Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 30, 2014

Meredith came to see me along with the CTO Marc Berte. They had been introduced by my friend Brian Garrett, a partner at Crosscut Ventures and the ambition outlined in their deck seemed almost unbelievable, “to make wireless charging of phones (and other devices) as easy as WiFi” that I had to see it for myself.

Technical Review 418

Technical Review Software Review Due Diligence CTO Hire 418

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2014

On teams I have a framework for tech teams “ CTO vs. VP Eng ” or on sales I have “ Journeymen, Mavericks & Superstars ” 5. My job is just to be your sparring partner. On sales I often talk about “ Why Buy Anything, Why Buy Now, Why Buy Me ” as a tool to think about a sales process.

Framework 407

Framework Startup Retention Sales 407

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 12, 2009

Your CTO and leading technology visionary has just announced he’s quitting. Here’s my advice: Don’t reveal your “skeletons&# in the first meeting but you need to tell your sponsoring partner before the full partner meeting. You’re not happy with your existing investors.

Technical Review 311

Technical Review Venture Capital Due Diligence Partner 311

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

They often make great team members such as head of products, CTO, head of sales, CFO, etc. He and his partner told me about this new idea over the course of nearly a year. Partners in VC funds only wanted to fund entrepreneurs who had a certain percentage of their net worth tied up in their venture. I finally called bullshit.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur CTO Hire South America Salary 293

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 7, 2013

He joined when Maker was a small, chaotic organization and helped bridge our talented creative team with the outside world of investor, brands, partners & press. Another major hire was Ryan Lissack who joined as CTO.

Video 320

Video Los Angeles Technical Cofounder CTO Hire 320

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2015

In practice it can be a fine line between sparring partner / coach and stepping over the line to brute-force persuasion. The way we dealt with this issue is that we took each senior exec in the company (including the CFO and the CTO) and assigned them to important accounts. ” Of course I agree with this.

Startup 150

Startup CTO Hire Sales Leadership 150

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

I had really positive experiences such as working with Greg Gretsch at Sigma Partners where he championed us to a partners’ meeting where we sort of got crucified. We made changes and Greg was a gentleman throughout the process rather than berating us for our performance (it was our first partners’ meeting).

Venture Capital 274

Venture Capital Term Sheet San Diego Viral 274

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

Our partners have invested in more than dozen companies that became worth more than a billion dollars and that has disproportionately drive returns. Ryan Lissack is the CTO of Maker Studios. And the “stay lean” argument isn’t only good for entrepreneurs, it can be good for VCs, too. It is VC math, like it or not.

Silicon Valley 390

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Startup Technical Review 390

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

Now they are partners. Marc Berte, the CTO, and a masters from MIT, is exceptionally gifted. .” When Elon Musk set out to build SpaceX he wasn’t greeted with enthusiasm from the space community not used to having a private enterprise challenge the government funded space exploration of NASA. What about loss of efficiency?

Technical Review 417

Technical Review South Korea San Francisco Software Review 417

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 28, 2010

This week’s guest was David Travers from Rustic Canyon Partners. Investors: Matrix (Dana Stadler, who was the CTO of PayPal). What I found strange about this funded was the fact that it was led by Summit Partners. Investors: Summit Partners (lead), Jeff Clavier, Aydin Senkut, Gary Vaynerchuk. 15mm in Series A.

Venture Capital 270

Venture Capital Cofounder Spain San Diego 270

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2019

The first check I wrote was just over 10 years ago into a company called Invoca who just announced a new $56 million in funding led by Scott Hilleboe at HIG Growth Partners. It proved to be fortuitous because it allowed me the time & space I needed to get to know tons of founders and VCs and to hone my craft. Over the past 2.5

IP 223

IP Intellectual Property IRR Cofounder 223

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2011

Want meet one of his key investors, USV partner Albert Wenger ? This time on mysterious party bus to nowhere but situated with the CTO & Cofounder of Living Social, Aaron Batalion. I couldn’t have said it any better replacing music with tech. Want to hang out with Dennis Crowley ? He was there, too. Just hanging out.

Technical Cofounder 294

Technical Cofounder Austin Hosting Cofounder 294

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 25, 2011

A year ago I invested, along with Dana Settle at Greycroft Partners , in a startup company called Maker Studios. And I’m excited to say that we’ve poached a major technologist from Silicon Valley who will move down to Los Angeles join as CTO in January. It was founded by Danny Zappin, Lisa Donovan & Ben Donovan.

Silicon Valley 291

Silicon Valley Los Angeles Distribution Internet 291

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 15, 2010

– I spoke about GRP’s recent exit of Ulta in which we returned $320 million to our limited partners. I spoke about the need of the CEO, CTO and head of Products to be in the same location. Yes, that was the value that we actually returned as opposed to the value of Ulta. Great exit. -

Southern California 210

Southern California Venture Capital Seed Stage Angel Investor 210

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2017

Also, make sure you know several partners at the VC firms who have invested in you because in tough times it helps to have very broad support. You need to know how many partners they have and which partners do which kinds of deals. Strangely, most founders I know don’t have this conversation with the inside investors early.

Burn Rate 238

Burn Rate Term Sheet CTO Hire Fractional CTO 238

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 4, 2009

So a friend recently called to ask for advice on becoming the CTO of a startup. When I was CEO of my first company (where I admittedly F’d up everything before I figured it all out) we initially calculated for people how much there options were going to be worth some day. That’s a given. He’d be employee number 3.

Stock Options 418

Stock Options Stock Liquidation Preference Option Pool 418

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

There’s you and your killer CTO co-founder. I know it’s not single-handed as he has both fantastic partners at Foundry Group and many other community leaders. But as I look at the GRP Partners returns we’ve made a lot of money investing in companies in New York, Chicago, Baltimore, Las Vegas, Arizona and Seattle.

Seattle 317

Seattle Silicon Valley Technical Review Los Angeles 317

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 30, 2013

On my first project the partner on my job said, “to be successful you need to become irrelevant.” Then my CTO quit. And the CTO was a super close friend (and former roommate). I had never talked to my CTO about making sure he had no single-points-of-failure on his team – including himself.

Founder 372

Founder Early Stage Campaign Leadership 372

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 12, 2018

We would have gladly followed Jamie (and Josh Roth, the CTO who is phenomenal and we’ve also known for a decade) right through an IPO if we could have. we were sold on the concept immediately. We funded the seed round, the A round, the B round, C round, D round and E round. Jamie is truly a visionary and a focused executioner.

Security 247

Security Los Angeles Silicon Valley Video 247

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 10, 2013

He believed we had a weakness with his CTO. It is my job to be a sparring partner for teams not the decision maker. The CTO had at-will employment with no notice period. About a year ago I was working with a team whose performance had not gone as expected. This was not the first discussion I had had with the CEO.

Vesting 344

Vesting Cofounder Salary Sales 344

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2011

I want somebody that can deal with partners, interest future investors and keep everybody calm in moments of set-backs. A partner might really help you get through that.&#. He took this as a challenge and had a CTO in one week. If they’re from the industry – that’s a nice to have. That’s my problem.

Leadership 363

Leadership CTO Hire Technical Review Cofounder 363