Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 26, 2010

Competition. So if you’re raising money – from angels or VCs – you’re going to have to address the question of whom you’re competing against. And the reality is that if you have no competition it will likely be perceived as a negative, not positive. Harvey Balls.

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Venture Capital Slides Competition Education 313

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

Something happened in the past 7 years in the startup and venture capital world that I hadn’t experienced since the late 90’s — we all began praying to the God of Valuation. How might our next phase of the journey seem brighter, even with more uncertain days for startups and capital markets? What happened?

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Venture Capital Startup Marketing Pricing 466

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Picking a VC is hard. So I thought I’d write about out with what I would look for in a VC knowing what I know now and why. Most VCs are book smart. It’s insanely competitive to get into our industry so most have degrees from institutions like Stanford, Harvard, Wharton and University of Chicago (blatant plug ;-).

Venture Capital 364

Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

This is part of my ongoing series on Understanding Venture Capital. I recently wrote a blog post on understanding how the size and age of a venture capital fund might affect you when you’re raising money. I believe these VC funds have suffered some amount of reputation fall out. Let me explain: 1.

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Seed Funding Pricing Invest 265

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 3, 2016

In the VC insider baseball world a discussion has gone on about “VC platforms” over the past 5 or so years. While firms define platforms differently, let’s just say they are the services that a VC offers outside of investment capital and partner time on boards or providing intros.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Platform Startup Resource 150

TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 18, 2019

Most of the venture capital firms covered in TechCrunch and other tech publications compete for a spot on the cap table of the hottest Bay Area, New York or Los Angeles companies of the moment. Since Revolution launched in 2005, venture capital activity in underrepresented markets has grown significantly.

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Venture Capital Funding Seed Funding Activity 211

InfoChachkie

MAY 22, 2012

The steps outlined below represent an ideal approach to raising capital from sophisticated investors. You might be at Step 2 with one VC and Step 3 with another. VCs collude all the time, it is only fair that entrepreneurs compare notes every now and again as well.”. Even the most jaded VC cannot resist authentic flattery.

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Venture Capital Capital Research Customer 236

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

I had previously raised VC in 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2005. It included one firm who I asked not to call Salesforce.com as a reference (they were our largest pilot customer) and in their kindness they called Marc Benioff (the CEO) and asked his opinion. In case VC’s haven’t figured this out yet, shit rolls downhill.

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Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2011

I recently filmed a show for This Week in Venture Capital in which I talked about how to prepare for a VC meeting: whom you’ll meet, who should attend from your side, what materials you should bring and how you should run the meeting. The “Triple Play&# of VC Presentations. But take prompts from the VC.

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Venture Capital Slides Technical Advisors Startup 299

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2010

One of the questions I’m most often asked is, “what’s it like being a VC?&# I’ve been a VC for nearly 3 years now. I always start my answer to this question with, “you’d have to be a pretty big baby to complain about being a VC.&# And the VC job has plenty of admin and minutiae.

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Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Entrepreneur 312

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 11, 2021

Photo by Vanna Phon on Unsplash Customer acquisition is the lifeblood of many startups from e-commerce to gaming to marketplace companies, among others. that’s where the customers are. But if you ask anyone in the ecosystem of customer acquisition?—?founders, no surprise?—?that’s founders, marketers, investors?—?and

Product 424

Product Platform Advertising Acquisition 424

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 7, 2013

Based on the final report for 2012 from Thomson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), it may appear that IPOs are back as a viable startup exit strategy. For the full year 2012, venture-backed initial public offerings raised $21.5 Identify the right people in the right venture firms.

Venture Capital 101

Venture Capital Startup Capital Seed Funding 101

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2010

To see the video of This Week in VC click on this link. What a pleasure that I got to spend an hour talking with both Om Malik (whom I’ve always respected his views) and Paul Jozefak , a venture capital partner at Neuhaus Partners in Germany (and formerly the head of Europe for SAP Ventures).

