View from Seed

MAY 31, 2023

For example, a 2009 study conducted by Paul Gompers and David Scharfstein, “Performance Persistence in Entrepreneurship”, found that failed founders have the same chances of success¹ as novice founders, but prior success does increase the odds of future success. I reached out to a dozen founders using the criteria of: 1.

Silicon Valley 156

Silicon Valley Cofounder Term Sheet Founder 156

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 26, 2015

In fact, choosing the right partner to champion your deal can have a huge impact on whether or not you get a term sheet in the first place. I understand that and actually think it’s ok because that partner gets experience with making investments, sitting on boards, finding co-investors, managing founder relationships, etc.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Detroit Early Stage Partner 150

Rob Go

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

It occurred to me that although we mentioned our new thematic approach when we raised our last fund in 2017, we haven’t really shared a broader manifesto about how we are approaching the early stage market. It’s been an interesting several years in the early stage venture eco-system, and the sands have shifted considerably.

North America 36

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 36

Austin Startup

JULY 22, 2021

It’s hard to describe in words the palpable energy when a room is this packed full of incredible female entrepreneurs at the Women in Tech Summit at Capital Factory. On October 4th, five technology startup finalists will pitch to a panel of advisors and judges made up of successful investors, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders.

San Antonio 107

San Antonio Dallas Houston Founder 107

David Teten

AUGUST 19, 2019

RBI normally requires founders to pay back their investors with a fixed percentage of revenue until they have finished providing the investor with a fixed return on capital, which they agree upon in advance. For background, see Revenue-Based Investing: A New Option for Founders who Care About Control. Decathlon Capital.

Revenue 60

Revenue Technical Review Software Review Equity 60

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). This post assumes that you have a basic understanding of Series A financing terms. Y Combinator Series AA Equity Financing Documents (by WSGR). Legal fees.

Finance 70

Finance Software Review Term Sheet Liquidation Preference 70

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2015

In the old days there usually weren’t convertible notes on early-stage deals and there weren’t party rounds with 20 angels or 6 seed funds. So how DOES a VC think about financings at early stages? If you’re a solo founder and haven’t built out your team or engineers I’m likely to want 15+%.

Pre-Money Valuation 150

Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Post-Money Valuation Dilution 150

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

I know many super experienced entrepreneurs who don’t understand the basics of how fund size and age can affect them so I thought it was worth establishing a baseline. In a world of The Funded, VentureHacks and entrepreneur blogs this kind of informations spreads like wildfire. We used the Y Combinator open source term sheet.

Venture Capital 265

Venture Capital Term Sheet Early Stage Silicon Valley 265

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2012

You could argue that choosing the name “first round” paints them into a corner in case they want to ever do a late stage fund, but I suspect they named it FRC precisely because they wanted to excel at early-stage investing. I know that I call them often to co-invest. Like they truly understood entrepreneurs.

Community 304

Community Los Angeles Startup Silicon Valley 304

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 14, 2012

” In this week’s discussion with entrepreneurs I think the word impending wasn’t used often enough. Let me remind readers as I outlined in this post , there are VERY FEW M&A transactions for early-stage startup companies above $100 million. But I owe it to my existing investors and co-founders to listen.

Valuation 316

Valuation Balance Sheet Dilution Term Sheet 316

Agile VC

FEBRUARY 28, 2012

Startups in NextView’s portfolio frequently receive inbound interest from other VC investors who are intrigued about what they’re doing, and I often talk with other early-stage entrepreneurs how to approach similar situations. Im a former Silicon Valley entrepreneur turned East Coast VC. Author howerl.

Early Stage 100

Early Stage Syndicate Syndication Silicon Valley 100

Hunter Walker

APRIL 27, 2014

We brief our major investors quarterly and decided to model our LP meeting after what “big funds” do, albeit with a few Homebrew flourishes :) Logistically this meant an afternoon session with presentations/Q&A then a dinner with founders/advisors. We love our founders. 2) Product Market Fit & Our Roadmap.

LP 97

LP Cofounder Term Sheet Valuation 97

BeyondVC

OCTOBER 13, 2004

I was speaking with a friend of mine today who mentioned that his term sheet for his Series A round fell through. To make a long story short, one of the co-founders of the company built the company’s software in his spare time. Today, the IP is about to get assigned in the proper manner.

Software Review 60

Software Review Intellectual Property IP Due Diligence 60

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2009

With open source software (LAMP stack) and cloud computing infrastructure it just wasn’t that expensive to get your company going and founders just wanted to raise less money. I was an early cynic. I told entrepreneurs that it was a bit of a Faustian bargain. They do many early-stage deals.

Software Review 283

Software Review Term Sheet Due Diligence Southern California 283

reidhoffman.org

NOVEMBER 12, 2013

. × At Greylock , my partners and I are driven by one guiding mission: always help entrepreneurs. It doesn’t matter whether an entrepreneur is in our portfolio, whether we’re considering an investment, or whether we’re casually meeting for the first time. Entrepreneurs often ask me for help with their pitch decks.

