Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 13, 2018

As a VC and former entrepreneur let me offer you some advice. Remember that the goal of an email to a VC or an introduction from a trusted mutual connection is simply to get you the meeting. Remember that the goal of an email to a VC or an introduction from a trusted mutual connection is simply to get you the meeting.

Venture Capital 261

Venture Capital Slides Email Startup 261

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 5, 2011

Steve Blank , January 25, 2010 10 Tips for Adding Game Mechanics to a Non-Gaming Service - ReadWriteStart , September 21, 2010 Startups & VCs: Learn How to Design, Market, & Eat Your Own. - First Principles. First Principles.

Startup 378

Startup Venture Capital Blogging CTO Coach 378

socalTECH

JUNE 26, 2013

A new, startup incubator-created by the Art Center College of Design and the California Insitute of Technology --said this morning that it has launched a brand new, design-focused incubator, housed at Idealab. Breitenberg is special assistant to the president of Art Center College of Design. READ MORE>>.

Incubator 178

Incubator Idealab Design CalTech 178

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

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

This is part of a series that I’ve been working on called Understanding Venture Capital. This led Roy Rodenstein (whose company Going.com was sold to AOL ) and others to discuss , what happens when VC’s need to invest across multiple funds. And VC’s don’t like to invest across multiple funds.

Invest 226

Invest Venture Capital Funding .Net 226

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 14, 2013

I’ve been involved with technology product design in one form or another for nearly 25 years and seen one mistake consistently repeated. ” Most technologists design for themselves and then test with uncorrelated user groups only months after product launch – if ever. Design for the Novice, Configure for the Pro.

Product 408

Product Design Technical Review Screening 408

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

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 10, 2014

The problem is that with WordPress I just found it a bit too cumbersome to change the design on my own. I like to get what is in my brain out into words and as you probably know I worry less about typos, grammar or – generally – visual design. He runs platform for Upfront Ventures and is doing an amazing job.

Blogging 294

Blogging Design Venture Capital Screening 294

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2013

If you’ve been following the press about VC funds you’ll know this is no small feat. Perhaps the biggest piece of new news is that after 17 years of operations we’ve changed our name from GRP Partners to Upfront Ventures. Well, the venture capital industry has changed a lot in the past 20 years … and we have too.

Funding 343

Funding Santa Monica Venture Capital Startup 343

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 12, 2013

Because my role as a VC requires me to take and endless stream of meetings I long ago decided I need to learn as much as I can from the meetings I attend so I often just ask tons of questions and assimilate knowledge. When I think about what defines us as a VC I think: Operationally knowledgeable / strong startup competence.

Venture Capital 360

Venture Capital GRP Partners Startup Invest 360

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

And that was evident on today’s Angel vs. VC panel. There are real changes in the venture capital industry and it would have been fun to talk about them. The VC industry is segmenting – I have spoken about this many times before. So in the past we needed VC to really get a startup going.

Venture Capital 308

Venture Capital Training Startup Entrepreneur 308

Berkonomics

AUGUST 22, 2024

We then sought and received a venture investment from a top tier Silicon Valley VC firm, whose partner came onto the board. We’ll be there in six months when you run out of money with your new R&D focus”, the VC board member replied. And the VC firm’s partners voted not to fund the restarted venture.

Venture Capital 291

Venture Capital Course Email Design 291

socalTECH

JANUARY 24, 2013

A new startup looking to revolutionize the sharing of information on electronic parts for hardware designers, CircuitHub , launched today, looking to bring an open source, collaborative community to the sharing of electronic part libraries.

UCLA 164

UCLA Design USC Google 164

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2011

I took the opportunity this past week to publish summary notes of some of the VCs and entrepreneurs I had interviewed on This Week in VC. One of my goals in doing the show was not only to educate entrepreneurs but also to put a human face on many of the VCs in our industry as VCs can be hard to get to know. Thank you. (if

Capital 265

Capital Venture Capital Veoh Startup 265

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2012

She hasn’t raised any venture capital. It represents the great majority of entrepreneurship and eschews the fairytale rags-to-VC-riches stories we so often read about in the press. I blog on entrepreneurship & VC precisely because entrepreneurs and other VCs are my customers. That may soon change.

Startup 363

Startup Entrepreneur SEO Venture Capital 363

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 26, 2014

And what’s up with this crazy new blog design? But for now … Every year we run a big VC, LP & Tech Summit in Los Angeles (this year downtown) to showcase the best of our community and invite others from around the country. You disappeared? What the fork happened to you? Well … more on that next week.

Startup 290

Startup Blogging Venture Capital Los Angeles 290

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

Do you imagine eventually raising VC and trying to build a faster growing company?” ” Because of the circles I run in I tend to meet many people who eventually do want to build large companies and therefore do want to eventually raise VC and “go big.” They raised $5 million in venture capital to fund growth.

Startup 418

Startup Venture Capital Sales Technical Review 418

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

He and I once took different sides of an debate about whether “VC signaling&# in early-stage deals is a serious problem or not. So it was fun to turn the cameras on him for 45 minutes for a special “NY edition of This Week in VC&# and hearing his views. I’ve also found him to not be dogmatic either.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2018

The idea is simple enough: several female VC partners at top funds will hold 1-hour meetings with 40 promising female entrepreneurs looking to get advice on their business and pitch in a friendly, non-judgmental, safe environment. 8% of VC partnerships, for example). Now 33% of Supreme Court Justices are women (vs.

Venture Capital 256

Venture Capital Examples Screening Help 256

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. As a VC you want to feel like you have “proprietary sources” of deal flow. There is one source I never liked and no early-stage VC should – investment bankers. They are venture bankers not investment bankers. What stage?

