Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

There has been much discussion in the past few years of the changing structure of the venture capital industry. The rise of alternative sources of capital (crowd funding and the like). ” The pioneering fund of funds realize that their source of differentiation is much more about the latter than the former.

Technical Review 398

Technical Review Venture Capital Valuation Pre-Money Valuation 398

thebarefootvc

MAY 8, 2012

It is the human capital involved, both internally with company teams and externally with advisors, boards and investors, that is going to differentiate which startups survive and become the disruptive businesses of tomorrow. Money is fast turning into a commodity. We are moving at light-speed today — and every step counts.

Venture Capital 78

Venture Capital Syndicate Syndication Bandwidth 78

Feld Thoughts

JUNE 14, 2017

Over sushi last night with two of them, who are also long-time friends, one of them asked me “Brad, how do you think we are differentiated?” I don’t even know what differentiation means anymore as it all blurs together. The angels say look at the deals we’ve done and the networks we have.

Differentiation 147

Differentiation Later Stage Equity Founder 147

Berkonomics

JANUARY 14, 2021

If you seek funds from an organized investment group such as an angel fund, venture capital entity, or even an investment club, the first thing you want to do is to find one person to buy into your vision, become excited by your enthusiasm and be willing to become the internal champion for your fund-raising effort. Find your champion.

Technical Review 62

Technical Review Due Diligence Venture Capital Differentiation 62

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 16, 2024

Add on the fact that some people theorize that the need for venture capital dollars will peak, or potentially already has, and then decline because of the ever-decreasing cost of technology infrastructure as well as the increasing capability of AI to replace expensive humans. That would probably signal the end of the asset class.

Vertical 89

Vertical Differentiation Cofounder Deal Flow 89

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 20, 2019

They want to see that you have some unique advantage that differentiates your company from others in your industry, and they’d prefer that you have some experience in that industry, which gives you legitimate insight into the problem you’re attempting to solve. Draw upon connections to help get an audience. Tailor your pitch deck.

Technical Review 140

Technical Review Due Diligence Early Stage Differentiation 140

VC Cafe

APRIL 27, 2011

10 things VCs can do to differentiate themselves and provide more value to potential investments – based on feedback from dozens of entrepreneurs. Despite the VC’s obvious disadvantage in the early stages, marketing and differentiation of venture capital funds is limited today.

Venture Capital 90

Venture Capital Differentiation Incubator Angel Investor 90

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.

Private Equity 48

Private Equity Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage 48

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 5, 2021

In startup business plans, a bubble is too many entrepreneurs and too many investors chasing the latest “next big thing,” like Google search engine, Facebook social network, or Amazon e-commerce site. In finance, a bubble is too much money chasing assets, greater asset production and a herd mentality. Supply and demand ignored.

Demand 362

Demand Government Venture Capital Valuation 362

Genuine VC

SEPTEMBER 7, 2010

The famed business strategist Michael Porter described a set of successful general strategies which firms employ to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage: differentiation strategy and cost leadership strategy for those firms with a broad market scope, and a segmentation strategy for those with a narrow market scope. Cheers to your VC.

Seed Stage 191

Seed Stage Belgium Differentiation LP 191

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 27, 2011

If you spent the 3 years perfecting some hugely differentiated technology IP that may also be different. Company 2 might represent an “ad mediation company” where the company gets paid by ad networks for running ads on publisher websites and the company in turn must pay the publisher 85% of the revenue it collects.

Startup 418

Startup Revenue Technical Review Flash 418

Haystack

JUNE 5, 2018

Not yet profitable but invaluable to developers worldwide, the decade-old company bootstrapped, differentiated from formidable competitors GitLab and Atlassian’s BitBucket, weathered leadership upheavals, and eventually ingested lots of venture capital which helped them weather the challenges they faced.

Acquisition 71

Acquisition Azure Open Source Seattle 71

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014

As the former CEO of a professional expert network , I’m a firm believer in the value of speedy access to relevant experts. I was excited to see that GLG (formerly Gerson Lehrman Group), the industry leader, is now offering a professional network service geared to the needs of the startup community: GLG Share.