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital Google Web Sites 225

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 11, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series “ Pitching a VC.&#. The “Triple Play&# of VC Presentations. A large part of my series has been outlining what the typical VC PowerPoint presentation should look like. You want to build a dialogue where you get to know the VC with whom you’re meeting. It happens.

Venture Capital 238

Venture Capital Slides Startup Sales 238

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 14, 2018

I know all of this because every VC knows this because we’ve all either funded companies that have marketing technology or we’ve seen a pitch with a company that does this. If you haven’t read the other VC fund-raising posts I’ve done as part of this series you can find the whole outline and this first in the series here.]

Funding 239

Funding Venture Capital IP Email 239

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 24, 2011

I just read the Q1 2011 report from CB Insights , which shows venture capital is back. Back to VCs, Silicon Valley venture capital firms are still the most active. So what can you do to get to the head of the venture capital investment queue? Overall, investors put $7.5 That represents a $1.5

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Venture Capital Startup Capital Seed Funding 93

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2023

Whether the partner is a supplier looking to gain a lock on your business as it grows or a customer looking to create a competitive barrier through use of your product, such an investment typically carries fewer restrictions than from a professional investor and less oversight. These include Y-Combinator and TechStars, among others.

Venture Capital 295

Venture Capital Startup Class Invest 295

TechCrunch LA

MAY 20, 2021

Builders VC led the round, which included participation from Celtic, Newfund and Wish co-founder Danny Zhang. Eano, she said, offers competitive and transparent pricing so that homeowners aren’t surprised as a remodeling project goes on. Jim Kim of Builders VC, said he first encountered Wu and Jung while they were at Wish. “We

Technical Review 185

Technical Review Startup Venture Capital Software Review 185

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 26, 2020

leadership, mentorship, competitiveness, communications, relationship-building?—?and So mostly we just had to listen to customer feedback from founders, VCs and LPs. She worked for 5 years as a VC at Battery Ventures and co-headed M&A at IAC working with Barry Diller. And all the platform stuff.

Venture Capital 361

Venture Capital Startup Invest CitySearch 361

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

seed and they are writing $1.25m of it you can expect them to require a board seat) The competitive landscape (If you have several sources of capital you can likely politely decline the board request or can grant them a seat but ask for it to be “common appointed” and those revokable if you need in the future). But it’s quite rare.

Startup 236

Startup Venture Capital Tips Capital 236

InfoChachkie

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

Too Techie - Tone down emphasis on the technology underlying your venture; an interested investor will perform tech diligence at the appropriate time. No VC Fit - Match your venture with appropriate funding source. Competition. Explain your team's experiences that are relevant to the success of your current venture.

Venture Capital 211

Venture Capital Summary Technical Review Template 211

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 31, 2018

The only “sustainable competitive advantage” in business is self-awareness. For example, I once worked for a startup CEO who desperately needed money from a venture capitalist, but became totally defensive when the VC suggested that my CEO might be better in the chief marketing role, in favor of a more experienced CEO.

Competition 81

Competition Startup Examples Coach 81

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 10, 2010

This episode of This Week in Venture Capital featured Michael Montgomery, president of Montgomery & Co. You have to be selected to present and it is typically reserved for companies that have already raised early-stage capital and are well into revenue growth. Should you use investment banks to raise venture capital?

Venture Capital 242

Venture Capital Mission Ventures Capital Help 242

Berkonomics

JUNE 2, 2022

Looking for an entrance into a VC, an angel group, a bank, a CxO for a sales opportunity, or any other entity? Are you working with or selling to a particularly important competitor to your target customer? Dropping that name will often immediately draw a response if the decision maker is curious or particularly competitive.

Ideas 156

Ideas Sales Competition Venture Capital 156

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 3, 2010

This was really a fun week at TWiVC because we decided to have an entrepreneur come and talk about raising capital rather than having a VC come on. In particular I tried to do most of the “entrepreneur advice on VC” up front so that if you don’t want to watch our views on the deals you don’t have to. OTHER DEALS: 1.

