A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

OCTOBER 23, 2012

.” Here’s the summary of his track record (excerpted from the Fast Company article): Forefront — IPO’ed in 1995 by CBT — CBT stock fell 85% in 1998 and prompted class-action lawsuits. Freeloader — On $3m invested, sold for $38m in 1996 — shut down in 1997. from an IPO under a year ago of $10.

IPO 240

IPO Flash Bootstrapping Private Equity 240

Feld Thoughts

OCTOBER 28, 2014

Between 1994 and 1996 I made 40 angel investments with the money I made from the sale of my first company. Hedge funds are once again allocating big money to private companies and lots of cross-over public company investors are trying to get large dollars into private companies pre-IPO. What’s old is new again.

Angel Investor 140

Angel Investor Venture Capital IPO Sales 140

Steve Blank

APRIL 10, 2019

In the 20 th century, the best companies IPO’d in 6-8 years from startup (and in the Dot-Com bubble of 1996-1999 that could be as short as 2-3 years.) Startup Compensation Changes with Growth Capital – 12 Years to an IPO. Venture capital growth funds are now giving startups the cash they would have received at an IPO.

Stock Options 333

Stock Options Stock Vesting Common Stock 333

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 13, 2012

Believe it or not, three years after founding the company in 1996, Larry Page and Sergey Brin actually tried to sell Google for $1 million. Google reportedly turned down buyout offers from Microsoft shortly before the 2004 IPO. Google’s value has grown from $23 billion at the time of the IPO to over $200 billion today.

IPO 162

IPO Exit Strategy San Francisco Startup 162

Feld Thoughts

JANUARY 11, 2021

From 1996 to 2001, I spent a lot of time with Len in New York, where Interliant was headquartered. I remember signing document after document with him at Interliant and remember sitting at the Interliant office in Purchase after the IPO roadshow, waiting for the SEC to clear our filing so we could price.

SEC 164

SEC Cofounder Boston New York 164

Pascal's View

NOVEMBER 15, 2011

Dan Primack posted an article in Term Sheet last week titled Yelp This: IPO Market Is Killing It. Responding to these comments in a new post on Monday November 14, IPO Worries Put to the Test This Week , Dan reasserts “my belief that the death of small company IPOs has been greatly exaggerated.” jobs today.

IPO 31

IPO Term Sheet Marketing United States 31

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 26, 2013

Initial Public Offerings (IPO) are back as an exit strategy. That is a 65% increase in the number of IPOs over 2012, and the highest proceeds raised since the year 2000. The percent of entrepreneurs who are Baby Boomer starting a business since 1996 has grown from 14.3 business entrepreneur investment IPO social media startup'

IPO 273

IPO Entrepreneur Social Media Startup 273

Seeing Both Sides

NOVEMBER 30, 2010

Bill Gurley’s excellent piece on Silicon Valley IPO Anxiety inspired me to take a companion look at the East Coast, particularly Massachusetts and New York, and evaluate the health of the local IPO economy and prospective pipeline. Yet, when you evaluate the pipeline of IPO candidates, the results in MA are less inspiring.

IPO 34

IPO Massachusetts New York Silicon Valley 34

Pascal's View

AUGUST 22, 2009

On Monday, August 10, Barron’s ran a story “Does the IPO Market Shun Smaller Companies?”, This practice has created “ a near oligopolistic hold on tech IPOs ” by these large investment banks. The IPO chasm that exists today is the result of the death of the sub $50 million IPO. jobs today.

IPO 40

IPO Merger Institutional Investors Venture Capital 40

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 4, 2008

He is the co-author of several books including The Black Art of Java Game Programming (Waite Group Press, 1996). ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th.

San Francisco 155

San Francisco Technical Cofounder Fractional CTO CTO 155

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2010

But knowing the right people and knowing a market only works well for angel investors in bullish tech markets in which IPO’s happen quickly (97-99) or where larger companies are actively scooping up little tiny companies at sub $50 million valuations to drive innovation (05-08, 10-?). Obviously I agree.

Angel Investor 284

Angel Investor Early Stage Cap Table Deal Flow 284

Growthink Blog

JUNE 4, 2012

So lots of companies went public - 1,272 of them from 1990 to 1996 - and Wall Street was very much about "long" promotion of companies' growth potential and as "analog" distributors of their stocks. And the Facebook IPO debacle will only accelerate this sometimes disturbing but ultimately inevitable and yes welcome trend. read more.

