Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2018

My friend Michael Broukhim, founder & co-CEO of FabFitFun and I recently had a catch-up meeting for 3-miles on the Santa Monica “Bird Trail” No company has ever elicited so many questions by friends, colleagues, entrepreneurs, fellow VCs and journalists as has Bird, the company that pioneered the electronic scooter as a service market.

Santa Monica 256

Santa Monica Funding Startup Course 256

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. Fables of the reconstruction.

Startup 229

Startup Technical Review Invest Research 229

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 25, 2021

A business is about making money, while inventions are more about spending money. According to an old Harvard Business Review article, many people in history, famous for their inventions, like Thomas Edison, were entrepreneurs who only later were remembered as inventors of the products they commercialized.

Technical Review 156

Technical Review Funding Patents Ideas 156

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 18, 2019

The Truth About the Scooter Economy?—?An This led to massive funding rounds at Bird, Lime and others. Act III was the “I told you so” comeuppance of anybody who we sure that the electric scooter market would fail. There was seasonality, theft, tough unit economics and slowing funding rounds. The valuations were too high!

Santa Monica 250

Santa Monica Venice Competition Software Review 250

TechCrunch LA

OCTOBER 5, 2020

Companies that have leveraged technology to make the procurement and delivery of food more accessible to more people have been seeing a big surge of business this year, as millions of consumers are encouraged (or outright mandated, due to Covid-19) to socially distance or want to avoid the crowds of physical shopping and eating excursions.

Technical Review 343

Technical Review Startup Marketing San Diego 343

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2014

If you’re funding the same stuff as everybody else and if you started your activities when the clues were obvious you’re much less likely to drive enormous returns. When Fred Wilson funded Twitter I guarantee you it wasn’t obvious that it was a billion dollar idea. Venture Capital is a tricky industry. Far from it.

Funding 362

Funding Technical Review Ideas Startup 362

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

How might our next phase of the journey seem brighter, even with more uncertain days for startups and capital markets? And then in the late 90’s money crept in, swept in to town by public markets, instant wealth and an absurd sky-rocketing of valuations based on no reasonable metrics. Nobody cared about our valuations any more.

Venture Capital 466

Venture Capital Startup Marketing Pricing 466

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 9, 2011

was still a term being bandied about. I spent my days meeting companies, figuring out what areas of the market interested me and trying to get a sense for how VCs thought about fair valuations. By 2008 I had gotten more serious about championing companies through our investment process. The market had tanked.

Marketing 305

Marketing Venture Capital Funding Technical Review 305

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 16, 2014

We’ve been dying to tell you all for a while that we had raised a new venture capital fund and of course given SEC filing requirements the story was somewhat already scooped by the always-in-the-know Dan Primack a few weeks ago. Wait, didn’t you just raise a fund? We raised $280 million.

Venture Capital 396

Venture Capital Funding Technical Review Startup 396

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 24, 2020

As a frequent advisor to new entrepreneurs and startups, I often hear your frustration with being treated differently from other startups by investors, on expectations for valuation , traction, and market size. On the other hand, if the market is super-hot, many will be willing to jump in to make your case.

Marketing 174

Marketing Startup Artificial Inteligence Technical Review 174

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2014

We are often asked how companies get funded, why VCs make the decisions we make and what we’re looking for in entrepreneurs. At Upfront we’re totally fine funding entrepreneurs who have done multiple businesses in the past – in fact we like it. But I’m guessing the narrative is similar elsewhere.

Funding 373

Funding Technical Review Startup Screening 373

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 20, 2017

Just over a year ago I wrote about how MakeSpace had raised $17.5 I pointed out that the storage market in the US alone is ~$30 billion / year and there is no dominant provider — the largest player has < 10% market share. If you buy that Amazon is a tech startup then essentially you’ve already answered the question.

Technical Review 268

Technical Review Funding Software Review Artificial Inteligence 268

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 14, 2022

The key elements of leadership in a company, both individual and organizational, are less tangible, but very critical in setting a market value for investment, acquisition, or going public. Every business and brand has unique requirements to fit into their market environment. Performance accountability processes.

