Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 5, 2023

Some entrepreneurs start polling venture capitalists for that multi-million-dollar investment before they even have a business plan. It’s helpful to think of startups as proceeding through several stages, which I have defined a long time ago from a funding perspective. Don’t waste your resources on the wrong ones.

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TechCrunch LA

OCTOBER 16, 2019

All Raise chief executive officer Pam Kostka, who joined the business earlier this year, says demand for an All Raise presence in local geographies continues to increase: “Women are hungry for the support and guidance we provide,” Kostka tells TechCrunch. “I Scaling a nonprofit, startup style. It’s highly concentrated.

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Venture Capital Ideas Los Angeles Tool 184

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Do you need a board when you first start you company? If you haven’t raised any money or if you raised a small round from angels or friends & family I would suggest you avoid setting up a formal board unless the people who would join your board are deeply experienced at sitting on startup boards.

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socalTECH

JULY 8, 2019

Los Angeles- and New York-based 3L Capital , a new venture capital investment fund co-founded by former Demand Media CEO Shawn Colo, has raised $217M in a new investment round, the firm said today. READ MORE>>.

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TechCrunch LA

MAY 19, 2018

In startup-land, however, the presumptions about where housing demand is going looks a bit different. Seeking roommates and venture capital. Funded shared and short-term housing startups are cropping up across the globe, from China to Europe to Southeast Asia. This isn’t a U.S.-specific specific phenomenon.

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TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 21, 2019

Hello and welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week’s noteworthy news pertaining to startups and venture capital. Before I jump into today’s topic, let’s catch up a bit. Last week, I profiled an e-commerce startup Part & Parcel. Startup Spotlight: Landline.

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Services Startup Venture Capital Redpoint 207

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. Most of these startups spend the lion’s share of their marketing budget in today’s social media channels: Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Snap, TikTok and so on because?—?no no surprise?—?that’s

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TechCrunch LA

APRIL 4, 2020

Late Friday night, the Treasury Department updated its rules regarding the “affiliation” of private entities to include religious organizations but keep in place the same rules that would deny most startups from receiving loans. (b) “ But most startups are getting killed because, you know, the economy is mostly dead.”

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Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 17, 2017

There are certain topics that even some of the smartest people I talk with who aren’t startup oriented can’t fully grok. It’s common cocktail party chatter to hear people confidently pronounce that some well known startup is sure to blow up because, “How could they succeed when they’re not even profitable!”

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Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 13, 2020

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited angel investors. They fail to realize that the considerations are quite different for each, which can make or break their investment efforts, and ultimately their startup.

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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. I’ve seen too many companies go off track by a VC hell bent on the team pursuing the VCs strategy which at times is about chasing the next shiny object.

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Venture Capital Coach Writing SaaS 364

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 12, 2020

Some entrepreneurs start polling venture capitalists for that multi-million dollar investment before they even have a business plan. It’s helpful to think of startups as proceeding through several stages, which I have defined a long time ago from a funding perspective. Don’t waste your resources on the wrong ones.

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Resource Startup Organization Incubator 171

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 10, 2023

Even though the color of their money is always green, all startup investors are not the same. Investor due diligence on a startup is not a mysterious black art, but is nothing more than a final integrity check on all aspects of your business model, team, product, customers, and plan. It’s no fun for either side.

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Technical Review Startup Innocal Offshore 138

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.

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TechCrunch LA

JULY 2, 2020

When it comes to venture capital, Los Angeles is a city on the rise. In the past year, it’s seen one of the most profitable venture-backed exits of any tech ecosystem (with the $4 billion sale of Honey to PayPal) and investors are minting billion-dollar companies in the region at a torrid pace.

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socalTECH

AUGUST 18, 2010

For today's Insights and Opinions section, where we feature insights and analysis from the local technology community, we have an article from Jeff Cohn , an entrepreneur and veteran of the angel and VC investment community here in Southern California. Read the rest of Jeff's post on on angel and venture capital shareholder liquidity.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 2, 2014

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited Angel investors. They fail to realize that the considerations are quite different for each, which can make or break their investment efforts, and ultimately their startup.

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Venture Capital Entrepreneur Angel Startup 106

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2021

Thus, financial projections for up to five years are a necessary element in every business plan. External investors will demand a financial forecast, but it’s equally valuable to you, even if bootstrapping. Per the words of an old country song, “if you don’t know where you’re going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”

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InfoChachkie

DECEMBER 7, 2015

Jason concludes that: A top founder takes much more risk, at least on paper, but can make a lot more than even the best VC of all time. A pretty good VC probably makes more than a pretty good and successful founder. Jason’s comments caused me to compare my career as an entrepreneur and a VC with Rincon Venture Partners.

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Venture Capital Capital .Net Entrepreneur 100

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 21, 2009

On the third Wednesday of every month I co-chair a meeting called the SoCal VCA (venture capital alliance), which represents participants from all of the top venture capital firms in Southern California as well as prominent members of the Tech Coast Angels (TCA). We feature a prominent speaker at every event.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 22, 2020

Luckily, not all investors are looking for the same thing, so it pays to know what type of investors are most interested in what your startup brings to the table. The key is understanding how potential investors see you, and especially how they view the maturity stage of your startup. Congratulations!