Private Equity 72

Private Equity Stock IPO Equity 72

BeyondVC

NOVEMBER 17, 2016

This is a story about starting an enterprise seed fund called Boldstart in 2010 and our journey in enterprise since 1996. Despite our firm being a little over 6 years old, our individual stories go further back.

Cap Table 60

Cap Table Cofounder Dividend Institutional Investors 60

BeyondVC

APRIL 15, 2011

OK, I may be biased having been an early stage VC based out of New York since 1996, but I must say that the vibe, energy, and people at the Techstars NYC Demo Day event yesterday was simply awesome. Dave Tisch and team simply did a fantastic job guiding the startups, recruiting the mentors, and organizing the event.

New York 129

New York Sweat Equity Marketing Startup 129

BeyondVC

APRIL 15, 2011

OK, I may be biased having been an early stage VC based out of New York since 1996, but I must say that the vibe, energy, and people at the Techstars NYC Demo Day event yesterday was simply awesome. Dave Tisch and team simply did a fantastic job guiding the startups, recruiting the mentors, and organizing the event.

New York 129

New York Sweat Equity Marketing Startup 129

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 19, 2015

Initial Public Offerings (IPO) are back as an exit strategy. Last year was the most active year for IPOs in the United States since 2000. 275 IPOs were completed in 2014, topping the 2013 total of 222 by more than 23%. IPO proceeds also shattered 2013’s high-water mark of $55 billion, with an impressive $85 billion in proceeds.

IPO 120

IPO Angel Investor Startup Incubator 120

Reid Hoffman

MARCH 19, 2019

And from a financial perspective, any investor would be better off buying stock in Amazon than buying and share of a corner bookshop; if you invested $100 in Amazon’s 1997 initial public offering (IPO), those shares would have been worth about $120,000 in 2018. Blitzscaling is a strategic technique for moving faster, not a reckless gamble.

Cofounder 28

Cofounder Business Model IPO Non-Compete 28

Seeing Both Sides

DECEMBER 27, 2013

It is natural, therefore, that a robust stock market has led to a robust IPO market. More and more companies are eyeing 2014 and research conducted by analyst firm 451 suggests it will be a record year for tech IPOs and also suggests M&A will see a strong increase in 2014 as compared to an already solid 2013.

IPO 49

IPO Stock Valuation Portfolio 49

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

But knowing the right people and knowing a market only works well for angel investors in bullish tech markets in which IPO’s happen quickly (97-99) or where larger companies are actively scooping up little tiny companies at sub $50 million valuations to drive innovation (05-08, 10-?). Let’s call these cards 1996-99 and 2005-08.

Angel Investor 152

Angel Investor Cap Table Early Stage Deal Flow 152

Pascal's View

MAY 13, 2011

i. Pre bubble period 1991-1996 totals $28 billion. ii. Bubble period 1996-2000 totals $243.6 Number of IPO’s has shrunk while average size has increased. The NVCA has developed research going back forty years showing that over 90% of the job growth created by venture-backed companies occurs AFTER their IPO.

Equity 31

Equity Securities and Exchange Commission IPO Marketing 31

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 30, 2015

Would you be surprised to know that almost half of the dot com companies founded when the boom started in 1996 were still around in 2004--four years after the peak of the NASDAQ? With growth rates reduced, IPOs would be even tougher to come by--but companies would survive.

Hockey Stick 60

Hockey Stick Valuation Startup Maryland 60

Pascal's View

AUGUST 21, 2011

This time, the debate centers on the “favored few” Social Media venture backed companies that have brought tremendous windfalls to a select group of venture funds and management teams, both pre- and post-IPO.

Valuation 50

Valuation Social Media Media IPO 50

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 13, 2010

We worked together at Andersen Consulting between 1996-99 when the markets were booming. On July 27th, 2001 Accenture IPO’s and many of the partners grew fabulously wealthy. He always was. But his favorite line was, “can you please slow down and explain this again? I’m only a 386 processor.&#.

Turkey 302

Turkey Differentiation IP Technical Review 302

Pascal's View

OCTOBER 10, 2009

Combined with New Order Handling rules originally passed in September 1996 and implemented in 1997, these modifications to technical trading rules fundamentally changed how then-emerging electronic trading networks (ECN’s), such as Instinet, could buy and and sell stocks. This change to decimalization occurred in 2001.

