ReadWriteStart

JULY 5, 2023

Neko Health is well positioned to achieve its goals, as the board of directors recently welcomed notable investors such as Niklas Zennstrom, co-founder of Skype, and Klaus Hommels, founder of the venture capital firm Lakestar.

Sweden 126

Sweden Artificial Inteligence Cofounder Technical Review 126

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 6, 2020

Along with lack of oversight, outdated software or hardware, inadequate cybersecurity, or one bad tech investment could seal the demise of a small enterprise. is any liability incurred in the development, acquisition, use, and retirement of technology — i.e. hardware and software systems, or the skills set needed to support them.

Technical Review 246

Technical Review Small Business Software Review Security 246

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

He came to work in our offices at Upfront Ventures as an EIR and immediately began building software to improve how storage was picked up, photographed, scanned and routed to a warehouse. Sam began drawing out plans for a new way to provide storage after he had horrific experiences with traditional storage after the storm.

Operations 286

Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

Duct Tape Marketing

SEPTEMBER 29, 2021

Aaron is the CEO and Co-founder of Leadferno, a business and text messaging platform to close more leads faster. Aaron is a digital marketing veteran of over 20 years founding and growing both digital marketing agencies and marketing software products. In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast , I interview Aaron Weiche.

SMS 101

SMS Marketing Cofounder Software Review 101

View from Seed

AUGUST 17, 2021

A few weeks ago, we hosted a small dinner for a number of portfolio company founders, LP’s, and friends of the firm. It’s by far the longest time I’ve spent working on any one thing, and I feel very blessed to have been able to work with my partners, colleagues, founders, and collaborators. Traction creates opportunity.

IRR 205

IRR Dilution Founder Portfolio 205

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 18, 2019

Depending on the composition of the founding team, you might or might not have near-term holes in certain functions at the exec level – e.g. you’ll most likely need to bring on a CTO/VP of Engineering shortly after the seed round if you don’t have a technical co-founder.

Part-Time VPE 195

Part-Time VPE Seed Stage CTO Hire Forecast 195

View from Seed

AUGUST 17, 2021

A few weeks ago, we hosted a small dinner for a number of portfolio company founders, LP’s, and friends of the firm. It’s by far the longest time I’ve spent working on any one thing, and I feel very blessed to have been able to work with my partners, colleagues, founders, and collaborators. Traction creates opportunity.

IRR 156

IRR Dilution Founder Portfolio 156

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 17, 2018

by Felix Winstone, Co-Founder and Managing Director at Talkative. As a startup co-founder with a growing team, here are the recruiting tips I’ve learnt over the last couple of years. Robert Metcalfe, co-founder and CEO of 3Com, says you need to think about it as “recruiting, not hiring”. Hiring = Sales. Be Specific.

Cofounder 164

Cofounder Elevator Pitch Hiring Dividend 164

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 11, 2016

We then help surround founders with other talent who want to join important causes but don’t have the startup idea themselves. Importantly, we recently announced a $30 million financing that gives us the resources we need to build a global enterprise software company. It’s the founders who are willing to let you join their boards.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Fractional CTO Cofounder Early Stage 150

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 11, 2014

By Thelton McMillian, Founder & CEO of Comrade. Laziness at any step of the software development lifecycle can lead to usability issues or broken interaction. To successfully compete in today’s digital world, companies must design user experiences that resonate with customers and keep engaged.

Oakland 180

Oakland Design Differentiation Software Developers 180

View from Seed

AUGUST 17, 2021

A few weeks ago, we hosted a small dinner for a number of portfolio company founders, LP’s, and friends of the firm. It’s by far the longest time I’ve spent working on any one thing, and I feel very blessed to have been able to work with my partners, colleagues, founders, and collaborators. Traction creates opportunity.

IRR 136

IRR Dilution Founder Portfolio 136

Version One Ventures

SEPTEMBER 17, 2013

How do we differentiate between B2B start-ups that sell to many vs. sell to a few? Startups that succeed with this approach tend to have founders with deep connections in the industry they serve, and often previously worked for one of the large incumbents in the market. Sell to few”: Traditional enterprise sales. Final thoughts.

