David Cohen

MARCH 30, 2020

In 2001, the towers were hit. Founded in 2006, Techstars ran our first startup accelerator in 2007. Uber took the shockingly low valuation of $4m when raising it’s first $1.5m. 3m valuation. Less than a $2m valuation for their seed round. In 2000, the Internet bubble burst. Starting a tech company after this?

Founder 174

Founder Valuation Startup IP 174

Berkonomics

NOVEMBER 4, 2016

Originally created in the mid 1990’s to help with the imprecise problem of how to value early stage companies, especially those in technology, I developed what soon became known as “The Berkus Method” when published in the popular book, “Winning Angels” by Harvard’s Amis and Stevenson with my permission in 2001.

Valuation 48

Valuation North Carolina Oklahoma City Silicon Valley 48

Gust

OCTOBER 20, 2011

In 2011, the valuation of pre-revenue, start-up companies is typically in the range of $1.5–$2.5 Scorecard Valuation Methodology. This method compares the target company to typical angel-funded startup ventures and adjusts the average valuation of recently funded companies in the region to establish a pre-money valuation of the target.

Valuation 146

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Intellectual Property Technical Review 146

Austin Startup

JUNE 27, 2017

For investors outside of Austin and LPs: Austin is a a vibrant startup market and this list of capital sources can help you identify firms to co-invest with and funds to invest in. We’ve compiled a definitive list of sources of startup capital in Austin.

Venture Capital 54

Venture Capital Austin Texas Private Equity 54

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

At an accelerator … Me: Raising convertible notes as a seed round is one of the biggest disservices our industry has done to entrepreneurs since 2001-2003 when there were “full ratchets” and “multiple liquidation preferences” – the most hostile terms anybody found in term sheets 10 years ago. Him: $12 pre.

Venture Capital 417

Venture Capital Liquidation Preference Valuation Term Sheet 417

The Startup Magazine

NOVEMBER 13, 2018

Belnick founded BizChair.com with $500 in 2001. The name of this startup was Flipkart and they started it with $6,500. This company’s valuation peaked at $10 billion in 2013/2014. The post 10 of the Most Successful Investors of the Last 10 Years appeared first on The Startup Magazine. Source: Pexels. Sean Belnick.

Cofounder 142

Cofounder Venture Capital India Valuation 142

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

Five Quarters of Profitability During the 1980’s and through the mid 1990’s startups going public had to do something that most companies today never heard of – they had to show a track record of increasing revenue and consistent profitability. The world of building profitable startups as the primary goal of Venture Capital would end in 1995.

Silicon Valley 217

Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 217

Up and Running

JULY 7, 2014

At my startup, iSuppli, I created an organization structure that revolved around weekly status meetings and quarterly business reviews that allowed me to feel clued in and integral to every part of the business, without micromanaging or holding back our growth. Start now – Oliver Emberton, Richard Branson and Tim Berry (oh, and Nike).

Entrepreneur 142

Entrepreneur Software Review Cofounder Audience 142

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2010

Recently I’ve been debating with a number of young startup companies that are raising money in the next few months, “what is the right about of capital to raise at a startup?&#. 24 months for most tech startups is usually too much money. - This is part of my ongoing series on Raising Venture Capital. add a buffer.

Venture Capital 319

Venture Capital Startup Silicon Valley Warrant 319

Scalable Startup

AUGUST 26, 2014

As further market proof of the power of Drupal in the enterprise, Acquia has received about $100 million in funding in the past 3 months, which puts its valuation at over $1 billion. Drupal was launched in 2001, and Acquia started in 2007. It was a startup that launched with funding from day one and has never looked back.

Founder 42

Founder Los Angeles PHP Open Source 42

Ben's Blog

MAY 24, 2021

There are a number of trends concerning IPOs and capital formation to note: First, the raw number of IPOs has declined significantly: From 1980-2000, the US averaged roughly 300 IPOs per year; from 2001-2016, the average fell to 108 per year. 44% 2001-2019 13.7% First, as the below chart shows, IPO pops are not a new phenomenon.