Technical Review 129

Technical Review Funding Organization Coach 129

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 22, 2023

I second his list of top innovation challenges and strategies to capitalize on untapped global startup opportunities: Create new markets rather than disrupt existing ones. Even here, Elon Musk faced this issue with Tesla, needing a support ecosystem as well as new technology. Target a global market rather than a local from day one.

Capital 138

Capital Marketing Ideas Venture Capital 138

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 14, 2011

The debt market has pretty much shut down for people, though there is some money coming out of the SBAs that have been somewhat helpful. And, the equity markets are certainly a more challenging environment. The venture capitalists we look at to fund our deals are certainly tightening down, there's no question about that.

Tech Coast Angels 231

Tech Coast Angels Technical Review Angel Southern California 231

socalTECH

MAY 18, 2010

Anyone looking for signs that the economy is turning around, might want to look at what appears to be happening in Southern California's technology jobs market. Tags: angeles employment jobs technology california southern. However, she confirms that potential employees are harder to find. Why the disconnect?

Southern California 246

Southern California Technical Review Playa Del Rey Technology 246

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 15, 2014

.” I have been weighing in slowly on the topic over the past few weeks on Twitter but have avoided writing a blog post about it until now. I have thought a lot about anonymity over the years and actually have enjoyed debating the topic with those passionate about anonymity’s benefits because of course that’s how I learn.

Technical Review 329

Technical Review Blogging Examples Startup 329

TechCrunch LA

SEPTEMBER 13, 2021

Last year at this time, SpotOn was on the brink of announcing a $60 million Series C funding round at a $625 million valuation. Since its 2017 inception, SpotOn has been focused on providing software and payments technology to SMBs with an emphasis on restaurants and retail businesses.

Technical Review 296

Technical Review Software Review Invest Acquisition 296

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 4, 2013

I recommend you read Fred Wilson’s recent blog post about the need for a well articulated business strategy before pushing a particular business model. Compelling in the sense that you solve a real problem a target group of potential customers has with a product that is significantly better than the alternatives on that market.

Startup 401

Startup Customer Custom Technical Review 401

TechCrunch LA

OCTOBER 27, 2020

The 29 year-old CEO has, indeed, built a decentralized ghost kitchen — and managed to convince Softbank’s latest Vision Fund to invest in a $120 million round for that the company announced today. ” After hearing about Nextbite, Softbank actually didn’t take much convincing. .

Funding 263

Funding Los Angeles Technical Review Training 263

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 30, 2014

As I’ve written about recently, at Upfront Ventures we started talking a couple of years ago about wanting to fund stuff with more meaning. What about if elderly people never had to ask a relative or healthcare worker to change the batteries on their hearing aids? We hired IP specialists to review prior art.

Technical Review 418

Technical Review Software Review CTO Hire IP 418

Tech.Co

FEBRUARY 16, 2024

Read on to find a financing option that suits you, whatever your business's specialism, needs, and financial profile, or jump to a specific funding type below. Grants can be used at the discretion of the business owner – from marketing to onboarding and beyond, but winners need to use the funds as they pledged to in their application.

Technical Review 193

Technical Review Software Review Startup Competition 193

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

Seed investments are down by any measure (funds, deals, dollars) over the past 3 years in deals < $1 million AND in deals between $1–5 million. As a result of the IPO window shifting we saw a massive inflow of public-market capital into the latest stages of venture. So What Impact Did the Drop in Tech Founding Costs Have on VC?

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Invest Seed Funding Startup 328

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2018

If you’ve read any of my ongoing series on fund raising from venture capitalist (episode 1?— ?controlling controlling your psychology ) you no doubt have heard me say that raising capital is a sales & marketing process. Building models to evaluate the deal and/or reviewing customer files, company financials, business plans, etc.