Fractional CTO 154

Fractional CTO Software Review Viral Sales Cycle 154

Austin Startup

MAY 24, 2021

In the last post , we started with this chart, and we focused on RPA (the bright blue at the bottom of the bar chart), the most explosively growing enterprise software category I’ve ever seen. Look to build solutions with IPA when you need a highly tailored customer journey or process to differentiate from your competition.

Cofounder 94

Cofounder Marketing North America Acquisition 94

ConversionXL

NOVEMBER 24, 2021

This is the basis of an effective differentiation strategy. The audience size identified is encouragingly large, and the frequently used phrases and words (brick mortar, retail, founder) align directly with our target audience. Take SparkToro’s Co-founder, Rand Fishkin. Not every person that buys from you will be a superfan.

Reputation 134

Reputation Audience Management Social Media 134

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2016

We believe that it is incrementally harder to differentiate on simple Internet products or mobile apps and while great companies are built doing this, our goal as a fund is to try and fund things that can be 100x returns if they work. We’re not Pollyannaish about this.

Cofounder 207

Cofounder Differentiation Hosting Design 207

Software By Rob

NOVEMBER 16, 2009

Business of Software is a conference organized by Neil Davidson and Joel Spolsky , and was held this year in San Francisco. The speaking line-up is a who’s who of software bloggers and authors, including Geoffrey Moore, Paul Graham, Dharmesh Shah and Joel Spolsky. There were several great presentations during the conference.

Software Review 47

Software Review Software San Francisco RSS 47

Up and Running

JULY 6, 2016

Establish technology as a differentiator, when it is. Even if technology isn’t the driving force of your business or your main differentiator, these days, almost all businesses have to manage technology as part of branding, marketing, and communications. That’s a great way make your reader run in the other direction!

Technical Review 72

Technical Review Software Review Business Plan Development Team Review 72

ReadWriteStart

FEBRUARY 4, 2020

It was summer 1986, the fall-out from Chernobyl was blowing over Europe and, after graduating in engineering science, I undertook a software development project for the UK Atomic Energy Authority. My first job was writing software systems to monitor the nuclear reactor core and to predict the future failure of cooling components.

Startup 78

Startup Java Europe Differentiation 78

The Startup Magazine

JUNE 14, 2019

It is estimated that at least 80% of all startups rely on personal funds from their founders for operations, albeit in their formative stages. If you have been self-employed, you probably have had episodes where you cannot clearly differentiate between work and personal finances or time. 1. Set obvious parameters.

Balance Sheet 144

Balance Sheet Limited Liability Company Bootstrapping Startup 144

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 6, 2014

When you first start your company and raise initial venture capital your board probably consists of 1-3 founders and 1-2 VCs. Most experienced VCs won’t push you to give up founder control at this stage of the business nor should they. Founder’s perspective. You’ll get empathy. Experience. Relationships.

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Early Stage Software Review Los Angeles 325

The Startup Magazine

SEPTEMBER 10, 2019

There is a myth among first time tech founders that product is everything. Here are five financial concepts that every startup founder should know to build an everlasting company. The basic lesson that founders can learn about asset valuation is that Accounting is past and Finance is future. Asset valuation. venkatarag.

Founder 148

Founder Valuation Dividend Startup 148

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2014

This week I wrote about obsessive and competitive founders and how this forms the basis of what I look for when I invest. Back then there was no “cloud” so we had to plow money into hardware, software licenses and web hosting. And that’s what differentiates founders and early employees.

Founder 409

Founder Salary Startup Early Stage 409

Version One Ventures

SEPTEMBER 12, 2023

It was suddenly free for consumers to access content and software products. In every single enterprise software category, SaaS companies won against the on-premise incumbents. Sarah Tavel had a great post about the most likely direction of this business model change: Sell work, not software !

Business Model 126

Business Model Technology Differentiation Software 126

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 11, 2011

Ask early candidates how they differentiate themselves from their peers. If you already have some technical people on board, like software developers, and need a new manager, you supply the candidates based on credentials, and let them do initial interviews and make recommendations. Use existing team to find a new manager or peer.

Technical Review 236

Technical Review Partner Entrepreneur Architecture 236

Austin Startup

MAY 11, 2017

645 Ventures 645 Ventures makes deeply-researched investments in institutional Seed to Series A rounds for exceptional companies who demonstrate stellar early results in the areas of market validation, product differentiation, team strength, and brand narrative. These sectors generally leverage the Internet or software in a fundamental way.