SEC 36

SEC Accredited Investor IPO Technical Review 36

Early Growth Financial Services

OCTOBER 23, 2014

This was the largest quarterly investment total since 2001’s first half. The trend continued in 2014: with activity during the six months through June the strongest since the comparable period of 2001. Median pre-money valuations have increased by 43% so far in 2014 compared to 2013.

Pre-Money Valuation 59

Pre-Money Valuation Equity Valuation Startup 59

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 17, 2011

When times are really good for fund raising many teams delay to maximize their valuation. I’m a very big believer in the “Lean Startup&# principles as espoused by Steve Blank and Eric Ries. In the seed phase startups are typically raising between $500k-$1m in today’s market. How do you push valuation?

Pre-Money Valuation 303

Pre-Money Valuation Dilution Valuation PR 303

500hats.com

AUGUST 2, 2012

It’s no coincidence we designed 500 Startups with these evolutions in mind, altho none of the required strategies have been easy to execute and we are still refining our approach. In short, we were a lot more geeky than the previous generation of fund managers , and we started blogging a lot about tech startups and best practices.

Silicon Valley 74

Silicon Valley Early Stage Venture Capital Valuation 74

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

The signals are loud and clear : seed and late stage valuations are getting frothy and wacky, and hiring talent in Silicon Valley is the toughest it has been since the dot.com bubble. What are they, how do they differ and what can startup do to take advantage of them? The world of building profitable startups ended in 1995.

Internet 334

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 334

Berkonomics

MARCH 25, 2012

For those of us who’ve invested in early stage companies, especially technology startups, we have confronted a universal problem. And in my opinion, all fail to take into account the universal truth – that fewer than one in a thousand startups meet or exceed their projected revenues in the periods planned. Email readers, continue here.]

Early Stage 128

Early Stage Valuation Revenue Internet 128

Feld Thoughts

APRIL 21, 2016

In 2001 and 2002 I learned a brutal set of lessons, including experiencing that $100 million of paper money going to $0 when Interliant went bankrupt. If you are a founder, an employee in a startup, or an investor in a startup, you have to be playing a long term game. Long term is not a year. It’s not two years.

Marketing 70

Marketing Down Round Startup IRR 70

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 24, 2015

I’ve seen friends (and family members) lose much of their savings that way over the years because “Black Swans” happen and in 1987, 2001, 2003 & 2008 (just to name a few from my memory) huge market gyrations caused much financial distress to people seeking short-term gains. So plan your start date accordingly.

Stock 150

Stock Finance Marketing Valuation 150

YoungUpstarts

MARCH 3, 2020

Chris Kape: I established JAMCO in early 2001 in the wake of the dot-com bubble collapse. Anyone involved in Internet related high-tech businesses at the time learned much from the loss of easy to raise capital with high valuations and quick IPO/RTO exits. The next group I would look to are angel investors.

Partner 147

Partner Uganda Angel Investor Bulgaria 147

View from Seed

JANUARY 11, 2017

A startup can benefit in various ways from having a strategic investor involved in their company, but there are plenty of drawbacks too, both commonly known and more subtle. On the flip side, simply taking strategic investor capital because it’s there or it’s easier or cheaper than other capital rarely works out well for startups.

Strategic Investors 120

Strategic Investors Post-Money Valuation Seed Stage Cofounder 120

Eric Friedman

AUGUST 18, 2021

Most investors, most people in the startup ecosystem, I would describe as eternal optimists, glass-half-full people. On Dan’s Former Startup. Dan Kimerling: In 2011 and 2012, I was working at a startup doing payment processing. I see a lot of startups that I don’t think fit those criteria. Two questions.

Silicon Valley 88

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Cofounder Africa 88

genylabs.typepad.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Planning, Startups, Stories. I wont bother going into details on start-up financing terms ( see this post for an overview of typical VC terms) except to say if you dont know and understand: the firms cap table and valuation. The best start-up I ever invested in went bankrupt in 2001. Small Business Blogs. OReilly Radar.

