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?” If you have the urge to be an entrepreneur, I encourage you to think seriously about each of these, before you zero-in on one or two, and get totally discouraged if those don’t work for you.

Funding 174

Funding Startup Equity Examples 174

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

It should help some entrepreneurs to better access early-stage capital and should allow some angel investors better access to deal flow. If you know, VCs end up writing sizable checks into their own funds, which is important in better aligning interests. For starters, what is AngelList Syndicates? So What’s the Big Deal?

Venture Capital 356

Venture Capital Invest Course Technical Review 356

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

So super angel and seed funds are proliferating – As a result there has been an explosion in the number of amazing early-stage investors such as Softtech VC , Floodgate , Felicis Ventures , K9 Ventures , OATV , Lowercase Capital , Founder Collective , and many, many more. I have written more in depth on this topic in the past.

Venture Capital 311

Venture Capital Startup Seed Funding Rustic Canyon 311

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

” The new narrative is “will my seed funds be able to fund the prorata of their winners?” ” Stated simply – if you seed funded Uber at $4.5m Seed funds now represent 67% of all funds being created now, which is up 100% from 6 years ago. .”

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

SoCal CTO

MARCH 1, 2010

Startup Killer: the Cost of Customer Acquisition | For Entrepreneurs , February 2, 2010 Looks at the critical equation around customer acquisition cost vs. customer lifetime value similar to what I discussed in Startup Metrics but in more depth. Of course, one of the best ideas around this is to have Negative Customer Acquisition Costs.

Pricing 150

Pricing Acquisition Customer Custom 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2012

I had a very enjoyable day in Cincinnati meeting many local entrepreneurs, angels and accelerators. I was here to see one of our LPs (limited partners are the people who invest money in VC funds) called Fort Washington. ” OF COURSE! Of course they don’t. Of course I’ll be in Austin next week. They shouldn’t.

Press 364

Press Course Startup Email 364

socalTECH

JUNE 19, 2019

We have highly engaging courses, taught by professional players, and where you track your progress, driven by data, and which also features an on-demand marketplace to help you find any coach you want to help you improve your play on any game. After finishing a course, we've found they likely also want to find a coach.

Help 113

Help Coach Startup Tips 113

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 18, 2013

The number of startups getting seed funding in 2012 jumped by 65% over the previous year to a total of 1749, according to a recent report by CB Insights. Seed investments” are early stage financings (typically less than $1.5 This is great evidence that the recession drag on funding new startups is behind us.

Startup 99

Startup Invest Venture Capital Seed Funding 99

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2016

It’s very easy in venture capital when you’ve seen thousands of companies have read thousands of decks and spreadsheets and been to numerous conferences and exchanged ideas with other investors and entrepreneurs to feel like “you know better” and that’s precisely what we try to encourage Team Upfront not to feel or how not to behave.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Startup Invest Course 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

At an accelerator … Me: Raising convertible notes as a seed round is one of the biggest disservices our industry has done to entrepreneurs since 2001-2003 when there were “full ratchets” and “multiple liquidation preferences” – the most hostile terms anybody found in term sheets 10 years ago.

Venture Capital 417

Venture Capital Capital Pricing Doc 417

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2019

$15 million first checks but we also have three growth funds. The advantage is that in many of our best deals we now have $50+ million invested so we can really support entrepreneurs as their businesses scale. Of course the media doesn’t do nuance well so this is an emotional topic.

Venture Capital 223

Venture Capital IP Startup Google 223

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2014

and I thought if we brought the community together for common purpose we could create more of a sense of community to help new entrepreneurs get funded, assemble teams, raise profiles and help with biz dev, product, etc. Companies were getting funded more easily and many more companies were actually being created. See point one!

Venture Capital 290

Venture Capital Startup Idealab Funding 290

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 25, 2016

One of the most frequent questions I get as a mentor to entrepreneurs is “How do I find the money to start my business?” If you have the urge to be an entrepreneur, I encourage you to think seriously about each of these, before you zero-in on one or two, and get totally discouraged if those don’t work for you.

