Agile VC

JANUARY 13, 2016

Looking back at 2015, the standout theme in the VC/startup ecosystem was unicorn hunting. People started thinking of startup unicorns like this: Illustration for WSJ: Chris Silas Neal. A realignment of valuations by late stage investors? Revenue is revenue, right? What happened?

Technical Review 157

Technical Review .Net Revenue Software Review 157

Steve Blank

MARCH 17, 2020

With the Covid-19 virus a worldwide pandemic, if you’re leading any startup or small business, you have to be asking yourself, “What’s Plan B? If you’re running a startup or small business, your first priority (after your family) is keeping your employees and customers safe. “Winter is coming.”. And what’s in my lifeboat?”.

Burn Rate 436

Burn Rate Startup Valuation Sales Cycle 436

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 26, 2012

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” How much is NewCo worth to investors at this point (pre-money valuation)? This is the most concrete valuation element, usually called the asset approach.

Valuation 270

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 270

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 16, 2011

Money to build the business is the number one challenge for most startups. A large percentage of startups never apply to either. You need to explore more common and more productive approaches for getting your startup moving forward. Self-funding is the preferred source of cash for your startup – if you can do it.

Technical Review 233

Technical Review Bootstrapping Startup Venture Capital 233

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 26, 2016

Some analysts argue that revenue drives growth, while others say user growth drives revenue. Google reached $1B in revenue within five years of incorporation, and now has a market capitalization of over $400B. Long-term stability requires revenue growth and profit. Both have worked. Traditionally, it was simple.

Revenue 145

Revenue Valuation Startup Viral 145

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2014

Some analysts argue that revenue drives growth, while others say user growth drives revenue. Both have worked.Google reached $1 billion in revenue within five years of incorporation, and now has a market capitalization of over $400 billion. Long-term stability requires revenue growth and profit.

Revenue 246

Revenue Entrepreneur Valuation Viral 246

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 26, 2020

There are two reasons to raise money: You have a killer idea that is only partially validated, that you think can get to $50M+ of revenue in 5 years with 80%+ gross margins (if margins are lower, you need a lot more revenue)and you need money to get to product-market fit, or. Not all startups need outside investment to grow.

Cofounder 429

Cofounder Seed Stage Valuation Metrics 429

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 25, 2012

Money to build the business is the number one challenge for most startups. A large percentage of startups never apply to either. You need to explore more common and more productive approaches for getting your startup moving forward. Self-funding is the preferred source of cash for your startup – if you can do it.

Technical Review 257

Technical Review Bootstrapping Venture Capital Incubator 257

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 6, 2010

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” How much is NewCo worth to investors at this point (pre-money valuation)? This is the most concrete valuation element, usually called the asset approach.

Valuation 234

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Startup 234

Gust

NOVEMBER 18, 2012

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” How much is NewCo worth to investors at this point (pre-money valuation)? This is the most concrete valuation element, usually called the asset approach.

Valuation 187

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 187

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 1, 2010

Money to build the business is the number one challenge for most startups. In reality, there are multiple more productive approaches you should explore in getting your startup moving forward. Yet, I find that startup founders often fixate on one or two sources, often to the detriment of their business. Startup incubators.

Technical Review 149

Technical Review Bootstrapping Startup Venture Capital 149

Steve Blank

MARCH 31, 2014

Just look at the disruptive challenges that businesses face today– globalization, China as a manufacturer, China as a consumer, the Internet, and a steady stream of new startups. Perhaps that’s because where established companies might see risks or threats, startups see opportunity.

Private Equity 325

Private Equity Metrics China Intellectual Property 325

VC Cafe

NOVEMBER 30, 2022

We wanted to share the perspectives of startups, platforms, investors and brands. In addition, we put together what I believe is the first landscape of UK startups building the Metaverse. UK XR startups generated over $1.4 billion in revenue in 2022. Framestore – a leading VR and visual effects studio.

