Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

And this era ushered in by Amazon changed everything from the age of founders to the skill sets required to the structure of the VC industry and even to the layout of cities (yes, I would proclaim that boldly that Amazon AWS affected city development). The “A Round” of my startup in 1999 was $16.5

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage IPO 328

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.

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Early Stage Software Review Los Angeles 325

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 28, 2018

There’s a quick litmus-test conversation any early-stage VC will have with the founder and it’s one that you should be as prepared for as your elevator pitch. Founder: “$8–10 million” VC: “What’s your current burn rate?” Founder: “$250k / month.” Founder: “Um. Why are you raising so much?”

Burn Rate 247

Burn Rate Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Dilution 247

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

These tensions seep out in some angels or seed funds publicly or semi-privately deriding later-stage VCs for their “bad” behavior. I have seen bad behavior from later-stage VCs, believe me. But I have seen equally bad behavior from super early stage investors. As always a balanced perspective is in order.

Technical Review 336

Technical Review Later Stage Early Stage LP 336

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 27, 2012

By now you probably know that David Sacks , co-founder of PayPal and founder of both Geni & Yammer made some observations on Facebook that Silicon Valley “as we know it” was coming to an end. “In order to create a successful new company, you have to find an idea that. (1) I described that here in this post.

Silicon Valley 299

Silicon Valley Technical Review Early Stage Cofounder 299

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

As an early-stage VC I love this phase. Sam also had a vision as early as 2012 about how MakeSpace would be a large employer of middle-income jobs: The company would hire employees rather than just have contractors and he would lead the effort to ensure they had opportunities for growth and benefits for their families.

Operations 286

Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2018

If you haven’t yet heard about Female Founder Office Hours it is an initiative you should be aware of whether you’re male, female or any other gender identify. Female Founder Office Hours gives founders the mentorship and the role models to see that it is in not only possible but also to have a plan to make it a reality.

Founder 256

Founder San Francisco Deal Flow Los Angeles 256

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 17, 2011

I recently wrote a post about why I didn’t think early-stage startups should have COOs. “We’re all equal co-founders and we don’t care about titles.&# I usually encourage people to think about titles like, “Founder & CTO&# or “Founder & VP Marketing.&#. and my favorite].

Operations 292

Operations CTO Hire Startup Early Stage 292

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

They might be ideas they hatch internally (via a Foundry) or a founder who just left SpaceX and raises money to search for an idea. two founders in a garage?—?(HP The most connected and high-potential founders start with wads of cash. The biggest change for us in early-stage investing is that we now need to commit earlier.

Pre-Money Valuation 471

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Venture Capital Early Stage 471

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. And that’s what differentiates founders and early employees. So even after raising a $16 million A-round I still paid myself a paltry salary. So I did, in fact, invest in myself.

Founder 409

Founder Salary Startup Early Stage 409

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

” From the hyperbolic Jason Calacanis weighing in that “The petty VC’s did everything to deride [Naval, the co-founder of AngelList]” as though the industry was collectively s g its pants that AngelList was going to put us out of business. founder fighting. For starters, what is AngelList Syndicates?

Syndicate 356

Syndicate Syndication Cofounder Early Stage 356

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 30, 2011

With more competition in early-stage many VCs are investing smaller amounts at earlier stages. Some are going later stage to not miss out on hot deals. I call this “stage drift.&#. What I’ve started to observe is that we’re certainly headed for a bit of a brick wall for early-stage companies.

Venture Capital 289

Venture Capital Early Stage Valuation Angel Investor 289

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2014

For all the things he’s likely known for, he probably hasn’t yet built a strong relationship as an early stage venture investor (he invests often in later-stage deals where he is very respected). VCs will spend over a year networking just to position around one founder or one deal, and if they lose it, it’s gone.”

Silicon Valley 333

Silicon Valley Early Stage Later Stage Technical Review 333

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 13, 2011

You have two founders and it was agreed that one would get the CEO role so the other needs to call themselves president or COO. In an early stage start I believe it’s the CEO’s job to manage these functions. I was the CEO of my startup and my co-founder was the president. He liked to weigh in on biz dev deals.

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Due Diligence 325

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2010

One of the biggest mistakes I see early-stage startups making is hiring “seasoned&# sales professionals or hiring people too senior, too early. I see way too many startup founders who don’t have experience in selling and probably don’t feel that comfortable going to customers and asking for orders.

Hiring 346

Hiring Sales Startup Early Stage 346

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 3, 2010

years ago and told me, “I just got offered the chance to buy this company because the founder doesn’t want to continue. The only thing worse than your early-stage company buying another early stage company is you trying to pull off a merger of equals. I promise they’re not.

Merger 276

Merger Technical Review Early Stage Dilution 276

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 12, 2011

He and I once took different sides of an debate about whether “VC signaling&# in early-stage deals is a serious problem or not. This week I sat down with Chris Dixon, co-founder / CEO of Hunch and Partner at Founder Collective in the most recent installment of This Week in Venture Capital.

Technical Review 281

Technical Review Artificial Inteligence Cofounder API 281

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2011

I covered what I call “the co-founder mythology.&# Either you’re not technical and you think you need a technical co-founder or vice-versa. It is increasingly popular to have “founder dating&# or “startup weekend hackathons&# of some variety or the other. Hire your co-founder. Vested over 4 years.

Cofounder 393

Cofounder Founder Vesting Founder Vesting 393

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. It’s the founders who are willing to let you join their boards. It’s the executives who trust you to join the early-stage startups you’ve funded. It’s the people who want to work with you.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Fractional CTO Cofounder Early Stage 150

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2017

It was a “disappearing text app” where the founders told me that they named the company because the idea came from how Tiger Woods got caught cheating on his wife because all of his mistresses had evidence that he cheated because they saved text messages from him. I hear tons of ideas for early-stage apps. I didn’t do that.

