Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 11, 2023

As a business advisor and advocate for entrepreneurs, I find myself almost always talking and writing about change. Productive networking traffic does not happen by default. It takes effort to get out there, do your homework on the best traffic lanes, and follow-up on potentially valuable relationships to make them productive.

Startup 106

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Screening 106

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 22, 2020

That means writing down and signing the terms of the agreement, after making sure everyone understands them. Tie payments to your product or service revenue. Loans are a safer option than equity. Treat the transaction as you would expect to be treated by an angel investor or VC.

Funding 123

Funding Startup Equity Venture Capital 123

Berkonomics

MAY 8, 2014

I am chairman of a company that, as I write this, is twelve years old and has not yet taken a dollar of outside investment. Grant writing takes skill and immense amounts of time. .” . The company has been funded entirely by grants from the National Institute of Health, amounting to millions of non-dilutive dollars in all.

Company 166

Company Companies Writing Education 166

TechCrunch LA

NOVEMBER 4, 2019

Last month, the product launched with $1.2 Creators and influencers like Bernstein are forging a path from content creator to full-fledged business, with multiple revenue streams via podcasts, licensing deals, branded merchandise and even software products. “A million in funding from Rebecca Minkoff and other unnamed investors.

Platform 170

Platform Marketing Tool Venture Capital 170

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 16, 2020

As a business advisor and advocate for entrepreneurs, I find myself almost always talking and writing about change. Productive networking traffic does not happen by default. It takes effort to get out there, do your homework on the best traffic lanes, and follow-up on potentially valuable relationships to make them productive.

Startup 153

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Screening 153

SoCal CTO

MARCH 3, 2011

This overview (executive summary) needs to include: Product and Business What is the product? How does the product solve a pain? What are related products/companies? What product, market testing have you done so far, if any? I'm looking for free (equity only) development, should I contact you?

CTO Hire 264

CTO Hire Startup Technical Review Development Team Review 264

SoCal CTO

MARCH 3, 2011

This overview (executive summary) needs to include: Product and Business What is the product? How does the product solve a pain? What are related products/companies? What product, market testing have you done so far, if any? I'm looking for free (equity only) development, should I contact you?

CTO Hire 259

CTO Hire Startup Technical Review Development Team Review 259

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2019

I had just left Salesforce.com where I was VP, Products, after they had acquired my second startup. As I was trying to figure out the role I wanted to play in the VC world I decided I wanted to focus on businesses that were building deeply technical products to solve problems for business users.

Venture Capital 223

Venture Capital IP Startup Google 223

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 6, 2014

Provisional filings are especially beneficial for startups because: You gain a year to write a thoughtful, defensible patent without delaying your filing date. You can describe your technology as “patent pending”, which may or may not be worthwhile, depending on your product and target customers.

IP 210

IP Patents Journal Equity 210

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2018

I’ve had this at times in dealing with big companies like Facebook and Apple where we realized that going against the machine was going to be counter-productive. My scarcest resource was time and it was important to put my time against the most productive activities. This also applies to internal company decisions.

Startup 199

Startup Writing Demand Equity 199

SoCal CTO

MARCH 12, 2012

I promised I would write this post with some thoughts and ideas on the topic. Here are a few perspectives on the topic of finding technical cofounders: In Building a sweat equity team , Joel on Software tells us: You simply need to network. Here's an example of that kind of email. Go to user groups. Refine your elevator pitch.

CTO Hire 211

CTO Hire CTO Coach Startup Equity 211

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2017

Boards are not appointed to be founder-friendly lapdogs for the 1–3 founders who start companies and usually own the largest equity positions in the company. To be clear — most founders I’ve ever worked with have been super ethical, very conscientious, not overly greedy and take their personal responsibilities very seriously.

Startup 217

Startup Technical Review Equity Report 217

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 11, 2015

That means writing down and signing the terms of the agreement, after making sure everyone understands them. Tie payments to your product or service revenue. Loans are a safer option than equity. Treat the transaction as you would expect to be treated by an Angel investor or VC.