Venture Capital 314

Venture Capital Technical Review Invest Slides 314

SoCal Tech Calendar

APRIL 6, 2017

Wednesday, April 12, 2017 -- Funding your Innovation. This course is about selling your innovation to investors, grant proposal reviewers, potential strategic partners, and to your intended customers. Do you need to build better market traction? Santa Ana District SBDC. Do investors say that you are too early for them?

Funding 100

Funding Course Customer Custom 100

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 23, 2010

We all know about AngelGate by now. Here’s what you need to know… As a funny coincidence I happend to have written about the topic of collusion 3 weeks prior to the fateful dinner. They’re not in search of price fixing or collusion, they’re in search of diligence information about the company.

Pricing 292

Pricing Entrepreneur Technical Review Venture Capital 292

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

The rise of “micro VCs” or seed-stage funds. The rise of alternative sources of capital (crowd funding and the like). 15 years ago we were at the peak of Internet hype with the launch of many over-capitalized businesses with a market size & opportunity was limited. On the surface the narratives have been.

Venture Capital 398

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Seed Funding 398

Berkonomics

FEBRUARY 15, 2024

And yet, such relationships properly used and never overused, can quickly and precisely help you cut through delays in government agencies, speed the process of product planning and ultimate release, aid in positioning in the market and help you avoid a myriad of mistakes that could prove costly in time and money.

Class 194

Class Organization Technical Review Activity 194

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2016

At the Upfront Summit in early February, we had a chance to have many off-the-record conversations with Limited Partners (LPs) who fund Venture Capital (VC) funds about their views of the market. …But LPs Have Been Putting Out More Money Than They Are Getting Back. .

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Capital Marketing Seed Funding 150

socalTECH

JANUARY 7, 2019

During the holiday season, our tradition over the last few years has been to post reflections on the past year and some predictions for 2019 from Southern California's technology industry. And, many of the presenting companies received sizable funding commitments and offers of ongoing help.

Technical Review 157

Technical Review Software Review Startup Coach 157

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 26, 2022

For example, Bill Gates founded and grew Microsoft, and Michael Dell built a great technology company, both with no outside funding until they went successful enough to go public years later and sell shares to common stockholders. Many times friends and family have been broken by failed investments.

Funding 107

Funding Startup Satisfaction Venture Capital 107

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 26, 2010

Social Proof in Action … Yesterday I wrote about the benefits of using social proof and authority in raising venture capital. Many of you have read or at least know the primary thesis of “ Crossing the Chasm &# the seminal book on marketing your products to mainstream consumers by Geoffrey Moore.

Marketing 294

Marketing Customer Custom Technical Review 294

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 1, 2014

It’s the company that evokes fear into more startups and venture capitalists looking to fund eCommerce businesses than any other potential competitor. We always had the added advantage that I have never met a single person in my life who ever said anything positive about their storage provider or experience.

Technical Review 380

Technical Review Software Review CTO Hire Startup 380

Tech.Co

JULY 13, 2023

Initially pinned as a generative AI startup for Twitter when it first hit the headlines back in April, the xAI website seems to suggest that the new startup will remain separate from the social media platform, as well as Musk's collection of other technology companies.

Artificial Inteligence 115

Artificial Inteligence ChatGPT Generative AI Technical Review 115

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

Should I trust my instincts for founders and products or should I be more focused on the market size or business plan? I’m not saying that lawyers were my screening process – simply that they knew about deals early on and they had voted with their time and pocketbooks so I knew I had a degree of filtering. What price?

Startup 361

Startup Venture Capital Pricing Technical Review 361

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 28, 2021

If you are the hot-shot technical innovator that invented your solution, make sure you have an equally adept business and marketing expert to complement your skills. “If Bill Gates was the technical genius, but Steve Ballmer, from Procter & Gamble, ran the business side of the equation.

Technical Review 131

Technical Review Case Study Mentor Software Review 131

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 17, 2020

In most cases, these applicants for equity funding must be rooted in technology to apply to this limited discussion. We’ve worried together about the moral obligation implicit in taking such investments from people so close, even with their promise never to expect a return. Angel investment groups or funds. Accelerators.

Equity 156

Equity Technical Review Class Organization 156