Private Equity 48

Private Equity Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage 48

Hearpreneur

JANUARY 20, 2021

Educators are looking for tools and programs to help facilitate their transition into this new learning environment, making affordable to free software key to this niche industry. I am the CEO and co-founder of a dating app called So Syncd that is based on matching compatible personality types. Thanks to Kurt Bodenstedt, PDAFL LLC ! #3-

Entrepreneur 149

Entrepreneur United States Software Review Technical Review 149

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2011

In this three-part series I will explore the ways that the Venture Capital industry has changed over the past 5 years that I would argue are a direct result of changes in the software industry, not the other way around. million in team costs to code, launch, manage, market & sell our software.

Venture Capital 334

Venture Capital Software PHP Open Source 334

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 25, 2016

It says that selling an airplane ticket for $500 and getting paid a $5 fees by the airlines (1% gross margin) is not the same thing as selling $500 of software that you built (>90% gross margin). Sam did all this analysis before even deciding to build V1 of his software and before we put serious money behind him launching.

Startup 150

Startup Seed Money DC Software Review 150

om.co

FEBRUARY 5, 2013

Om Malik is the founder of GigaOM. He is the founder of Desiparty.com. Evolution of a Founder: Lessons I have learned. Being a startup founder is hard, tough, frustrating and rewarding – possibly all within the space of a nanosecond. Are You Winning As a Founder? He is a venture partner at True Ventures.

Founder 80

Founder Conversion Distribution Silicon Valley 80

Up and Running

AUGUST 8, 2017

For example, Apple Computer’s 2017 mission statement is: “Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional software. Tim Berry is the founder and chairman of Palo Alto Software and Bplans. Don’t just say it, especially if it isn’t important or always true.

Software Review 157

Software Review Employee Differentiation Business Plan 157

David Teten

APRIL 1, 2021

This typically includes: Relationships with relevant service providers in your vertical, often with pre-negotiated discounts: coaches, lawyers, accountants, common software vendors, consultants. A well-organized library of best practices for founders in your vertical, which you can share as appropriate. AskAnything.VC Advantages.

Private Equity 78

Private Equity Venture Capital Portfolio Equity 78

Up and Running

APRIL 9, 2019

I believe in it because the SWOT phase was vital to my planning process as I grew Palo Alto Software from zero to over $5 million in annual sales. In another session, we realized, as a group, that our key differentiator was the know-how and how-to built into our software. . People like strategy. They like to be included.

Business Plan 89

Business Plan Software Review Differentiation Framework 89

Brandanew

OCTOBER 12, 2015

One of the major problems with automation is that the software does not know how to differentiate between different people. Look at a message our founder Upasna got from LinkedIn-no less, they know her name, yet why is the email subject line coming up with “firstname”? gif via: Kapost. Lack of Customization.

Software Review 100

Software Review Marketing Semantic Social Media 100

Duct Tape Marketing

APRIL 6, 2022

Steve is the CEO of Founders Space, one of the world’s leading startup accelerators with over 50 partners in 22 countries. Founders Space was ranked the #1 incubator for overseas startups by Forbes and Entrepreneur Magazines. 18:05] How does the Founder Space operate? [20:21] He's the CEO of founders space.

San Francisco 96

San Francisco Technical Review Incubator Silicon Valley 96

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Smart is simply not a differentiator. Traditional software vs. SaaS. When you look at a deal so much of what you’re trying to understand are the skills, resiliency , work ethic, motivation and team dynamics of the founders. Nothing blows up great opportunities faster than founders who are constantly fighting.

Portfolio 364

Portfolio Chicago Sales Incubator 364

ConversionXL

APRIL 1, 2019

Say you work at a SaaS company selling AI software. I’m a new user to their product, but they don’t assume I have prior knowledge about their software. Do they already know about your software category and simply want to compare options? Jordie Black, founder of Copy and Check , has a six-step process for all client content.

Technical Review 133

Technical Review Marketing Software Review Audience 133

ReadWriteStart

JANUARY 16, 2020

Another reason is that garage startups kick off their projects with just a few people in the bundle, and there’s no differentiation between positions. The same person can be a developer and a technical manager, while a non-technical founder is more likely to be accountable for marketing.

Fractional CTO 85

Fractional CTO CTO CTO Hire Part-Time VPE 85