Startup 97

Startup Equity Entrepreneur Venture Capital 97

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 9, 2018

That means writing down and signing the terms of the agreement, after making sure everyone understands them. Tie payments to your product or service revenue. Loans are a safer option than equity. Treat the transaction as you would expect to be treated by an angel investor or VC.

Funding 59

Funding Startup Equity Entrepreneur 59

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 10, 2014

That means writing down and signing the terms of the agreement, after making sure everyone understands them. Tie payments to your product or service revenue. Loans are a safer option than equity. Treat the transaction as you would expect to be treated by an Angel investor or VC.

Funding 101

Funding Startup Equity Entrepreneur 101

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 8, 2017

Providing your product or service free to customers may sound attractive in marketing materials, but you need revenue sources to survive. Professional investors look for the right people, more than the right product. Provide details on the business model and cash flow. Current and past titles don’t convey this information.

Startup 65

Startup Writing Patents Competition 65

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 2, 2011

I’m sitting at my computer now at 9.00pm writing this – which is an hour earlier than I normally write (there are about 8 women at my kitchen table having a book club (aka excuse to drink wine & gossip so I’m locked in another room writing. Should entrepreneurs have convertible debt or priced equity?

Email 287

Email Blogging Venture Capital Writing 287

Tech Zulu Event

NOVEMBER 30, 2012

Jackson , “This financing round, coupled with hiring Adam Sroka as our head of technology, puts CapLinked in a position to further enhance our enterprise product offerings.”. Yesterdays’ equity round of $1.6 25 Years of Writing Code. According to CEO Eric M. million Raised. The post CapLinked Raise $1.6m

Technical Review 88

Technical Review Software Review Bertelsmann Technology 88

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 11, 2016

As a business advisor and advocate for entrepreneurs, I find myself almost always talking and writing about change. Productive networking traffic does not happen by default. It takes effort to get out there, do your homework on the best traffic lanes, and follow-up on potentially valuable relationships to make them productive.

Startup 93

Startup Writing Entrepreneur Screening 93

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 4, 2012

After you have successfully attracted angels or venture capital with your business case, your million dollar product idea, and you have a signed term sheet, there is still one more hurdle to overcome before investors write the check. Product or service readiness. Investors are evaluating your process as well as your product.

Technical Review 94

Technical Review Startup Writing Competition 94

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 31, 2012

The idea that the course asks students to write public blog posts is a testament to its more modern teaching style. My list of excuses includes: product, pricing, competition and lack of sales support. Feedback isn’t always an excuse – and often sales people can provide the best feedback to your product teams.

Startup 319

Startup Sales Course Competition 319

Tech Zulu Event

DECEMBER 2, 2014

Now, you’re handling payroll and doing writing as well. You may even discover that you enjoy writing more than crunching numbers. Piaw Na, who spent over six years at Google, writes on Quora that she recommends fresh grads to join a startup instead of big companies. This allows employees to become more versatile and productive.

Startup 102

Startup Social Media Writing Google 102

TechCrunch LA

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

Anyone who has worked in a large company further knows that timing a product launch or a new marketing strategy has more to do with internal politics than reading market forces. Start writing down predictions about people, companies, and markets. How can you practice timing? Ditto people you met a while back.

Venture Capital 202

Venture Capital Startup Technical Review Invest 202

InfoChachkie

JANUARY 16, 2018

Jim Semick: I’ve been launching and managing software products for 15 years now, going back to when you and I worked together at Expertcity before it was acquired by Citrix. I have always worked on early stage products. Some of the products I’ve helped validate and launch include GoToMyPC, GoToMeeting and AppFolio.