Venture Capital 214

Venture Capital Startup Design S3 214

InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 23, 2015

VC's love to talk about their successes. Yet most VC's bury their failures under six feet of denial. In the startup world, the former happens when a VC makes a bad investment, and the latter occurs when they miss a great opportunity. The difference is that VoiceXML does not leverage customers' knowledge of web development.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review Southern California 100

TechCrunch LA

NOVEMBER 24, 2020

million in new financing, HMBradley is making moves as the Los Angeles-based entrant into the challenger bank competition. Unlike most banking startups that woo customers with easy credit and savvy online user interfaces, HMBradley is pitching a better savings account. With $90 million in deposits and $18.25 on their deposits.

Los Angeles 237

Los Angeles Venture Capital Capital Customer 237

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 2, 2022

You can’t succeed in business without an operational model that delivers value to customers at a reasonable price, with an underlying cost that allows you to make a profit. A target market is the group of customers that the startup plans to attract through marketing and sales their product or service. Competition. Production.

Sales 102

Sales Customer Custom Outsource 102

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 28, 2012

You’re on a first date with a VC – how much should you tell them? When is it appropriate for a VC to call your customers? There is no universal answer and my discussions with various VCs on these topics have yielded many differing opinions. “We are sharing with you our list of key customers / biz dev partners.

Technical Review 316

Technical Review Venture Capital Customer Custom 316

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 16, 2018

Without taking a dime of outside capital, the company has achieved impressive success in a competitive, SaaS market segment, landing companies such as Nike, Intuit, NASA, AutoDesk and PBS. We have customers from so many different industries like software, financial services, healthcare, and media.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 19, 2011

He is very hands-on and helpful – especially for any company looking into customer acquisition. What better than to have capital from somebody who has actually done it in the trenches? Matt’s commitment to re-investing in tech startups is reminiscent to this great Fred Wilson post of “recycling capital. &#.

Acquisition 304

Acquisition Startup Customer Custom 304

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 6, 2018

As a VC with scores of startups in our portfolio we have ringside seats to many, many fund raising processes plus I had to raise money across about 5 different rounds of capital as an entrepreneur so I’ve developed some thought on the process that I hope can be helpful to some of you before you start. Let me give you an example.

Funding 236

Funding Venture Capital Startup Entrepreneur 236

SoCal CTO

JUNE 9, 2010

Kathy Sierra at Business of Software 2009 - Business of Software Blog , May 4, 2010 "In the old days, getting customers was easy. Putting customers first. Legendary customer support. Draw Your Ideas - A VC : Venture Capital and Technology , May 16, 2010 I saw Jack Dorsey give this talk at The 99% Conference last month.

Startup 248

Startup Venture Capital Conference Social Media 248

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series of posts and I need to file this one under both Raising Venture Capital and Startup Advice. I’m not even talking about your 12-page Powerpoint presentation that you need to raise venture capital or to talk with potential biz dev partners. Why do VC’s care about these years?

Web 2.0 334

Web 2.0 Venture Capital Web Technical Review 334

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 20, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series, “ Pitching a VC.&# Getting a meeting with a prominent angel or VC is difficult enough. Some advice on how to do that was covered in this link – Getting Access to a VC. If you haven’t read how to build VC relationships and demonstrate traction make sure to read it.

Venture Capital 277

Venture Capital Startup Email News 277

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 4, 2020

As an entrepreneur, I understand your passion when pitching your solution to investors and customers, but passion alone won’t make one more technology pitch stand out above all the rest. Good relationships are the primary basis for trust in business, leading to supportive investors, loyal customers, and effective partnerships.

Startup 145

Startup Competition Customer Custom 145

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

Many observers of the venture capital industry have questioned whether its best days are behind it. I can’t help feel a bit of rear-view mirror analysis in all of “VC model is broken” bears in our industry. They are, in fact, great news for traditional venture capitalists. This article originally ran on PEHub.

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Venture Capital Capital Technical Review Startup 347