Startup 122

Startup Generative AI Venture Capital Valuation 122

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2016

While there is much discussion about VCs starting to pull back on their investments into startups, the LPs we surveyed don’t expect to slow the pace of investment into VC funds themselves – at least for the foreseeable future. That’s money that fuels our startup ecosystems.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital LP Silicon Valley Marketing 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

It has historically been the case that VCs would rather fund the promise of 100x in a company with almost no revenue than the reality of a company growing at 50% but doing $20+ million in sales. Case in point, Procore just went public and is trading at an $11 billion valuation. It literally drove FOMO. Instagram selling to Facebook.

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital LP Valuation Later Stage 363

Agile VC

APRIL 17, 2011

AGILEVC My idle thoughts on tech startups. How They Make Money: Majority of Kayak’s revenue actually comes from advertising on their site (55%), not lead generation or referral fees to travel suppliers as you might think (more on this below). Financial Snapshot: 2010 Revenue: $170 million. 2010 Net Income: $8 million.

Pre-Money Valuation 113

Pre-Money Valuation Liquidation Preference Dividend Common Stock 113

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 19, 2017

The Basics The starting point — the 101 — is knowing the difference between gross burn and net burn. Gross burn is your cost base and net burn is the difference between your revenue and costs. GAAP Net Income, which at times isn’t a good reflection of cash burn). years of cash runway, which is too much for a startup.

Burn Rate 212

Burn Rate Startup .Net Venture Capital 212

Gust

JUNE 17, 2012

Money to build the business is the number one challenge for most startups. A large percentage of startups never apply to either. You need to explore more common and more productive approaches for getting your startup moving forward. Self-funding is the preferred source of cash for your startup – if you can do it.

Technical Review 164

Technical Review Bootstrapping Venture Capital Incubator 164

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 12, 2020

Right on time, I’ve got a company from my first fund doing a roadshow right now that could net a big exit by the end of the year. That leaves me out raising with two funds under my belt and no big exit and no unicorn valuations. Yet, I’ll admit, it has been a lot harder than I thought it would be. Life of a micro-fund, I guess.

LP 136

LP Technical Review Software Review Valuation 136

Up and Running

AUGUST 19, 2014

An angel investor is a high net worth individual who invests their own money into startup companies in the hopes of gaining a return on their money. I was the CEO of both startups, so it was my job to pitch to the angels. Entrepreneurs impress me when they demonstrate a proven revenue stream before asking for capital.

Angel Investor 161

Angel Investor Technical Review Due Diligence Startup 161

The Next Web

FEBRUARY 27, 2014

George Deeb is the Managing Partner at Chicago-based Red Rocket Ventures , a startup consulting and financial advisory firm based in Chicago. One of the questions I get, more often than not, is what is the appropriate valuation of my business. Each industry typically has its unique valuation methodologies. Your industry.

Valuation 167

Valuation Forecast Seed Stage .Net 167

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2023

Some businesses require very little capital and the founder can self-finance the enterprise and retain 100% of its ownership and control from ignition through liquidity event (startup through sale). And even with the significant cost of credit card debt, many entrepreneurs aggressively use existing cards to finance a startup.

Private Equity 118

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 118

abovethecrowd.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2015

As a result, a “late-stage” financing is no longer reserved for high-revenue, pre-profitability companies getting ready for an IPO; it is simply any large round of financing done at a high price. An unprecedented 80 private companies have raised financings at valuations over $1B in the last few years.

IPO 40

IPO Liquidation Preference Valuation Technical Review 40

The Startup Magazine

APRIL 24, 2020

Whether you’re interested in selling a website you built from scratch, or want to sell your Amazon-based B2C brand, there are many different baseline factors that go into determining an appropriate website valuation number. While it’s true that valuations can get quite technical, the basics are relatively easy to understand.

eCommerce 91

eCommerce Valuation B2C Revenue 91

Berkonomics

DECEMBER 17, 2020

There is an exemption from the requirements that these investors be accredited with net worth or income minimums to qualify legally to invest in your company. If you have a virtual company with your employees working from home locations, as many startups do, it should be the location of the founder. We’ll call these “inside angels.”

