Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2010

I’m very pleased today to announce that I invested, on behalf of GRP Partners, in Burstly alongside Rincon Venture Partners , an early stage VC in Southern California whith whom we love to work (and were our co-investors on RingRevenue ). Naturally I’m excited about this investment or I wouldn’t have done it.

Mobile 282

Mobile Invest Company Companies 282

socalTECH

MARCH 21, 2014

In a world with a rash of startup incubators and accelerators, super angels, crowdfunding sites, and more, what''s the relevance of organized angel investments groups? Terry Kay: We have always been about helping the entrepreneurs succeed, first, and then, we figure out how we get our fair share from that success.

Pasadena Angels 162

Pasadena Angels Pasadena Angel Startup 162

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

Because entrepreneurs often went to lawyers at their earliest stages to get their company registration done. Entrepreneurial lawyers like Don Lee , Dave Young or Ted Wang are good at sussing out which entrepreneurs are high potential. They are likely taking losses on their first project with the entrepreneur so they select carefully.

Startup 361

Startup Venture Capital Pricing Technical Review 361

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

If you truly believe that you, your company and your products are exceptional and your company will be valuable then you’re actually doing them a FAVOR by helping them invest in your startup. If you don’t believe in your bones that you’re amazing then it’s no wonder you don’t want to sell them on making the investment.”

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 25, 2010

Rincon is part of the new breed of Seed Stage VCs and with the leadership of Jim Andelman has charted out the most authentic early-stage investment strategy in Southern California. Any SoCal entrepreneur raising early-stage money should put Rincon on their short list. Nowhere is social proof more prevalent than in angel investing.

Guide 293

Guide Funding Venture Capital Technical Review 293

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 8, 2009

Most of them are telling you that they just need to see a bit of traction before they’d be prepared to invest. Investors are giving you a version of the “soft no,&# which basically means that they’re not prepared to invest now. Everybody seems to like you but nobody seems to be getting out their checkbooks.

Venture Capital 309

Venture Capital Guide Startup Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

You’re writing a freaking blog post! I do what I wish all entrepreneurs would do. I had a pre breakfast with a CEO of a company in which I invested talking about his next fund raising round. It’s an entrepreneur with whom I’ve been wanting to work for 6 years. “But WAIT !!! Operations.

Email 314

Email Product Startup Writing 314

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Huge thank you to Steve De Long for the write up. My initial desire to blog came from something that’s always been my approach to investing – I’m a nerd and I love to play with the technology and part of my approach has really been to understand things both at a user level and at a reasonably deep tentacle level. “My Brad on blogging.

Venture Capital 288

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Software Review 288

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2012

I’ve wanted to write a blog post called “Mobile Second” for a long time to make this point more forcefully. The power of large screen real estate. I think many recent companies make the mistake of not investing enough in web products, if they invest anything at all. The power of a keyboard.

Web 334

Web Mobile Startup Software Review 334

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 14, 2014

It’s why the first company I ever invested in as a VC – Invoca – just announced a $20 million funding by Accel Partners. Only naive people believe that but for inexperienced entrepreneurs you can be fooled into the narrative by the press who sometimes write stories without the actual data. PHONE CALLS.

Email 339

Email SaaS Venture Capital Google 339

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 26, 2011

I have often said that what separates real entrepreneurs from pundits and bystanders is a bias towards getting things done versus over analyzing things. The startup entrepreneur knows that they’re going to be wrong often. I’m not arguing that no screening is required. Great entrepreneurs find a way. But here’s the thing.

Startup 335

Startup Technical Review Framework Entrepreneur 335

Steve Reich

FEBRUARY 15, 2012

They have to be aggressive, and they have to be willing to write a check. He is a long-time Angel, a former Chairman at TCA, and has invested in more startups that most of us will see in 2 lifetimes. Dave advocated tirelessly for LeisureLink, created enthusiasm among the other Angels, and invested personally.

Tech Coast Angels 40

Tech Coast Angels Angel Pasadena Angels Startup 40

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. Last year I lost a deal in a company that I wanted to invest in and that I thought I should have won. Write things down. I hate losing. Be gracious.

Outsource Development 333

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 333

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 25, 2010

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. Last year I lost a deal in a company that I wanted to invest in and that I thought I should have won. Write things down. I hate losing. Be gracious.

Outsource Development 328

Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review News 328

Tech Zulu Event

OCTOBER 11, 2012

The multi-tiered platform allows for money to be transferred between Facebook friends, the ability to click and purchase any item that you see on Facebook and through the published API’s, developers can integrate and write their own applications on top of the ZunguZ platform. Ernst & Young – World Entrepreneur Awards – FINALIST (Annex.13).

Software Review 92

Software Review Social Network Platform Technical Review 92

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2011

A huge shout out to Ricky Wong of NYCSteals for helping me with the write-up. He knew he was an entrepreneur because he couldn’t stop thinking about ideas. Seth also spoke about not accepting investment until after gaining traction. So some show notes if you’re a bit busy to watch the video.