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Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 1, 2009

In my previous post, The VC Ice Age is Thawing (for now) I wrote about the reasons why the VC market came to a screeching halt in September 2008 and remained largely shut until at least April 2009. There are now signs the VC market has gathered pace meaning it’s a great time to be fund raising. billion.

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Tech.Co

JULY 25, 2017

The successor to social media, at least in terms of cultural significance, are the on-demand apps that have us reaching for our phones not just to message friends, but to make transactions. On-demand companies broke into the national consciousness as much as a cultural phenomenon as a commercial one.

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Demand Startup Social Media Training 73

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. Revolution Ventures managing partner Tige Savage. Revolution Ventures managing partner David Golden.

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Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 28, 2010

This was the first episode where Jason wasn’t on the show, which gave me the chance to have another VC on the show to discuss deals. Rustic Canyon is an LA-based, but geography-agnostic VC that is currently investing from a $200 million fund. VC Financings: 1. I keep meaning to get him drunk to spill the stories.

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Venture Capital Capital Rustic Canyon Mobile 270

socalTECH

OCTOBER 16, 2019

TDK Ventures , the venture investment arm of TDK Corporation , has made an investment in Los Angeles-based Wheels , the last-mile, on-demand, electric bicycle company led by Josh Viner. According to TDK Ventures, the investment came as part of the recently announced funding round led by DBL Partners.

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Invest Demand Los Angeles Funding 113

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 23, 2019

One year after a $38 million Series B valued on-demand aviation startup Blade at $140 million, the company has begun taxiing the Bay Area’s elite. Blade, led by founder and chief executive officer Rob Wiesenthal, a former Warner Music Group executive, has raised about $50 million in venture capital funding to date.

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Van Nuys Help Startup Google 279

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 21, 2010

So it’s really hard to draw too many conclusions about whether the investment really makes sense because often you learn stuff in the fund raising about the future strategy of the company that might make you much more excited than somebody on the outside might be. So there is likely robust demand from borrowers. LendingClub.

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Venture Capital Capital Email Blogging 265

socalTECH

APRIL 15, 2020

John Nackel, says it has launched a new venture capital fund, Wavemaker Three-Sixty Health Fund II. According to Wavemaker 360, the fund focuses on healthcare start-ups seeking seed-stage investment, and importantly avoids biotech. Size of the new fund was not announced.

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Tech.Co

JUNE 29, 2021

You know what a startup is, right? Or at least you have an idea of what a startup is like to work in? Don't forget the pizza parties and deskside beers funded by a seemingly endless stream of venture capitalist money, either. Or, as can happen, when the money dries up and the business goes under.

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Startup Course Coach Demand 175

TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 24, 2018

Ross Lipson, the chief executive officer and co-founder of the on-demand marijuana and cannabis delivery service, Dutchie, had thought he was done with the online delivery business. But with online delivery services, a whole city’s worth of restaurant options opened up to consumers (as long as they were in your delivery area).

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Services Venture Capital Startup Los Angeles 259

socalTECH

APRIL 12, 2021

Two startups won a total of $25,000 in prizes last week at the Sunstone Innovations Challenge at CSULB, a startup pitch competition involving student teams from CSU Long Beach. The runner up was UNWIND, which is developing personalized meditation programs, which received $10,000 in seed funding.

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Tech.Co

JUNE 28, 2021

Startup tech businesses used to land on the scene with big ideas about how their tech could change the world. However, in recent years, there have been precious few startups with such grand ambitions from an early stage. But the trend for world-changing mission statements is waning in the startup sphere.

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Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 17, 2023

Luckily, not all investors are looking for the same thing, so it pays to know what type of investors are most interested in what your startup brings to the table. The key is understanding how potential investors see you, and especially how they view the maturity stage of your startup. Congratulations!

Funding 125

Funding Startup Ideas Equity 125

socalTECH

AUGUST 8, 2010

Santa Monica-based Demand Media , the online media firm run by Richard Rosenblatt, has finally filed for its long awaited IPO. According to the firm's filing, filed late Friday, the firm is looking to raised up to $125M in its IPO. According to Demand's IPO filing, the firm had a net loss of $6.00M on revenues of $114.0M

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 16, 2023

Thus, financial projections for up to five years are a necessary element in every business plan. External investors will demand a financial forecast, but it’s equally valuable to you, even if bootstrapping. Per the words of an old country song, “if you don’t know where you’re going, you will probably end up somewhere else.”

Startup 116

Startup Pricing Sales Statistics 116

TechCrunch LA

MARCH 31, 2021

The sweeping infrastructure package put forward today by President Joe Biden comes with a price tag of roughly $2 trillion (and hefty tax hikes) but gives startups and the broader tech industry about $1 trillion worth of reasons to support it. ” Climate resiliency . Given the steady drumbeat of climate disasters that hit the U.S.

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