Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 2, 2010

I’m writing this post to explain to entrepreneurs what you should be thinking about in terms of the VC’s you approach and the size and stage of their funds. A fund size of $25 – $100 million in normally an “early stage&# fund that is likely to do seed investments and/or smaller A round investments.

Venture Capital 269

Venture Capital Balance Sheet Early Stage Software Review 269

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

by Michael Woolf that is worth any startup founder reading to get a sense of perspective on the reality warp that is startup world during a frothy market such as 1997-1999, 2005-2007 or 2012-2014. Plus, most early-stage M&A fails so this isn’t likely a good use of capital for a young company).

Burn Rate 383

Burn Rate Balance Sheet .Net Valuation 383

thebarefootvc

MAY 8, 2012

As an entrepreneur at heart, I often innately grasp the potential of entrepreneurs and ideas that I meet with. These days, I am seeing a large number of first time entrepreneurs with great ideas, which is fantastic to see. There is inherent risk taking when you haven’t done it before, which often leads to true innovation.

Venture Capital 78

Venture Capital Syndicate Syndication Bandwidth 78

crowdSPRING Blog

SEPTEMBER 6, 2012

The video above shows Billie Holiday (one of my favorite singers) singing “Strange Fruit”, a song that Time manazine named, in 1999, the “song of the century” The song is a protest against racism. Are you an entrepreneur or small business owner – [link]. More Vacation is the Secret Sauce – [link].

Social Media 92

Social Media Small Business Design Media 92

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2014

I had been thinking a lot about this recently because I’m often asked the question of “what I look for in an entrepreneur when I want to invest?” And it’s still less than I was paid at Accenture in 1999. Being a startup entrepreneur is not for everybody and it’s not the only desirable career choice.

Founder 409

Founder Salary Startup Early Stage 409

Agile VC

MAY 26, 2011

I also joke with Reid Hoffman that this was back in the days before he was “Reid” Reid’s an incredible entrepreneur, startup investor, and human being. It’s truly a privilege to have known him for more than a decade as my mentor, boss, and friend going back to the early PayPal days. link] leehower.

Term Sheet 178

Term Sheet Silicon Valley Technical Review Social Network 178

Up and Running

SEPTEMBER 5, 2017

So, I’d like to start by sharing the story of a female entrepreneur who did experience VC funding success—but still also felt the impact of the biases held by the industry. A study based out of Babson College via The Diana Project looked at venture capital investments in women between the years 1999 and 2014. A rare success.

Venture Capital 82

Venture Capital Lean Cofounder Technical Review 82

Startup Lessons Learned

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

Last May, I shared the news that long-time Lean Startup advocates Brant Cooper and Patrick Vlaskovits were working on a new book called The Lean Entrepreneur featuring illustrations by FAKEGRIMLOCK. Social entrepreneurs take note!) Lastly, I wanted to share with you the foreword I wrote for The Lean Entrepreneur.

Lean 167

Lean Entrepreneur Agile San Francisco 167

Feld Thoughts

JULY 31, 2014

I know many entrepreneurs who feel that VCs have played them, gamed them, deceived them, or bullshitted them. But this doesn’t only happen to entrepreneurs. In 2007, when we set out to raise our first Foundry Group fund, early stage tech VC was in the shitter. VCs play this game with VCs all the time.

LP 155

LP Advisory Board Venture Capital Early Stage 155

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

I believe the rise in angel investing is here to stay and the professionalization of this class (aka “super angels&# or “micro VC&# ) is a good thing for the VC industry and for entrepreneurs. I believe that if you have 5 distinct skills you have a good chance at making great returns.

Silicon Valley 306

Silicon Valley Deal Flow Angel Investor Cofounder 306

Austin Startup

DECEMBER 20, 2020

I used to meet a high profile entrepreneur or investor moving here every month and now it seems it’s one or two a week. Follow Ben on Twitter @FederalLamm #ArtificialIntelligence #CEO #Space #Science #TomorrowingToday Brett Hurt is one of the most successful serial entrepreneurs in Austin. He’s an entrepreneur, investor, and author?—?seamlessly

Austin 110

Austin Texas Cofounder Los Angeles 110

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

One can even make the case that getting Market Type right is the most valuable thing a marketer can do to add value and affect success in an early stage venture. Back in 1999, it all ended very bad. This a hard concept and even harder to implement. And then set up the correct metrics in Customer Discovery and Validation.

