productive fights to be having. For starters Uber itself has had to lay off 27% of its workforce due to the pandemic and has been severely impacted financially from the crisis with no immediate respite in sight.

SaaS 242

SaaS Customer Custom Technical Review 242

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. Only one-third make it past their tenth anniversary. Apply for contests and business grants.

Startup 136

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 136

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 29, 2011

A clear trend over the past 15-years is that many Silicon Valley venture capitalists enjoy investing within driving distance. This concentration is partly due to natural causes – successful startups spawn other successful startups. However, a review of historical data confirms that this trend remains consistent, even in boom times.

Venture Capital 233

Venture Capital Capital Funding Technical Review 233

SoCal CTO

DECEMBER 1, 2010

I continue to collect great content that is the intersection of startups, products, online and technology. The United States is now a debtor nation to China and that the bill is about to come due. Five Reasons You Haven’t Launched - Software By Rob , November 10, 2010 Photo by stevendepolo. But I don’t think so. call to arms.

Technical Review 175

Technical Review Startup Product Technology 175

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 1, 2017

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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Develop 70

Develop Development Product Startup 70

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 31, 2021

Tech companies have spent the past decade or more developing innovations that can be applied to old-world industries like agriculture, construction, energy, education, manufacturing and transportation and logistics. The vast majority of those are nowhere up to modern codes. ” Climate resiliency .

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 6, 2019

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. Only one-third make it past their tenth anniversary. Apply for contests and business grants.

Startup 128

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 128

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. I believe that over capitalizing companies too early often favors the VC.

Development Team Review 374

Development Team Review Technical Review Startup Resource 374

socalTECH

OCTOBER 2, 2012

Southern California's technology community--despite all of the recent excitement around Silicon Beach--continues to be underserved in terms of capital, with a lack of venture capital funds (with money), and other private technology investors. Jeb Spencer: We consider ourselves a private equity firm.

Acquisition 168

Acquisition Software Review Technical Review Equity 168

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2018

Today the company officially announced its most recent round of capital ?—?having Capital of course drives scale advantages and when you have “winner take most” markets it also has a way of scaring away some investors from investing in the 3–5th “me too” competitors. having raised $300 million?—?less There is nothing viral!

Santa Monica 256

Santa Monica Funding Startup Course 256

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

Nearly every successful tech startup I’ve observed over the past 20 years has gone through a similar growth pattern: Innovate, systematize then scale operations. Innovate In the early years of a startup there is a lot of kinetic energy of enthusiastic innovators looking to launch a product that changes how an industry works.

Startup 286

Startup Technical Review Customer Custom 286

InfoChachkie

AUGUST 11, 2011

I recommend you first review Dharmesh’s article and then listen to Naval’s thoughts. Value Prop Twitter Style : AngelList is the productization of raising startup funding. Venture Hacks is educating entrepreneurs on the game theory of how to raise venture capital. AngelList is the productization of that.

Startup 273

Startup Software Review Summary Technical Review 273

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 4, 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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Tips 104

Tips Startup Technical Review Equity 104

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

There has been a lot of public debate over the past several weeks about whether it’s a good thing to be “gross margin positive” or not and commentary always reminds me that some people at startups don’t quite understand financial metrics or even how to think about which ones are healthy. So if you’re able to raise easily no problem.

Metrics 150

Metrics Startup SaaS Course 150

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. Reviewing financial & operational performance. And honestly if you did raise a ton of capital from many people it’s ok that you share control. how to market our products and company.

Startup 325

Startup Sales Technical Review Software Review 325

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Yeah, that was when I changed for me…” “…there was so much positive feedback on demystifying this one element of venture capital. A deep dive into the Foundry Group investment philosophy including an interesting discussion of their investing Themes. “… our lens is: Internet Software Companies anywhere in the U.S. was starting.

Venture Capital 288

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Software Review 288

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

I told her that I believed America’s best asset – driven initially from software innovation mindset in the San Francisco Bay Area and media innovation driven from Los Angeles – was our willingness to accept failure. It was really gratifying to read Larry Page’s interview in the FT this past week. Working on it.

Technical Review 417

Technical Review Startup Software Review Course 417

SoCal CTO

AUGUST 3, 2010

5 Lessons from 150 startup pitches - A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks , July 11, 2010 I just reviewed several hundred startup pitches for Capital Factory. The collapse of the IPO market and dysfunctional math in the venture capital community has stacked the odds against you. Not that I blame you! Here’s why.