Equity 62

Equity Finance Liquidity Event Angel Groups 62

Austin Startup

OCTOBER 15, 2017

As is often the case in startups, the desire to create may be outweighing the motivation to monetize, particularly if there are no hungry investors expecting venture returns. That last sentence gets at the heart of the primary monetization tension in a startup. A good example is the marketing technology sector.

Technical Review 48

Technical Review Software Review Nevada Silicon Valley 48

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

See Bessemer Venture Partners’ A comprehensive guide to security for startups. Data companies focused on early-stage startups include Aingel , fundsUP , Preseries , PredictLeads , and Sploda. For more on gathering data and using it to assess companies, see How to Assess Startups Using Machine Learning. 2) Market . 7) Negotiate

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Tim Keane

MARCH 9, 2011

Startups and angels: Along the way to success. It’s a deceptively simple question:  what is the optimal way to finance a new startup? It’s a deceptively simple question:  what is the optimal way to finance a new startup? Example one: Sustainable net operating income with some growth in a stable market. 

Finance 83

Finance Bootstrapping Startup Equity 83

Austin Startup

MAY 10, 2021

but then going public and rising 23% on day one to… drumroll please… a $36B valuation ?—?a a full 60x trailing twelve month revenues. For context, UiPath’s revenue last year was reported at $607 million and grew 81% over the prior year?—?so The IPO netted $500M for UiPath (and another $700M for shareholders).

Silicon Valley 113

Silicon Valley IPO Venture Capital Valuation 113

Version One Ventures

OCTOBER 15, 2020

And >40% of that revenue is coming from in-game purchases. Meanwhile startups like Zebedee are creating software development kits (SDKs) for the long tail of indie game developers to integrate lightning payments into their games as well. . The app could then take a small % of all revenue from “paid” messages.

Networking 168

Networking Global OTC Security 168

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2011

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” How much is NewCo worth to investors at this point (pre-money valuation)? This is the most concrete valuation element, usually called the asset approach.

Pre-Money Valuation 246

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 246

Agile VC

NOVEMBER 9, 2015

There’s been ample coverage in the popular press of course highlighting everything from the company’s revenue growth, lack of profitability, and the well-publicized fact that founder/CEO Jack Dorsey is also CEO of Twitter so would theoretically be running two public companies simultaneously. Revenue Composition. Starbucks Deal.

IPO 165

IPO .Net Revenue Acquisition 165

ConversionXL

AUGUST 11, 2021

Take This Week in Startups , for example. Their podcast is all about discussing the startup news that matters. All companies that This Week in Startups’ audience of entrepreneurs, company founders, and marketers would be interested in. Asset valuation. Your most obvious asset is the product itself. Source ).

Audience 139

Audience Social Media Email Ruby 139

Up and Running

AUGUST 29, 2014

While there are no guarantees any startup business will be successful, a good first step to determine if an idea makes sense before proceeding with an investment of time and resources is to do a venture feasibility study. CPA’s also can represent clients in case of an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) audit.

Small Business 87

Small Business CPA Government North America 87

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

Want to start a startup? A typical startup goes throughseveral rounds of funding, and at each round you want to take justenough money to reach the speed where you can shift into the nextgear. Few startups get it quite right. 1 ] A startups life will be more complicated, legally, if any of theinvestors arent accredited.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

Venture Chronicles

MAY 26, 2010

Back in March, Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz wrote a post called The Case For The Fat Startup, where he outlined some of the reasons why a fledging company might want to consider taking a large amount of funding — a strategy that contrasts with the ‘lean startup’ model that has become common in Silicon Valley.

Lean 40

Lean Early Stage Valuation Startup 40

Eric Friedman

AUGUST 18, 2021

Most investors, most people in the startup ecosystem, I would describe as eternal optimists, glass-half-full people. They talk about] businesses which are not contractually recurring revenue in the parlance of recurring revenue run rates. On Dan’s Former Startup. On Dan’s Eternal Optimism (or lack thereof). Two questions.

Silicon Valley 88

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Cofounder Africa 88