Startup 286

Startup Venture Capital Web Ideas 286

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2010

Writing down your weight from your scale is obviously a manual process and it’s tedious. Then I found out that Dave McClure had already invested along with many others in a Silicon Valley seed round even though the company is in Alabama. We’ll see. Enter Withings. Now how much would you pay?!? Pretty cool stuff.

Technical Review 278

Technical Review Software Review Startup SoCal 278

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 13, 2011

I talked about this in the TWiVC video but I didn’t do a good enough job of writing it up in the summary notes in the post. In reading the comments on Bijan’s blog and having discussed this so many times, I know some entrepreneurs only want to talk with VCs that think that Powerpoint causes leprosy. It’s subtle.

Venture Capital 299

Venture Capital Slides Technical Advisors Startup 299

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2009

I believe that it is part of the DNA of an entrepreneur – being so competitive that you’re practically sick when you lose. Entrepreneurs are neurotic about it. We helped the write out their requirements for a system. Something happened and it was clear to me that this IE issues was just a smoke screen.

Startup 151

Startup Outsource Development Software Review Technical Review 151

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2009

This is part of my new series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. I wanted to also post the series here to have it as a resource on my blog for future entrepreneurs who stop by. If you haven’t spent time over there you should.

Entrepreneur 338

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital Google 338

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2011

And so as Steve is apt to do, he consolidated this midnight mind meld, added it to his linear thinking on the investment phases of tech companies and turned it into one of the most cogent pieces on the topic that I’ve seen. Phillip Stevenson who is currently a Wharton MBA (and whom I was trying to talk him into being an entrepreneur).

Ideas 294

Ideas Startup Marketing Pricing 294

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 21, 2012

That users get the PIN code, enters it into the registration screen, and if they typed in the right code, they can complete registration and get access to all of what a service provider gives them. He called me and said--this is a company you might be interested in, maybe taking a board seat, or co-investing in, or helping them get funded.

Marina Del Rey 238

Marina Del Rey Startup IP Examples 238

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 19, 2011

Yet a critical mistake I see many entrepreneurs make is that they hand over too much control to their third-parties. They’re also good at screening candidates. I have investment money at stake so I’m a principal in the negotiation, too. As an entrepreneur I have one company to sell. Recruiters. You name it.

Venture Capital 319

Venture Capital Pricing Startup Outsource 319

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 29, 2017

Upfront VI is our latest core fund and is $400 million to invest in early stage entrepreneurs. LPs (the people who invest in VC firms) have clearly voted in favor of LA with the creation of 15+ new early-stage venture firms and the continued growth is size and team of the great larger firms that are well established.

Funding 287

Funding Venture Capital Santa Monica Invest 287

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 31, 2010

So I thought I’d write a piece on how to not suck when you give a presentation. Nobody wants to read your text on a big screen. Don’t write sentences on the – only key words to help you remember what you’re going to say. I spoke about this yesterday on Fox Business News. Far more expedient.

Startup 362

Startup Twiistup Slides Screening 362

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

When I described to people why I initially invested my calls went something like this, “He’s taken kicks to the face for nearly 2 years and is still standing. 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

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2011

We were talking about a company, Factual (disclosure my firm is an investor), which was founded by one of LA’s most talented Internet entrepreneurs, Gil Elbaz , who as co-founder of Applied Semantics (purchased by pre-IPO Google for $102 million and now Google AdSense) is responsible for a large portion of the Internet’s monetization.

Venture Capital 313

Venture Capital Southern California Google Startup 313

socalTECH

MAY 11, 2010

Jody--an experienced entrepreneur who was most recently co-founder of a firm he sold to the Virgin Group, and has been involved with such firms as Lycos, Buydirect.com, and Xoom--told us the story of EcoMom, plus how he connected with McClure on the investment. Jody Sherman: I've been an entrepreneur since I got out of the military.

Software Review 200

Software Review Commerce Startup Sites 200

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2010

My advice to entrepreneurs was and is “ when the hors d’oeuvres tray is being passed take two ” (e.g. So I agreed to offer my current thinking on the economy and what it portends for the VC industry & fund raising for entrepreneurs. raise money now to weather any storms). VCs get paid to “put money to work.&#. We took $2.3

Entrepreneur 298

Entrepreneur Venture Capital Technical Review Startup 298

TechCrunch LA

NOVEMBER 4, 2019

We are in phase three of the influencer economy,” Bain Capital Ventures senior principal Jamison Hill, who led the firm’s investment in the influencer shoutout marketplace Cameo , tells TechCrunch. 2020 will be a watershed year for investment in businesses around the creator economy,” Neil Robertson tells TechCrunch.

Platform 170

Platform Marketing Tool Venture Capital 170