Equity 40

Equity Technical Review San Jose Stock 40

Ben's Blog

JULY 16, 2013

If you run a startup and are currently raising money, you probably planned for a somewhat different fundraising environment than the one you find yourself in today. You probably thought that valuations would be roughly the same as they were the last time you raised money. 3/30/2001: 26.3. You can plan a pretty picnic.

Down Round 78

Down Round Marketing Preferred Stock Post-Money Valuation 78

This is going to be BIG.

JULY 30, 2015

One of the first things I did when I joined the venture asset class as a lowly institutional LP analyst in 2001 was to build the VC fund cashflow model. You don't want the "average" fund, because average funds don't do well--just like you don't want to model the average startup, because you might as well draw a big flaming hole in the ground.

Venture Capital 60

Venture Capital Pre-Money Valuation IRR Valuation 60

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 26, 2011

You might think that "company valuation" refers, naturally, to how much your company is - you know - valued. He and I have worked together on the Startup Visa initiative. When raising money, for example, you might think that most negotiations happen in a rational way, over just a few deal points that have a clear meaning.

Antidilution 148

Antidilution Term Sheet Silicon Valley Widget 148

ReadWriteStart

AUGUST 26, 2022

I founded a startup years ago, and that’s how I started getting a taste of it. The startup didn’t work out, but I found ways to be around it, whether it was on the sales side in Goldman for a few years. How does that translate into advice that you give to your startups? What guidance for your portfolio companies?

Partner 132

Partner Cofounder Retention Acquisition 132

thebarefootvc

AUGUST 26, 2015

As someone who invested through the 2001 and 2008 crashes I can assure you that down rounds and fire sales are not fun for anyone involved. Pay attention to who you’re taking money from and aim for a reasonable valuation. Entry valuations need to allow for room to grow and hit milestones or the next round may be a tough one to raise.

Marketing 40

Marketing Investment Bankers Valuation China 40

thebarefootvc

AUGUST 26, 2015

As someone who invested through the 2001 and 2008 crashes I can assure you that down rounds and fire sales are not fun for anyone involved. Pay attention to who you’re taking money from and aim for a reasonable valuation. Entry valuations need to allow for room to grow and hit milestones or the next round may be a tough one to raise.

Marketing 40

Marketing Investment Bankers Valuation China 40

Professor VC

FEBRUARY 12, 2015

I doubt Aileen Lee of Cowboy Ventures believed that a horse with a horn existed when she wrote Welcome To The Unicorn Club: Learning From Billion-Dollar Startups in late 2013, but she probably had no idea that it would become a hot buzzword in Silicon Valley and hit the cover of mainstream business press, Fortune Magazine. And this is not it."

Las Vegas 28

Las Vegas IPO Pre-Money Valuation Valuation 28

Ben's Blog

JULY 16, 2013

If you run a startup and are currently raising money, you probably planned for a somewhat different fundraising environment than the one you find yourself in today. You probably thought that valuations would be roughly the same as they were the last time you raised money. 3/30/2001: 26.3 Outkast, Ms. 3/29/1996: 22.3

Marketing 46

Marketing Preferred Stock Post-Money Valuation Down Round 46

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 25, 2010

million at a $15 million pre-money valuation. Morgan Stanley had proposed a higher valuation to let them in. I lived through this again September 2001. This is part of my ongoing series with Startup Advice (although this also applies tightly with Raising Venture Capital ). million at a $15 million pre-money valuation.

Technical Review 301

Technical Review Term Sheet Due Diligence Venture Capital 301

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 12, 2020

This is true not just for startups, but for so many of the institutions that govern society. And this is true not just of startups, but of so many of the institutions that govern society. As Brian tells me, "Design your organization or it will be designed for you." Design your organization or it will be designed for you," he told me.

Silicon Valley 113

Silicon Valley Design Hiring Government 113

Startup Company Lawyer

FEBRUARY 21, 2010

This was particularly common from 2001 to 2003, after the dot-com crash when companies had raised a large amount of venture financing at high valuations. In response to the problem of worthless common stock, some companies have implemented employee retention plans, which are also referred to as M&A carveout plans.

Retention 31

Retention Liquidation Preference Employee Common Stock 31