IPO 214

IPO Los Angeles Technical Review Silicon Valley 214

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

So super angel and seed funds are proliferating – As a result there has been an explosion in the number of amazing early-stage investors such as Softtech VC , Floodgate , Felicis Ventures , K9 Ventures , OATV , Lowercase Capital , Founder Collective , and many, many more. That’s OK.

Technical Review 311

Technical Review LP Early Stage Silicon Valley 311

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2013

My internal compass has always steered me strongly toward the belief that founders who can scale with their startup companies are better to back that founders who eventually need to hire a CEO. Very few founder CEOs go into the job ever expecting to give up their seat. We set out to find Jonathan’s “co-founder.”

Technical Review 303

Technical Review Cofounder Analytics Founder 303

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 25, 2010

I talked about this in my social proof post where I gave some suggestions about how to get the early guys off of the fence. Most early-stage entrepreneurs who have worked with me (either as an angel or as a seed VC) know that I don’t rely at all on the social proof of other investors. When I’m in, I’m in.

Finance 286

Finance Term Sheet Technical Review Warrant 286

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

Working with early-stage teams : coaching, mentoring, setting strategy, rolling up sleeves: 9/10. I divided success into the phases of venture capital and 18 months into writing my first check here was my view (details on each in the link above). Sourcing high-quality leads : 9/10.

Los Angeles 387

Los Angeles Intellectual Property Venture Capital LP 387

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 2, 2015

What I love about my job is getting to see teams of super-early-stage companies develop ideas that while raw have potential to make an impact on the market. Clearly the founders and senior executives of a company are the most valuable resources and their time should be maximized on the most valuable tasks. On and on and on.

Operations 150

Operations Metrics Early Stage Non-Compete 150

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 27, 2011

There are very few people in Silicon Valley who have such a precise grasp on what defines success of early-stage startup companies than Eric Ries. Timecodes: 00:00 Welcome, our guest is Eric Ries, founder of the Lean Startup Movement. ” This week was no exception. There are many in this episode. Check it out.

Silicon Valley 301

Silicon Valley Social Media Lean PR 301

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

The key to being able to run a business that isn’t yet profitable (on operating margin) is availability of capital to finance losses and preferably at a cost that isn’t too punitive to the founders and employees. The reason one would accept losses is when they are investments in fueling faster growth.

Metrics 150

Metrics Cost Acquisition Startup 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2010

Greycroft is an early-stage VC. Founded in November 2007 in New York City by Alexis Maybank and Kevin Ryan (co-founder of DoubleClick); CEO is Susan Lyne (ex-CEO Marta Stewart Living Omnimedia) Revenue estimates: $50mm in 2008; $170mm in 2009 (versus budget of $150mm); $450mm forecasted for 2010. Time will tell.

Partner 240

Partner New York City Cofounder Syndicate 240

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

I think you have to listen to the queue’s.” “…if you look at a lot of the early stage investors, whether it be Union Square Ventures or First Round or Jeff Clavier at Softtech or Dave McClure – we want to try the product, we want to experience the product, we want to get a sense of how the entrepreneur is thinking about it.

Technical Review 288

Technical Review Venture Capital Silicon Valley Software Review 288

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

But the thing I am most proud of about Rob is that he has taken a company with a uniquely talented founder & CTO – Nick Halstead – and managed to build a very tight working relationship with Nick where we drive world-class product development without having the usual founder / CEO conflicts.

Advisory Board 365

Advisory Board CTO Hire Fractional CTO Los Angeles 365

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2011

An investor called the founder, spoke for 30 minutes on the phone and committed to funding having never met the team. Great seed investors like Bryce Roberts / OATV (and other great ones like Floodgate , Founder Collective , Information Arbitrage or Rincon Ventures ) still get all the dealflow the need. Isolated incident?

Southern California 267

Southern California Angel Investor Early Stage Silicon Valley 267

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

I’ve decided to take all of my private conversations and subjective points-of-view on the topic and make them public in a keynote speech at the Founder Showcase in San Francisco on June 15th. They get a cheaper price, they wipe out much founder stock value and they reissue you new options. Raise at the top end of normal.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 26, 2015

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. Honestly, they are a refreshing group of hustling, young, early-stage VCs and I love working with them.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Detroit Early Stage Partner 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2016

During the Q&A I was asked about how I make investment decisions in early-stage businesses. I was asked again in an LP meeting later in the week and then again at a founder breakfast gathering we hosted yesterday. I know that sounds trite but it’s the best way I can describe my early-stage investments.

Early Stage 254

Early Stage Non-Compete LP Later Stage 254

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2014

Specifically what is often not in the DNA of founders are sales skills. Nor do they exist in the investors of early-stage companies. Founders think in options. Most technology startups seem to be funded by product people or business people. The result is a lack of knowledge of the process and of sales people themselves.

Sales 382

Sales Startup Technical Review Matching 382

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 8, 2011

The tech market is filled with many stories of early-stage funding. Andrea Benko , the founder & CEO of HDI, is simply one of the most talented CEOs we have worked with in our portfolio and that included 15 companies that have exited north of $1 billion. ” Let me explain all three.

Partner 285

Partner Las Vegas San Francisco Baltimore 285

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 29, 2009

We’re clearly in the early stages on Twitter monetization but let me offer some views on why we find Ad.ly But 70% of my investment decision in early-stage companies is the team. The Founder & CEO of Ad.ly My firm GRP Partners recently funded a young LA based company named Ad.Ly is Sean Rad.

Technical Review 286

Technical Review Advertising Early Stage Internet 286