Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 15, 2021

Every entrepreneur needs to understand the following basics, to be addressed at company formation, as they engage a qualified attorney to draw up the paperwork: Allocate founder’s stock commensurate with commitment. Key founder vesting should have no cliff. This is called stock dilution control.

Vesting 298

Vesting Dilution Stock Founder Vesting 298

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

I raised money and traded equity, but with my venture, I had to make one of the toughest decisions, to build it with some assistance of co-founders. Also, determine the market demand to make sure what you’re doing is sustainable. Find the right co-founders. Often, this is considered as a mistake.

Cofounder 124

Cofounder Sweat Equity Equity Dilution 124

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

(co-written with Jamie Finney, Founding Partner at Greater Colorado Venture Fund. From RBI, Flexible VCs borrow the ability to reap meaningful returns without demanding founders build for an exit. By tying payments to actual revenues, founders and investors remain aligned around the company’s real-time performance, good or bad.

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

As the idea went from innovating on software & systems to launching a company to rolling it out in the field brought on Rahul Gandhi as his co-founder to physically launch the company. and we were met with weak demand, slow growth and high costs. Seriously, this happens.

Operations 286

Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

The Next Web

OCTOBER 3, 2012

Andrew is the co-founder and CTO of Parse.ly , a technology startup that provides big data insights to the web’s best publishers. He wrote: When startups die, the official cause of death is always either running out of money or a critical founder bailing. Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Andrew Montalenti.

Cofounder 155

Cofounder Technical Cofounder Technical Review Software Review 155

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 16, 2016

By Bryan Miles, CEO and co-founder, Miles Advisory Group, Inc. As your business thrives, the providers who support you with banking, marketing and other services should change as your demands change. Growth places new demands on business, and with this comes an opportunity to reevaluate core functions and operations.

Cofounder 100

Cofounder Balance Sheet Small Business Administration Technical Review 100

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 10, 2019

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup founders quandaries in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Don’t wait for the harsh reality of the demanding business world to start thinking about these tradeoffs.

Hockey Stick 243

Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event Startup 243

YoungUpstarts

MAY 6, 2019

You are looking for cofounders that can help you build a product. You have finally found a cofounder that can take care of the startup. If there is a gap in the market, there will be demand. It will be in millions and you will have to dilute your shares even further if you are aiming for another funding round. Commitment.

Startup 113

Startup Technical Cofounder Merger Early Stage 113

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 31, 2020

In fact, they may fear team leadership as a burden, or a potential dilution of their ownership. Good entrepreneurs are often diluted in their potential by trying to attack too many new market opportunities or customer requests concurrently. Certainly interfacing to the outside world may not be an inventor forte.

Founder 312

Founder Intellectual Property Dilution Startup 312

Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 14, 2014

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup Founders dilemmas in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Don’t wait for the harsh reality of the demanding business world to start thinking about these tradeoffs. The Founder succession dilemma.

Hockey Stick 268

Hockey Stick Cofounder Entrepreneur Liquidity Event 268

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 19, 2017

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup founders dilemmas in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Don’t wait for the harsh reality of the demanding business world to start thinking about these tradeoffs. The founder succession dilemma.

Hockey Stick 144

Hockey Stick Cofounder Entrepreneur Liquidity Event 144

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 19, 2013

Most entrepreneurs struggle with many startup Founders dilemmas in building their business, and these key dilemmas are probably the biggest source of pain and failure for the entrepreneur lifestyle. Don’t wait for the harsh reality of the demanding business world to start thinking about these tradeoffs. The Founder succession dilemma.

Founder 245

Founder Hockey Stick Cofounder Liquidity Event 245

Hunter Walker

AUGUST 7, 2017

Employee options pools, typically created at the point of financings, shouldn’t be treated as haggling over dilution, but rather a strategic resource that will help founders build the best team and, by extension, a more valuable company.

Equity 94

Equity Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Founder 94

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 18, 2015

Every entrepreneur needs to understand the following basics, to be addressed at company formation, as they engage a qualified attorney to draw up the paperwork: Allocate founder’s stock commensurate with commitment. Key founder vesting should have no cliff. This is called stock dilution control.

Stock 120

Stock Vesting Common Stock Founder Vesting 120

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 30, 2018

I know that some founders feel uncomfortable with this as though they might somehow be sharing something so confidential that it ultimately hurts you. If a VC prices a flat or down round it means that management teams are often taking too much dilution. Why shouldn’t most founders just name a price? After all?—?we million.