New York 114

New York Technical Review Networking Advisory Board 114

VC Cafe

APRIL 8, 2011

VC Cafe asked entrepreneurs to tell us what type of help or support they wish they could get from the venture capital investors. What started originally as how can VCs differentiate themselves to stand out, quickly became an Entrepreneur’s wish list from its VCs. Help with introductions – but be selective.

Technical Review 101

Technical Review Due Diligence Hosting Harvest 101

Version One Ventures

JULY 21, 2020

By 2016, we had begun to specialize into a thesis-driven firm , focusing on businesses with potentially large network effects built around people and/or data. . We still think that network effects are incredibly valuable. Fast forward to today.

Founder 213

Founder Vertical Differentiation Portfolio 213

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

Differentiate. If you’re really an entrepreneur you’ll find a way to network with the right people. Social Network s / Search / Blogs – Obvious, huh? I’m surprised at the number of people who aren’t good at tracking down relationships in social networks. Stand out from the crowd.

Silicon Valley 291

Silicon Valley Ireland Technical Review Valuation 291

Hunter Walker

MARCH 25, 2015

Forerunner represented the best of both worlds to me – an opportunity to invest in new and innovative consumer businesses combined with an opportunity to build a new and innovative venture capital firm. HW: Is venture still an “apprenticeship” business? . EK: Absolutely. EK: It’s a great question.

Naming 48

Naming Technical Review Early Stage Green 48

David Teten

JANUARY 28, 2019

My former Partner John Frankel of ff Venture Capital observes that 20 years ago, the defining movie of the generation was “Wall Street”. But now, the defining movie of today’s twentysomethings is “The Social Network”. It’s a cliche that one of the most important benefits of attending an elite university is the network.

Affiliate 60

Affiliate Connecticut Programming Community 60

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 27, 2014

I was having dinner with a friend last night and we were chatting about venture capital and a bit about what I’ve learned. Of course these are great places to network with other investors, meet great entrepreneurs and keep your connections strong with senior execs at larger companies like Yahoo!, Oh, the conferences.

Cofounder 374

Cofounder Syndicate Syndication Early Stage 374

VC Cafe

DECEMBER 1, 2015

Machine learning in cyber security has already attracted a substantial amount of venture capital (e.g. 282m in Lookout , $78m in Vectra Networks , $40m in Darktrace , and $89m in Cybereason ), but a steady stream of bad news stories (like the recent hack of TalkTalk’s customer data) shows that the market is far from being sewn up.

Artificial Inteligence 60

Artificial Inteligence Algorithm Software Review Startup 60

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2010

What a pleasure that I got to spend an hour talking with both Om Malik (whom I’ve always respected his views) and Paul Jozefak , a venture capital partner at Neuhaus Partners in Germany (and formerly the head of Europe for SAP Ventures). The strategy of GigaOm and where they differentiate in the market.

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital Non-Compete Vertical Europe 225

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 20, 2013

In startup business plans, a bubble is too many entrepreneurs and too many investors chasing the latest “next big thing,” like Google search engine, Facebook social network, or Amazon e-commerce site. In finance, a bubble is too much money chasing assets, greater asset production and a herd mentality. Supply and demand ignored.

Demand 224

Demand Green Finance Government 224

This is going to be BIG.

APRIL 29, 2011

Reality is that we're probably connected in some way anyway through various social networks anyway and I'm very quick to figure out all of those connections to ask about you. I don't mind cold intros at all--but it's hard when I can't figure out who you are in the context of my network. What do you think of the group buying space?

Technical Review 121

Technical Review Early Stage Due Diligence Venture Capital 121

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 25, 2011

In startup business plans, a bubble is too many entrepreneurs and too many investors chasing the latest “next big thing,” like Google search engine, Facebook social network, or Amazon e-commerce site. In finance, a bubble is too much money chasing assets, greater asset production and a herd mentality. Supply and demand ignored.

Startup 225

Startup Demand Green Government 225

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 17, 2016

One of the earliest and most critical decisions an entrepreneur must make is whether to self-fund a startup by bootstrapping, or raise outside funding through venture capital.” – Forbes. What differentiates you from the competition? Reach out to your network and contract under your company name to gain credibility.

