Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 8, 2016

Most technical entrepreneurs I know demand the discipline of a product specification or plan, and then assume that their great product will drive a great business. Serious investors, on the other hand, look for a professional business plan or summary first, and hardly ever look at the product plan.

Product 55

Product Startup Summary Entrepreneur 55

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 6, 2019

Some investors seem to focus wholly on the strengths of the management team, or a sustainable competitive advantage, and in reality these are the core attributes for every funding equation. Today’s ultracompetitive global environment demands that you make alliances early. Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics.

Startup 97

Startup Education Customer Custom 97

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 20, 2014

Many entrepreneurs still don’t understand that building a business culture today of doing good, like helping people (society) and planet (sustainability), is also a key to maximizing profit. Companies can use this strategy to improve their profitability and competitive advantage. Doing good opens the door to a broader customer base.

Startup 91

Startup Organization Pricing Customer 91

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2014

The starting point of product IS marketing, which is what a lot of young entrepreneurs that never studied business don’t realize. Link has a summary of his argument plus a great video). So they’ll have to look for other competitive advantages for distribution. Everything we were taught pre-Internet is still relevant.

Marketing 379

Marketing Startup SEM SEO 379

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 6, 2019

Success in any business these days requires a constant flow of new and innovative solutions, to keep up with changes in the market, competition, and to attract new customers. Here is my summary of the ten top creativity mistakes we both still see too often: Criticize any new idea or employee suggestion.

Ideas 94

Ideas Framework Summary Organization 94

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 30, 2013

Some investors seem to focus wholly on the strengths of the management team, or a sustainable competitive advantage, and in reality these are the core attributes for every funding equation. Today’s ultracompetitive global environment demands that you make alliances early. Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics.

Startup 117

Startup Education Customer Custom 117

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

People who believe the former believe that you should see the market demand before too many people know you’re “in market.” As a VC I of course want you to come see only me because that means I have no competition and have time to properly get to know you. Remember, I was an entrepreneur for 10 years before a VC).

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

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

SEPTEMBER 15, 2014

Many questioned whether it could survive under the fail whale, inevitable competition from Facebook, founder fighting, fights with 3rd-party developers let alone become a revolutionary business that could make money. He simply is inspirational as an entrepreneur, an inventor and as somebody who wants to make a difference in the world.

Funding 362

Funding Technical Review Ideas Startup 362

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 22, 2010

Due to competitive markets we ended up with a pretty good term sheet until we needed to raise money in April 2001 and then we got completely screwed. And for some strange reason entrepreneurs didn’t share this information. I’ve started from day one trying to build total transparency into my process with entrepreneurs.

Venture Capital 405

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Funding 405

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 7, 2017

The solution is to establish and maintain a culture and processes that don’t view change as a discrete event to be spotted and managed, but as an ongoing opportunity to improve competitiveness. Failure rates this high demand a new mindset and startups are the logical place for this to happen. In summary, change will happen.

Startup 56

Startup Training Statistics Summary 56

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 17, 2016

Some investors seem to focus wholly on the strengths of the management team, or a sustainable competitive advantage, and in reality these are the core attributes for every funding equation. Today’s ultracompetitive global environment demands that you make alliances early. Montgomery, which does a great job of laying out specifics.

Capital 58

Capital Startup Education Customer 58

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 19, 2017

Success in any business these days requires a constant flow of new and innovative solutions, to keep up with changes in the market, competition, and to attract new customers. Here is my summary of the ten top creativity mistakes we both still see too often: Criticize any new idea or employee suggestion.

Ideas 56

Ideas Framework Summary Organization 56

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

” I mention journalists here because they perpetuate the myth that focusing on profits is ALWAYS the right answer and then I hear many entrepreneurs (and certainly many “normals”) repeating the same mantra. Exec Summary: Most companies (98+%) in the world (even tech startups) should be very profit focused.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 28, 2012

Some investors seem to focus wholly on the strengths of your management team, or your sustainable competitive advantage, and in reality these are the core attributes for every funding equation. Today’s ultracompetitive global environment demands that you make alliances early.

Startup 99

Startup Education Customer Custom 99

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

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 ;-). Summary: Team Leadership skills, operating knowhow and industry knowledge are all tremendously important. VCs, how to select a VC, etc.) Most VCs are book smart.

Venture Capital 364

Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 29, 2012

The solution is to establish and maintain a culture and processes that don’t view change as a discrete event to be spotted and managed, but as an ongoing opportunity to improve competitiveness. Failure rates this high demand a new mindset and startups are the logical place for this to happen. In summary, change will happen.

Startup 93

Startup Training Statistics Summary 93

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 14, 2011

The solution is to establish and maintain a culture and processes that don’t view change as a discrete event to be spotted and managed, but as an ongoing opportunity to improve competitiveness. Failure rates this high demand a new mindset and startups are the logical place for this to happen. In summary, change will happen.

Startup 94

Startup Marketing Training Statistics 94

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2011

Summary notes, as always, provide below. He was a life-long entrepreneur and the first business he created out of college (actually, he founded it while he was at Caltech) was a company that manufactured high quality audio speakers. Too many entrepreneurs focus on dilution. It was a pleasure to write them myself.

Competition 350

Competition Idealab Product CitySearch 350

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 26, 2020

As an advisor to new hardware entrepreneurs, I often hear the myth that a business plan is no longer required to find an investor, if your idea is good enough. What you don’t realize is these famous investors only deal with entrepreneurs who sold their last company for a $100M dollars or more. and trademarks.

Product 169

Product Summary Startup Examples 169

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

Valuing any company can be difficult because it requires a degree of forecasting future growth & competition and ultimately the profits of the organization. ” “This will be great for VCs and bad for entrepreneurs.” What is the True Sentiment of VCs? ” “Sure, prices are dropping. All of these are false.

Startup 150

Startup Company Companies Venture Capital 150

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

I raised money as an entrepreneur, like you, in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005 for two different companies. Executive Summary. If you want to watch the video version summary of my advice on fund raising it’s here. I never suggest that entrepreneurs just randomly pitch VCs. Don’t believe otherwise. Meet early.

Develop 366

Develop Development Funding Venture Capital 366

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

I was saying that I was happy it was all out in the open because I felt at least everybody could now understand the issues & opportunities from the perspectives of angels, entrepreneurs and VCs. Jody didn’t exactly have an easy time fund raising because he’s not one of the prototypical Silicon Valley funded entrepreneurs.

Startup 292

Startup Venture Capital Blogging Summary 292

Frank Addante

JUNE 4, 2006

. – Digital Messaging Infrastructure Company (incubated by Addante and Associates, LLC) Age: 25 - 29 (present) Time Period: 2002 - present My Role: Founder High Point: TBD Here is a summary of my experiences to-date with StrongMail: 1. It turned out that this drove even more demand for StrongMail. Relaxing 2. Incubation 3.

Startup 40

Startup Venture Capital Email CTO Hire 40