Startup 361

Startup Venture Capital Pricing Technical Review 361

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2013

Showing me designs. She talks about creative design of websites and physical products – in our case – stickers. Soleil is paranoid about leaking design & product information because she’s been burned. Unsurprisingly for Kara is was the VC connections. She debates manufacturing strategies.

Startup 398

Startup Design Downey Activity 398

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2014

Changes in the Software World & in Venture Capital. But notably you had the following changes: Horizontally scalable computing & storage systems, which meant you required less capital up front for hardware. Venture Capital. And then the world changed. Changes in the Startup Ecosystem. We have invested $17.3

Startup 390

Startup Venture Capital Capital Funding 390

socalTECH

MARCH 24, 2020

San Diego-based Design Therapeutics , which is developing therapies for patients with serious degenerative disorders caused by nucleotide repeat expansions, has raised $45M in a Series A financing round. The round was led by SR One, and also included Cormorant Asset Management, Quan Capital and WestRiver Group. and Aseem Ansari, Ph.D.

Design 113

Design San Diego Capital Funding 113

socalTECH

SEPTEMBER 25, 2013

Los Angeles-based venture capital investment firm DFJ Frontier is bolstering its ranks, and has snagged an entertainment and media veteran as a new Venture Partner at the company. frontier venture capital partner executive investor media hollywood' READ MORE>>.

Venture Capital 185

Venture Capital Hollywood Media Entertainment 185

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 25, 2011

All it says is that the VC has the right (but not obligation) to invest his/her proportional ownership in the next round of financing. So at the time that the initial VC funds you they’ll be thinking about protecting this right as depicted in the graphic below. A primer on “pro-rata” rights. Why would this happen?

Entrepreneur 310

Entrepreneur Venture Capital Writing Invest 310

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2013

I was 23 and had been programming computers, designing computer networks and selling software for 10 years. I talked with a few VCs and batted around the idea of becoming a VC. No prizes for guessing how my VC chats went. But you don’t really have VC experience.” ” or. ” or. ” No s**t.

Technical Advisors 385

Technical Advisors Marketing Startup Venture Capital 385

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2017

Upfront Ventures was created 20 years ago as one of the original VC funds in Los Angeles. 10 years ago we found ourselves trying to persuade LPs and VCs that it was worth spending more time getting to know the LA market and now the most common refrain that I hear from them is “there really is something going on in LA.”

Dollar Shave Club 321

Dollar Shave Club Cornerstone OnDemand Riot Games Venture Capital 321

socalTECH

JULY 9, 2013

theidealists idealists venture capital creative marketplace marketing artwork design' The startup says it currently has a community of over 5,000, vetted members, who must apply for access to its marketplace. READ MORE>>.

Seed Funding 200

Seed Funding Venture Capital Design Capital 200

socalTECH

DECEMBER 21, 2012

Playsino recently announced an effort to bring third party, social casino games into its ecosystem, where it wlil help market and support games not designed by the company. Playsino is backed by IDM Venture Capital, Eric Schmidt (Google), Michael Robertson (MP3.com),

Networking 226

Networking Clearstone Santa Monica Venture Capital 226

socalTECH

OCTOBER 7, 2014

The funding came from Ron Conway, Andreessen Horowitz, Spark Capital, and Chicago Ventures. BloomNation lets floral designers post their designs online, and then connects customers with those designers, avoiding the cookie-cutter designs currently found on floral broker sites like FTD, 1-800-Flowers, and Teleflora.

Santa Monica 178

Santa Monica Design Venture Capital Capital 178

SoCal CTO

MARCH 11, 2013

Cases Where a Mockup is Not Enough There are a few cases where mockups or clickable prototypes may not be enough: Usability, interaction design, etc. As Steve Blank likes to say: A Startup Is a Temporary Organization Designed to Search for A Repeatable and Scalable Business Model The unfortunate reality is - an MVP is not the above!

Metrics 264

Metrics Venture Capital News Product 264

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 9, 2012

I knew him well before he became a VC. I knew his as he considered becoming a VC and we talked a lot about how it was going for me in my early years. He had a philosophy that the future competition for startups would be design led and based on data analysis. The Dave I know, I’ve known for 6 years. Sounds obvious.

Startup 309

Startup Venture Capital Email Writing 309

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2010

And that’s how I view VC today. If you’re not engaging your VC this way you’re losing out. You should be presenting data to your VCs and framing the decisions that you’re trying to make into cogent frameworks that will allow a group of experienced people to help you with decision making.

Help 288

Help Startup Venture Capital Framework 288

socalTECH

APRIL 24, 2019

Los Angeles-based Qulab , a biopharmaceuticals startup developing artifical intelligence software aimed at small molecule drug design, said on Wednesday that it has launched its first product, Quleap.

Artificial Inteligence 124

Artificial Inteligence Design USC Los Angeles 124

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2011

VC Pitches. Having been an entrepreneur for near-on a decade and having pitched in 100 VC meetings I hated getting no feedback. To try and save you wasted energy, help you avoid bad decisions and to make you that much better in your next VC meeting. Sure, it would have been ONE HELL OF A LOT EASIER to say, “well done!

Press 337

Press Venture Capital Doc Summary 337

socalTECH

APRIL 7, 2011

Todd has a unique view, having worked both on the venture and high technology investing side at Anthem, as well as the architecture and construction industry now. The prefab building area has seen some recent venture capital interest, most recently with Blu Homes in Boston, which just scored some new venture capital.

Santa Monica 190

Santa Monica Venture Capital Anthem Design 190

socalTECH

MAY 2, 2014

Tehrani is founder and President of Allied Group, a product design and manufacturing company, and also has been very involved in the. Young Presidents Organization (YPO).

Entrepreneur 232

Entrepreneur USC Los Angeles Mentor 232