Valuation 324

Valuation Post-Money Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Cofounder 324

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 29, 2018

Of course, initially these founder’s shares were worth essentially nothing, but it doesn’t take much of an imagination to grasp the possibilities. Now is the time to talk to a qualified attorney, and get some discipline in place for the following strategies: Manage founder’s shares like gold with partners.

Stock 129

Stock Vesting Preferred Stock Cofounder 129

Startup Company Lawyer

MARCH 14, 2010

Founders Institute Plain Preferred Term Sheet (by WSGR – disclaimer, I represent the Founders Institute and was involved in drafting this document). If new investors get better rights in a future equity financings (such as registration rights, price-based anti-dilution, redemption rights, etc.), Anti-dilution protection.

Finance 70

Finance Software Review Term Sheet Liquidation Preference 70

Reid Hoffman

AUGUST 17, 2021

Greylock investor Sridhar Ramaswamy , who co-founded search engine startup Neeva , says it’s more important for startups to think about creating a product that is useful and resonates with people before worrying about whether a large incumbent is doing it. TRANSCRIPT.

Cofounder 69

Cofounder Differentiation Search Advertising 69

Reid Hoffman

AUGUST 17, 2021

Greylock investor Sridhar Ramaswamy , who co-founded search engine startup Neeva , says it’s more important for startups to think about creating a product that is useful and resonates with people before worrying about whether a large incumbent is doing it. TRANSCRIPT.

Cofounder 69

Cofounder Differentiation Search Advertising 69

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 26, 2009

They had their own private forum, and a company founder (aka me) personally ran the group in its early days. Customers kept demanding that we add this or that IM feature, and we were routinely refusing. Every time you listen to customers, you fear diluting your vision. One example is having a real Customer Advisory Board.

Advisory Board 151

Advisory Board Customer San Francisco Lean 151

This is going to be BIG.

AUGUST 13, 2015

Think of yourself as the "Uber for" when you don't even understand what makes Uber "Uber"--namely a commoditized, interchangeable workforce performing singular tasks whose demand is unpredictable geographically and schedulewise, that had lots of unused inventory. Thinking that PR alone is going to get you millions of users.

Dilution 60

Dilution Cofounder PR Demand 60

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 22, 2011

Here’s the problem: Let’s say you have 5 VCs (plus angels but let’s ignore that for now) and each one owns 5% so you took 25% dilution to get the round done. Hopefully each lead or co-lead their round so there is more harmony in the configuration. The Pitfall of One.

Dilution 314

Dilution Cap Table Due Diligence Option Pool 314

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

Whats is the best way to find a co-founder for your startup? However, one of my co-founders doesn’t seem to be as motivated as the rest of us. As founders invest massive amounts of time into their start-up, how critical is it for them to come out of their “hermit caves” and network?

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

www.quora.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

Type to Add and Search Questions; Search Topics and People Startups Startup Compensation Entrepreneurship Compensation Stock Options Major Internet Companies Silicon Valley Why is there such a large founder to early employee equity drop-off? The real question here is: why is it fair for founders to get so much more?

Equity 40

Equity Employee Founder Cofounder 40

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

The Laws of Supply & Demand. The most basic chart of microeconomics is a supply & demand curve. Demand represents a buyer and supply a seller. Some products are “inelastic” meaning when prices go up demand doesn’t fall much (think cigarettes, alcohol or even illicit drugs). goes into a startup.

Valuation 150

Valuation Down Round Startup Later Stage 150

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

The other revels in the world as we all know it will be someday: limitless distribution enabled by new technologies, the importance of collaborative filters, and on-demand availability of all content for end-users. And as everyone’s attention starts to focus on those same indicators, their value is being diluted.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

Second, more damning is the “signaling problem.&# This means that if a VC invests in your seed round and does not participate in a future round the next round investor will think to himself, “well, if Big VC Co. They said that they didn’t want the extra money or dilution. We offered them more : $750k-1 million.

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Term Sheet Early Stage Silicon Valley 265

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

As a consumer internet company with millions of customers, it may seem to have little relevancy for an enterprise software company with only a handful of potential customers, or a computer security company whose customers demand a rigorous audit before accepting a new release. No departments The Five Whys for Startups (for Harvard Business R.

Continuous Deployment 167

Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

crowdSPRING Blog

DECEMBER 13, 2018

If your brand tries to be too many things at once, the message becomes scattered and the brand grows diluted. For example, Charles Revson, founder of Revlon, always used to say he sold hope, not makeup. The 85,000 farmers in the cooperative are co-owners in the company. Neiman Marcus sells luxury, while Wal-Mart sells bargains.

Marketing 162

Marketing Charlotte Naming Design 162