Funding 107

Funding Startup Equity Examples 107

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2015

I rarely talk to any startup entrepreneur or VC who doesn’t feel it and somehow long for simpler times despite the benefits we all enjoy from increased enthusiasm for our sector. For entrepreneurs there’s too much money sloshing around. And it’s true that I still take a whole lot of first meetings with entrepreneurs.

Software Review 150

Software Review Startup Venture Capital Invest 150

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2015

In the old days there usually weren’t convertible notes on early-stage deals and there weren’t party rounds with 20 angels or 6 seed funds. Of course investors care about controls (board, protective provisions, IP assignments, non-solicitation) but these are all pretty standard. Those are the big three. No problem.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Invest 150

Tech.Co

JANUARY 15, 2018

The constantly changing media landscape is relentless, so our seed funding part-way through our journey from the Zappos leadership of Tony Hsieh and Fred Mossler via the downtown Las Vegas revitalization efforts of the Downtown Project was particularly helpful as we adjusted, and readjusted.

Media 175

Media News Organization Content 175

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 21, 2014

An impressive number of new VCs have been created – most of them with new seed funds. Of course back then it literally was sold in a package and stored on a shelf! Venture capitalists have raised increasing amounts of money from their investors (LPs) every year. And importantly we’ve had revenue.

Marketing 354

Marketing Case Study Metrics Sales 354

TechCrunch LA

NOVEMBER 4, 2019

The company plans to give creators and influencers more independence from existing platforms by allowing them access to funding from a team well-versed in their unique capital needs. The program, called The EduCator Incubator, planned to seed 25 to 40 “emerging video creators” with $25,000 to $75,000 in seed funding.

Platform 170

Platform Marketing Tool Venture Capital 170

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2011

Babak Nivi is one of the most understated, helpful & important people on the entrepreneur / startup scene in NorCal. What he (along with Naval) started with AngelList is also a very important transformation to the communications between first-time entrepreneurs & angels. But it +is+ an anti-entrepreneur stance.&#

Venture Capital 267

Venture Capital Writing Blogging Startup 267

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 8, 2022

With the cost of entry at an all-time low, and the odds of success equally low, more and more entrepreneurs are starting multiple companies concurrently. Other prolific entrepreneurs, like Richard Branson and Elon Musk , simply have several startups on the table at any given moment. Many entrepreneurs love investing in other startups.

Entrepreneur 145

Entrepreneur Startup Resource Course 145

socalTECH

MARCH 8, 2013

I've been a serial entrepreneur for about 20-odd years, and I didn't want to sit at a big company. I decided to become a parallel entrepreneur, and started a whole series of companies in big data. We have our own small seed fund, which we trigger to fund that company and hire a team, a CEO and a CTO.

Incubator 208

Incubator Startup CTO Hire Ideas 208

Tech Zulu Event

FEBRUARY 14, 2012

After an initial round of seed funding of $500k led by Pasadena’s Idealab, Mingly saw great success as they built up their Gmail user base. Fast forward to the present with Mingly announcing the launch of two new products to expand their services to a wider audience of users.

Web 74

Web Social Network Email Networking 74

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

In a world where the economy only heads in one direction (read: 2009-2014) most investors & entrepreneurs forget to pay attention to gross burn. Of course a lot of this also comes down to investor trust. Best to make sure you’re aligned closely with your investor on this topic.

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Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 23, 2015

Of course you could start your own company. Of course I’m not suggesting people shouldn’t start a company. 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.”

Technical Review 150

Technical Review Startup Venture Capital IP 150

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 27, 2021

More and more entrepreneurs are hearing about the successful graduates and investors queued behind a few well-known startup incubators, including Y Combinator, TechStars, and the Founder Institute. Initial funding. The reality is far different. All the rest of us might be the real beneficiaries, with a lot more to learn.