Venture Capital 115

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Santa Barbara SaaS 115

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 7, 2018

This process costs money, which professional investors are not willing to contribute, since their interest is in scaling a proven product and business model into a growth business. through Grants.gov , an online directory of more than 1,000 federal grant programs that don’t look for equity or payback.

Funding 90

Funding Technical Review Startup Research 90

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

Chris Dixon is one of my favorite people in tech and writes one of the few blogs I read religiously. He’s thoughtful about markets, investors, products and is always very well reasoned in his arguments. Lastly, he touched on a product that they are working on which can reorder Yelp reviews based on who is most relevant to you.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Venture Capital Startup Artificial Inteligence 281

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2010

a loan) that is later converted to equity at the time of the next financing. If no financing happened then this “note&# may not be converted and thus would be senior to the equity of the company in the case of a bankruptcy or asset sale. They might decide to delay new product features or upgrading technology infrastructure.

Startup 290

Startup Funding Venture Capital Pricing 290

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 15, 2010

I give a sneak peek at a blog post I’m writing on the topic next week. I spoke about the need of the CEO, CTO and head of Products to be in the same location. Heck, stick around and watch me discuss the seed funding debate that is going on right now and what is happening in the VC industry overall. Great exit. -

Venture Capital 210

Venture Capital Seed Funding Pricing Southern California 210

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 22, 2010

After you have successfully attracted angels or venture capital with your business case, your million dollar product idea, and you have a signed term sheet, there is still one more hurdle to overcome before investors write the check. Product or service readiness. Investors are evaluating your process as well as your product.

Technical Review 90

Technical Review Writing Competition Tips 90

InfoChachkie

MAY 16, 2011

Thus, I will recruit independent distributors and they will sell my new and innovative products on my behalf. 5) Allow Partners To Write Your Agreements. Thus, I will let my Big Dumb Company (BDC) partner write our agreement. Ask them to accept equity in exchange for all or a portion of their overall compensation.

Startup 242

Startup Outsource Development Outsource Writing 242

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2013

If you have a product description, that’s necessary, but not sufficient. Forcing yourself to write down a plan is actually the only way to make sure you actually have a plan. A CEO who has “been there and done that” is traction, especially if teamed with a financial lead (CFO) and a product lead (CTO). Show personal investment.

Funding 112

Funding Entrepreneur Startup CTO Hire 112

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 23, 2015

” It was meant both as a call to those writing angel checks into other people’s companies that they ought to think about putting that capital toward themselves either by becoming a startup founder or (and this was my real point) by taking an under-market salary in a company where they can learn the right skills to do it in the future.

Technical Review 150

Technical Review Startup Venture Capital IP 150

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. Like any sale you first need to plan your “prospects” and qualify whether or not they’d be a good fit for your product?—?an

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Funding Startup Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

We’re going to start aggressively spend money on marketing our product. Gross margin (GM) is the amount of profit you make per sale of your product or service taking into account your total costs of selling that product or service. So money spent should add equity value or create IP that eventually will.

Startup 383

Startup Company Companies .Net 383

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 11, 2012

agreeing whether or not to top up a founder’s equity. As a result I’ve really resisted writing about negotiations. If I forget to write, “Don’t Negotiation Piecemeal” after that then remind me. For starters, you should respect the people who are going to provide you with products and services.

Pricing 305

Pricing Startup Examples Writing 305

Tech Zulu Event

JANUARY 12, 2016

There are three things we know about startup business plans: one, you will write one eventually. Two, you will come to rely on your business plan, no matter when or why you write one. And three, you will throw the first business plan you write in the trash. The Product has to be Flashy. You Need Capital.

Startup 40

Startup Writing Ideas Capital 40

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

In this period (less than 2 years) he has brought on incredibly talented senior execs is sales, marketing, product management, client services, finance, vp engineering and more. He did it yesterday, “Mark, I’m going to write a blog post following on from your VC’s aren’t dumb. ” I know it sounds obvious.

Tips 365

Tips Email Venture Capital Blogging 365