Bootstrapping 100

Bootstrapping Venture Capital Salary Differentiation 100

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

This thinking is largely driven by the venture capital industry (and subsequently Wall Street) who are in search of high margin, highly scalable businesses. I gave them advice I don’t think they were expecting from a VC, “Don’t raise venture capital for this business. This team is talented.

Silicon Valley 332

Silicon Valley IP Dividend Finance 332

David Teten

FEBRUARY 9, 2015

I’ve listed below the points I recommend you cover when pitching your business to early-stage investors, including but definitely not limited to ff Venture Capital. ff Venture Capital Fundraising Venture Capital' One or two sentences about what you do, for who, so they can do what.

Venture Capital 60

Venture Capital Pre-Money Valuation Prospectus Early Stage 60

The Equity Kicker

JULY 8, 2019

When I started in venture capital in the late 1990s VCs were regularly lambasted for taking long summer holidays and spending too much time on the golf course. The most common strategies are to provide networking services and content to portfolio leaders so they can be more effective in their jobs. . Low handicaps weren’t good!

Portfolio 84

Portfolio LP Venture Capital Partner 84

David Teten

APRIL 13, 2021

Empirically, few small emerging investment managers hire placement agents, particularly in venture capital. Private equity/venture capital managers have a much longer duration than most any other fund type. Placement agents have to offer their investor network a range of funds to support themselves. But can you?

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Technical Review Management LP 60

Duct Tape Marketing

JULY 14, 2022

She has spent twelve years in startups and built three successful companies without venture capital backing. And the people that understand that will be able to use that as a differentiator in their business. So you can actually make transparency and access to content your differentiator. There's a recent episode.

Technical Review 82

Technical Review Demand Cofounder Video 82

Rob Go

APRIL 22, 2014

Expansion of one’s network through the network of the VC. Exposure to the venture capital process and a behind-the-scenes look to how VC’s work and evaluate deals. I’ve said before that one of the downsides of Venture Capital is that it tends to be a negative job.

Sweat Equity 72

Sweat Equity Venture Capital Silicon Valley Differentiation 72

Austin Startup

DECEMBER 12, 2017

Perot Jain , one of the most active early stage venture firms in Texas, is joining DivInc and The DEC to support our $100,000 Dallas Diversity & Inclusion Challenge and help us get the word out as far and wide as possible! According to Pitchbook, Capital Factory has been the most active investor in Texas since 2013.

Dallas 48

Dallas San Antonio Houston Texas 48

This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 29, 2010

This person has not attracted a network around themselves and their ideas. Clearly Twitter is commonly accepted in the startup world as a business and networking tool. It’s an indication of how well networked you are, and what the community thinks of your ideas. Tags: Venture Capital & Technology.

Startup 158

Startup Venture Capital Hiring Early Stage 158

cdixon.org

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

Quite early on, you will be able to differentiate yourself – and having competitors help you grow the market can actually be a good thing. and an investor, has a great blog on entrepreneurship and venture capital. link] 10 Tips for Making your Startup More Attractive for Investors [Presentation] : Venture Capital Cafe. [.]

Stealth 68

Stealth Startup NDA Cofounder 68

Babbling VC

OCTOBER 13, 2012

The old guys don't travel much nor feel inclined to network. Venture capital is a game where you bring your experience to the table. If you don't have enough experience, you're never going to differentiate yourself. That's not where the puck is going and the younger folks know this.

South America 88

South America Europe Asia Venture Capital 88

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 12, 2023

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited angel investors. The amounts from angels start as low as $25K, while minimum venture capital amounts usually start in the $2M range. How much help do you expect and need?

Angel Investor 246

Angel Investor IRR Venture Capital Valuation 246

Cracking the Code

JANUARY 19, 2016

As a consequence, they need a VC that has a strong international network and can help them develop their go to market successfully in the US. They also need VCs capable of financing their entire life cycle — on average, SaaS startups raise between $80 and $100 million before an IPO. More and more champions will be built out of Europe.

API 48

API Silicon Valley Europe Differentiation 48