Incubator 146

Incubator Technical Review Entrepreneur Mentor 146

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

In most cases if you can’t get a prototype done you’re probably not an entrepreneur. I know you’re not a tech guy and haven’t done anything other than an HTML course you once took, but if you’re inspirational and a leader you’ll find somebody to moonlight for free to get your prototype built.

Angel 291

Angel Funding Venture Capital Startup 291

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2016

Rise of Seed. Prior to then the concept of “seed funds” barely existed and as I’ve argued before the seed fund phenomenon was largely driven by: Open source + horizontal computing + Amazon AWS. Explosion in Seed Funds. Now seed funding is conventional wisdom. Late-Stage VCs Pay Up.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Capital Funding Seed Funding 150

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 30, 2014

More and more entrepreneurs are hearing about the successful graduates and investors queued behind a few well-known startup incubators, including Y Combinator, TechStars, and the Founder Institute. Initial funding. The reality is far different. All the rest of us might be the real beneficiaries, with a lot more to learn.

Incubator 103

Incubator Entrepreneur Technical Review Mentor 103

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

So far at the company I have raised seed funds of $500,000 of which $470,000 is still in the bank so I’m in pretty good shape. Dare I steer off the course from the tried-and-true PowerPoint ritual? Experienced and serial entrepreneurs in the content management space. Prepare to give your pitch in 30 including Q&A.

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Blogging Startup Slides 274

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 23, 2015

Crosscut Ventures has just announced their 3rd fund and clocking in at $75 million , which will be focused heavily on Los Angeles – FTW. Like many entrepreneurs, the founders of Crosscut quit their well-paid jobs in the belief that LA’s moment was about to arrive and they spent years on low (sometimes no) salaries to prove it.

News 150

News Funding Venture Capital Dollar Shave Club 150

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 1, 2013

With the cost of entry at an all-time low, and the odds of success equally low, more and more entrepreneurs are starting multiple companies concurrently. For entrepreneurs who really try to be the CEO of multiple early-stage startups concurrently, the hot new term for this practice is “multi-table” entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneur 92

Entrepreneur Startup Resource Seed Funding 92

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 6, 2019

Image via Flickr by watsonsinelgin With the cost of entry at an all-time low, and the odds of success equally low, more and more entrepreneurs are starting multiple companies concurrently. Other prolific entrepreneurs, like Richard Branson and Elon Musk , simply have several startups on the table at any given moment.

Startup 99

Startup Entrepreneur Resource Seed Funding 99

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 27, 2013

Last year I wrote a blog post on entrepreneurs with a chip on their shoulders. A chip on one’s shoulder as in, “F**k the system, it’s broken and I want to fix it” is exactly the energy I look for in entrepreneurs. You raised your seed funds. I think it’s an important read.

Startup 371

Startup Blogging Press Entrepreneur 371

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

I’d like to explain as best I can my opinion on what is going on because most of what I hear from entrepreneurs is not only wrong but is reminiscent of what I heard in 1997-2000. ” “This will be great for VCs and bad for entrepreneurs.” ” Of course life is more complicated. All of these are false.

Startup 150

Startup Company Companies Venture Capital 150

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 2, 2013

More and more entrepreneurs are hearing about the successful graduates and investors queued behind a few well-known startup incubators, including Y Combinator, TechStars, and the Founder Institute. Initial funding. The reality is far different. All the rest of us might be the real beneficiaries, with a lot more to learn.

Incubator 115

Incubator Help Startup Technical Review 115

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

This has led to the creation of incubators, accelerators and seed funds. The movie, “The Social Network” might have had more of an impact on creating future entrepreneurs than any other event of the past 5 years. So of course returns from 2000-2010 were subpar on average for the industry. Thank you, Aaron Sorkin!

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Capital Technical Review Startup 347

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 10, 2018

But if there is nothing wrong with you then please don’t let early rejections alter your course.” Many entrepreneurs let the early rejections get to them and it’s normal because when you hear “no” you think “what’s wrong with me!?” When investors hear that somebody else wanted to fund you it gets their FOMO going and they pile on.

Press 232

Press Funding Venture Capital Technical Review 232