Stock 31

Stock IPO Video Revenue 31

Pascal's View

NOVEMBER 14, 2009

IPO market and simply dismiss the American equity markets for emerging growth companies today as “no longer engineered for brokers & bankers to make money via flipping over-valued startups to retail investors via institutional cronies” (from Paul Kedrosky’s blog). The current IPO markets in the U.S. jobs today.

Delaware 37

Delaware IPO Venture Capital Private Equity 37

Seeing Both Sides

JANUARY 10, 2010

era who were very successful in their day - Open Market (IPO 1996, peak market capitalization of $2.5 Unfortunately, both moved off to California and are active investors and mentors for young start-ups out there. I served as an executive team member of two companies in Web 1.0

Boston 32

Boston Silicon Valley IPO California 32

Seeing Both Sides

APRIL 21, 2009

The IPO market remains completely irrelevant to VCs. Yes, Rosetta Stone had a successful IPO - the first one since March 2008 to be priced above the range. The IPO market may return modestly for some large, profitable companies will not return anytime soon for VC-backed companies. 2) Profitable, established business (i.e.,

IPO 22

IPO Revenue Stock Portfolio 22

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 3, 2012

Technical founders Tom Leighton and Danny Lewin built the original prototype at their lab at MIT starting in late 1996 before raising capital, so in a sense Akamai’s Minimum Viable Product (MVP) was a prototype with the basic architecture and traffic mapping in place that validated algorithms for the founders and investors alike.

Distribution 49

Distribution Lean Massachusetts Cofounder 49

Seeing Both Sides

MAY 26, 2009

Terry co-founded Polaris in 1996 after seven years as a VC at Burr Egan.    It is scary to reflect on how few of the 7,000 professionals active in the industry today were general partners before Netscape’s IPO in 1995. (3) Terry’s ascension to chair of the NVCA comes at an interesting time, to say the least. 

Private Equity 20

Private Equity Boston Massachusetts IPO 20

Ben's Blog

MARCH 24, 2011

In fact, 2010 venture capital fundraising is at the same level as it was in 1995 and 1996. For example, the 1998 IPO class had average revenue of $120 million (and net losses of $65 million to boot). Approximately $90 billion has been invested by the venture capital industry from 2008-2010—less than half of the 1998-2000 level.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Venture Capital Valuation Database 78

www.paulgraham.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

We alsothought wed be able to sign up a lot of catalog companies, becauseselling online was a natural extension of their existing business.But in 1996 that was a hard sell. When we got real funding nearthe end of 1996, we hired a great CFO, who fixed everything retroactively. We officially launched in early 1996.

Startup 105

Startup Cofounder Software Stock 105

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 10, 2013

As a judge for the MIT $50k until 1996, there were always a lot of VCs hanging around. From nothing to IPO in less than 18 months, a market cap of > $20 billion, followed by a 99% decline in the stock price post-bubble. They entered, but didn’t win, the MIT $50K competition in 1998.

Denver 129

Denver IPO Cofounder 129

infochachkie.com

DECEMBER 5, 2011

Readily Pronounceable – A name’s proper accent should be obvious, as made painfully clear in the 1996 Tom Hank’s Movie, “That Thing You Do!” Even after spending hundreds of millions of dollars on marketing, numerous potential customers still misspell the company’s non-intuitive name. John is a CPA and holds an M.B.A.

Naming 40

Naming Technical Review Product Product Name 40

Seeing Both Sides

SEPTEMBER 15, 2015

In 2014, for example, 18 IPOs raised a record-breaking $9.8 To answer these questions, we built a database of 112 Israeli companies founded between 1996 and 2013 that have met or exceeded $20 million in revenue. Indeed, the pattern of scaling seems to be changing meaningfully in recent years. billion, compared to just $1.2

Cofounder 20

Cofounder Technical Review United States 20

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 4, 2009

I just dont comment. :) Steve, The term was in active use in 1996 in the MMO world, which predates Googles founding. ► August (2) SXSW Case Study: SlideShare goes freemium ► July (4) Case Study: kaChing, Anatomy of a Pivot Some IPO speculation Founder personalities and the “first-class man&# th.

San Francisco 151

San Francisco Architecture Startup Database 151