Customer Development 219

Customer Development Web Developer Customer 219

thebarefootvc

JULY 3, 2016

Like any motivated entrepreneur, I started a company (in this case, an investment platform), to fill the gaps – which I also believed FPV was uniquely capable of filling. I am thankful to all of FPV’s early LPs, advisors and entrepreneurs who are an indispensable part of FPV’s mission and success to date. Below is a recap.

North America 40

North America Early Stage New York City Portfolio 40

Pascal's View

SEPTEMBER 5, 2010

My contributions to this undergraduate textbook, Venture Capital: Theory & Practice , are the result of two important collaborations. In the last chapter, Venture Capital in China, we explore the amazing development of China’s unique venture capital industry.

Venture Capital 44

Venture Capital China Technical Review Due Diligence 44

thebarefootvc

FEBRUARY 3, 2016

Like any motivated entrepreneur, I started a company (in this case, an investment platform), to fill the gaps – which I also believed FPV was uniquely capable of filling. I am thankful to all of FPV’s early LPs, advisors and entrepreneurs who are an indispensable part of FPV’s mission and success to date. Below is a recap.

North America 40

North America Early Stage New York City Portfolio 40

David Teten

APRIL 16, 2012

CEO: Ideally a successful serial entrepreneur who has taken a startup from Series A all the way to an exit. About ff Venture Capital ( http:/ffvc.com ) : We are one of the most active early-stage investors in New York. Since 1999, our partners have made over 150 investments in over 55 companies.

Cofounder 133

Cofounder New York Venture Capital B2C 133

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

Eighty some pages later I realized that a) I had some great war stories as a good marketeer and failed CEO, b) I’d have to pay my wife and kids to read them, c) the three of them were probably the entire total available market, and d) when I looked at what I had done and what other entrepreneurs had done at their startups, that there was a pattern.

Redemption 126

Redemption Silicon Valley RSS California 126

The Next Web

JUNE 20, 2013

When cloud services company Cornerstone OnDemand got its start in Los Angeles in 1999, the odds were against it. In its early stages, losing a customer would have doomed the startup, so it placed a strong emphasis on service. “We Entrepreneur Insider Profiles and Interviews' Miller noted. Image credit: iStockphoto.

Cloud 118

Cloud Southern California Los Angeles New York City 118

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 13, 2010

By 1999 we had grown into the largest independent consulting firm in the world. By 1999 it seemed like everybody was growing, though. I left Andersen Consulting in 1999 at the height of the market. Bryce is a bit like the entrepreneurs I search for. In other words, in a strong market even turkeys can fly. I love that.

Turkey 302

Turkey Differentiation IP Technical Review 302

Scalable Startup

DECEMBER 15, 2011

There seems to be a lot of this going around these days – the “I’m just about to start a startup” category of entrepreneurs, or “I just started a startup” when they haven’t. funding is more prevalent than ever for early early (read “ideas”) stage companies.

Angel Investor 24

Angel Investor Startup IPO Software Developers 24

andrewchen.co

AUGUST 20, 2012

My theory is, we’re currently in a golden age for early stage startups, and the early stage market will stay hot for at least the next 3-5 years. Whether you think this is a good thing or a bad thing, IMHO the mobile wave is so huge that it has the ability to power the early stage investing marketplace for years.

Seed Stage 51

Seed Stage Early Stage Mobile Seed Money 51

thebarefootvc

AUGUST 26, 2015

After the market downturn on Monday I set several limit orders – primarily on tech holdings that I wanted to increase positions in – in my personal account and went back to meeting with entrepreneurs. However, many variables come into play when investing at the early stage.

Marketing 40

Marketing Investment Bankers Valuation China 40

thebarefootvc

AUGUST 26, 2015

After the market downturn on Monday I set several limit orders – primarily on tech holdings that I wanted to increase positions in – in my personal account and went back to meeting with entrepreneurs. However, many variables come into play when investing at the early stage.

Marketing 40

Marketing Investment Bankers Valuation China 40

thebarefootvc

JULY 26, 2015

After the market downturn on Monday I set several limit orders – primarily on tech holdings that I wanted to increase positions in – in my personal account and went back to meeting with entrepreneurs. However, many variables come into play when investing at the early stage.

Marketing 40

Marketing Investment Bankers Valuation China 40

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2009

When you’re an early-stage startup that hasn’t raised any institutional money you end up doing almost every job function of the company yourself. I always encourage young entrepreneurs now to flip burgers for as long as they can. This is part of my ongoing series Startup Advice. We raised just $500k.