Entrepreneur 111

Entrepreneur Revenue Viral Networking 111

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 2, 2009

If a company has reached a level of success, has been around for a few years and you believe the company has potential to break out into a much bigger company then you should let the founders take money off of the table. A friend of mine is a serial entrepreneur and is running a high-profile, early stage company in NorCal.

Founder 329

Founder Liquidation Preference Term Sheet Participating Preferred 329

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.” We had many term sheets (it was 1999 and we had a pulse) and we were deciding which one to take. We were trying to optimize around a few criteria: price, size of round, number of syndicate partners and, of course, terms.

Technical Review 301

Technical Review Term Sheet Due Diligence Venture Capital 301

Eric Friedman

AUGUST 18, 2021

Dan is the co-founder of Standard Treasury, a Y Combinator backed company. He is also co-founder and Managing Partner of Deciens Capital, an early stage investment fund. It is the entrepreneurs that are singing their heart out, playing the instruments, et cetera. On Sushi and VC. Everything we do.

Silicon Valley 88

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Cofounder Africa 88

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

To learn more about this space, I suggest join an online community I co-founded, PEVCTech. . Small investment firms often have interns and entrepreneurs in residence passing through, each of which is a security risk. Data companies focused on early-stage startups include Aingel , fundsUP , Preseries , PredictLeads , and Sploda.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2019

The reality today is that capital is more available than ever and entrepreneurs have become more sophisticated, so founders are looking for more than just cash from their venture backers. You've seen how venture capital works from both sides--as an entrepreneur and a venture capitalist.

Lean 108

Lean Venture Capital Conversion IPO 108

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 26, 2020

What most founders don’t realize is: Every stage of a startup requires a different set of metrics and milestones and founder skills. Knowing these will help a founder position her pitch to get investors’ attention. Founders need to keep their eye on the prize — not just the next funding round. Business Model.

Cofounder 429

Cofounder Seed Stage Valuation Metrics 429

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 17, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series “ Pitching a VC “ There’s a great meme developing this morning on the need to simplify funding terms and documents. The meme was kicked off by Chris Dixon with this post saying that term sheets need to be simplified and align investor / founder interests.

Founder Vesting 252

Founder Vesting Vesting Founder Term Sheet 252

venturehacks.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

Entrepreneurs should think about unbundling money and value add. Get money on the best terms and get the best value add. They don’t even try to get market price for their investment; they limit their holdings to leave the founders enough stock to feel the company is still theirs.” Ask the Attorney” – Founder Vesting.

Equity 40

Equity Cap Table Valuation RSS 40

Professor VC

JUNE 20, 2011

Since the iControl system chronicles all meetings, I was able to find the automatic picture snapped from my first meeting with the founders, Reza Raji and Chris Stevens on April 22, 2004. At this time, we had secured a term sheet from a co-investor from one of my other angel investments (Thanks, Graeme!)

San Jose 28

San Jose Angel Investor Term Sheet Venture Capital 28

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 18, 2011

I first met the founder of Pose, Dustin Rosen , when he was a junior person with an LA-based venture capital firm called The Mail Room Fund. He wanted to be an entrepreneur. Our firm invested at a very early stage in retail brands including CostCo, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Ulta, Starbucks and many more.

Term Sheet 303

Term Sheet Mobile Cofounder Early Stage 303

Feld Thoughts

JULY 14, 2015

But instead of adding it on to the note or doing an equity round with a price, which could still be an early stage price but below the cap, they make the argument that since the company couldn’t raise a round, the company is worthless. So the new investment gets 60%, the founders get 39.9%, and the $1m of seed money gets 0.1%.

Recapitalization 70

Recapitalization Pre-Money Valuation Post-Money Valuation Angel Investor 70

Hunter Walker

DECEMBER 19, 2013

The only way to succeed in venture capital is backing wonderful entrepreneurs and working hard on their behalf. Loss 1: Offered a Substantial Secondary Slot But Passed Since We Seek to Lead/Co-Lead. This opportunity looked juicy: two founders we knew previously, mission-driven, attacking a big market.

Cofounder 105

Cofounder Term Sheet Seed Stage Portfolio 105

www.currentlyobsessed.com

MAY 28, 2010

Currently Obsessed Joe Heitzeberg – Entrepreneur | Tech Geek | MBA Home About Me Joe Heitzeberg is an internet entrepreneur who has started and sold two companies. It hardly deserves any attention at all in the early stages. He tries to write things that havent already been written 9000 times.

Valuation 42

Valuation Channel Pre-Money Valuation Term Sheet 42

mashable.com

JUNE 11, 2013

Or maybe the co-founders have a poisonous relationship that will hinder the companys growth. Whatever your companys "fatal flaw" may be, you can likely avoid it in your own venture if you take some advice from people whove gone through the early startup phase before. Some startups are destined for failure. Hiring Poorly.

Cofounder 111

Cofounder Technical Review Startup Software Review 111

www.vccafe.com

MARCH 11, 2013

VC Cafe covers early stage Israeli and European tech & mobile startups. A group of Seedcamp entrepreneurs started a startup tools wiki for that purpose, and we thought it would be well suited here. WSGR Term Sheet Generator. Orrick, Herrington Term Sheet Generator. Seed Stage Valuation Guide.

Software Review 53

Software Review Technical Review Startup 53