Startup 217

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Software Review 217

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

I recall being impressed with Jeff, but I was concerned that he was creating a platform, which often requires a significant amount of capital, takes an extended amount of time to establish and can be subject to margin pressure as the enabling technologies become commoditized. Tech Diligence - Consider The Source.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2016

As I have pointed out in previous posts , 91% of VCs surveyed believe prices are declining (30% believe substantially) and 77% believe that funding will take longer than it has in the past. The earlier the round, the less capital you need and the more reasonable your valuation the less time that is needed generally to raise capital.

Startup 150

Startup Capital Funding Invest 150

socalTECH

JULY 12, 2013

Many companies would love to be able to get the benefits of cloud--easy configurability, low cost, scaling, and more--but, due to various reasons, can''t take advantage of public cloud services like Amazon. With our software, our clients just inherited the ability to use Ceph, and there was nothing they had to do to get that.

CIO 207

CIO Southern California Technical Review Software Review 207

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

On December 3rd Brad Feld wrote a one paragraph blog post titled “ Raising Venture Capital &# in which he linked to my blog. There was no viral social networking products back then like Twitter where people could easily discover your content. I don’t plan to write the authoritative venture capital blog, just some anecdotes.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

Many observers of the venture capital industry have questioned whether its best days are behind it. They are frustrated by the past decade of subpar returns for the sector. If you want to understand the details of why this is, I covered it in detail in this post, Understanding Changes in the Software Industry.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Capital Technical Review Startup 347

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

One is the “denominator problem&# which says that if an LP invests X% (the denominator) into “alternative investments&# such as venture capital and if their total amount available to invest (the numerator) goes down by 30% then the amount they allocate to VC will by definition need to go down by 30% to stay the same percentage.

Venture Capital 311

Venture Capital Startup Seed Funding Rustic Canyon 311

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 30, 2019

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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Startup 87

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 87

Tech Zulu Event

APRIL 9, 2014

Perhaps it’s time to raise a round of Venture Capital funding and want a pitch presentation a bit more composed than the dusty Keynote you put together last year for your friends and family round. All the while, you have product to maintain and a team to manage, but the very thought of hiring a VP or consulting firm makes you cringe.

Outsource Development 105

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review Outsource 105

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 20, 2016

There is a common belief in the angel and venture capital community that you put your money on the best team, rather than the best idea. If your team has a depth of expertise in software, that won’t help you get funding for a new hardware solution. Solo entrepreneurs rarely find an investor. Focus on prior results, not titles.

Startup 60

Startup Entrepreneur Software Review Technical Review 60

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 5, 2010

This was in large part due to the marketing efforts of Jason that created a great top end of the funnel (100+ companies applied) and the herculean efforts of Tyler Crowley who spent days going through all of the submissions and serving up 5 very interesting companies. The game then interacts with the physical world product.

Angel 254

Angel Technical Review Software Review Platform 254

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 12, 2018

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. Only one-third make it past their tenth anniversary. Apply for contests and business grants.

Startup 53

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 53

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 20, 2015

If Smucker’s can annually generate hundreds of millions in sales for a variety of food products, there is little risk that a mediocre company or product name will preclude you from achieving similar success. Follow Tom''s lead and make the pronunciation of your company and products obvious. Do''s And Don''t Do''s.

Customer 100

Customer Custom Technical Review Software Review 100

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

So here is what I have been telling entrepreneurs privately for the past 6 months. In the past I have publicly commented on some specific companies that seemed over valued. It’s like people arguing that there’s a beautiful beach house in 2006 that represents great long-term value due to scarcity of similar property.

Pricing 309

Pricing Marketing Startup Venture Capital 309

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 16, 2016

This term refers to an initial venture-capital investment, often wrongly sought to seed early product development. After viewing your slide deck, if investors are still interested in your startup, they will ask for a deep-dive meeting to drill in on any hard questions before commencing due diligence. Sweat equity.

Startup 57

Startup Software Review Equity Invest 57

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 8, 2015

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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Entrepreneur 105

Entrepreneur Startup Technical Review Equity 105

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. People tend to overvalue past investments when making forward-looking investment decisions. Productivity. The sunk costs trap. Surprised?).

Startup 175

Startup Venture Capital Slides Blogging 175

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 14, 2014

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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Entrepreneur 113

Entrepreneur Funding Startup Technical Review 113

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 19, 2013

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. Consider licensing your product or intellectual property, and “white labeling.”

Startup 123

Startup Technical Review Equity Incubator 123