Founder 299

Founder Technical Review Startup Venture Capital 299

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 25, 2010

A reminder that it is important for all entrepreneurs is to remember to be careful about “deal drift.” When I was raising money for my first company we had closed a seed round in 1999 and were working on our A round. We had many term sheets (it was 1999 and we had a pulse) and we were deciding which one to take.

Technical Review 301

Technical Review Term Sheet Due Diligence Venture Capital 301

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 22, 2018

This is particularly true in the early stages of a new venture when you may be a solopreneur or working with a very small team. A single track conference with a maximum cap of 400 attendees offers an intimate, collaborative environment where founders and entrepreneurs can get to know one another. eTail East. Boston, USA.

Las Vegas 124

Las Vegas Software Review Affiliate Cofounder 124

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

A friend of mine is a serial entrepreneur and is running a high-profile, early stage company in NorCal. We exchanged ideas when I was an entrepreneur along side him in NorCal in 05-07 and my point-of-view on founder / VC relationships hasn’t shifted even 1% since I went to the dark side. I believe this is wrong.

Founder 329

Founder Liquidation Preference Term Sheet Participating Preferred 329

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2009

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Thursday, July 9, 2009 10 years of entrepreneurship I recently passed my ten-year anniversary of becoming an entrepreneur. In the summer of 1999, I started working on a startup from my college dorm. Id been on the internet since I was playing MUDs as a kid, but by 1999 I felt Id already missed the boat.

San Francisco 94

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 94

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

The movie, “The Social Network” might have had more of an impact on creating future entrepreneurs than any other event of the past 5 years. In 1998 it was 150 million, 1999 250 million and by 2000 it had crossed 350 million. We have lower costs to create companies – leading to more early stage innovation.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Mobile 347

David Teten

FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Their late stage deals outside of the venture centers outperform by ~5% vs. those in the venture centers; early stage deals outperformed by ~4%. At ffVC, our primary origination strategy is to provide a high level of services to entrepreneurs, and then let word of mouth spread.

Private Equity 114

Private Equity Venture Capital Technical Review Equity 114

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

I raised money as an entrepreneur, like you, in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005 for two different companies. I never suggest that entrepreneurs just randomly pitch VCs. You’ll never make a great entrepreneur. So your journey to fund raising begins by strengthening your relationships with other entrepreneurs.

Developer 366

Developer Silicon Valley PR Las Vegas 366

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 31, 2010

TechCrunch Europe ran an article in November of last year that European startups need to work as hard as those in Silicon Valley and I echoed the sentiment in my post about the need for entrepreneurs to be maniacal about their businesses if one wants to work in the hyper competitive tech world. We were based in London.

Entrepreneur 308

Entrepreneur Silicon Valley San Diego Non-Compete 308

Reid Hoffman

OCTOBER 10, 2017

For decades, technology entrepreneurs have had an affinity for pirates. Piracy became so associated with startups that when, in 1999, the cable network TNT released a movie about the heated rivalry between Steve Jobs and Apple, and Bill Gates and Microsoft, it was titled, “Pirates of Silicon Valley.”

Silicon Valley 36

Silicon Valley Early Stage Software Review Employee 36

Austin Startup

FEBRUARY 24, 2019

As I mentioned at the beginning of this series/ebook, over the years I’ve noticed that I tend to frequently share certain Lucky7 posts with entrepreneurs we’ve backed , team members at data.world, or other startup investors I know. So I’m packaging the best of them up for you here in a new series called The Entrepreneur’s Essentials.

Software Review 48

Software Review Sales Cofounder Analytics 48

VC Cafe

OCTOBER 18, 2011

He worked his way up the corporate ladder; in 1998 he became VP of the Digital TV platform strategy, which did not pan out, and in 1999 he found an opportunity in Microsoft Internet (MSN) international. There aren’t enough entrepreneurs here that want to start a company worth a billion dollars.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital New Zealand Startup 100

Austin Startup

NOVEMBER 29, 2017

It follows up on my posts discussing why early stage startups should — or should not — move to Silicon Valley. Should Early Stage Startups Move to Austin? Any attempt to get your head around why Austin is awesome for early stage companies needs to not only look at culture, but start at culture.

Early Stage 54

Early Stage Austin Silicon Valley Texas 54