The Equity Kicker

SEPTEMBER 24, 2014

I’ve been a venture capitalist since the first internet bubble and what I’ve learned is that it’s hard to assess investment opportunities unless you have a thorough understanding of the company’s product and market and unless you’ve spent some serious time doing due diligence on the business.

Early Stage 119

Early Stage Development Team Review Technical Review Software Review 119

View from Seed

JANUARY 13, 2021

But in the grand scheme of things, 10 years is a blip, and one that had a continuous bull market in tech. Like a number of funds of our era, early fundraising was not terribly easy. But what has also happened over the last 10 years is the massive expansion of the series A and lifecycle fund market. There are a few reasons.

Dilution 399

Dilution Later Stage Portfolio Technical Review 399

David Teten

JULY 25, 2017

As I’ve worked to build out HOF Capital ’s portfolio acceleration platform , the #1 question I think about is: how do we scalably support our companies? Many VCs offer (or strive to offer) a bundle of levers and support structures to help their portfolio companies. We have lower AUM, therefore lower management fees.

Portfolio 60

Portfolio Technical Review Private Equity Database 60

Hunter Walker

MAY 13, 2023

Especially in the early days of mobile/iOS engineering, if you hired strong technical talent into your early stage company, you basically created an acquisition outcome floor. Those who do, often believe they can hire from the open market without the hassle of an acquisition. Not in today’s market conditions.

Early Stage 117

Early Stage Cap Table Acquisition Sales 117

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 2, 2022

This may vary from fund to fund, but in general here is the top level criteria VCs would use to check initial fit: Stage – is the startup raising a round which is within the range of the fund (pre seed, seed, series A, early stage, growth, etc.). Stake – can the fund secure it’s minimum stake in the business?

Technical Review 166

Technical Review Early Stage Cofounder Portfolio 166

View from Seed

JULY 15, 2020

One topic of conversation among VC’s over the last few months is how their portfolios are faring during the Covid pandemic. So I thought I’d share my observations, informed by what’s going on in our portfolio and from what I can gather from others in the ecosystem. Reshuffling the deck.

Portfolio 215

Portfolio IRR Dilution Distribution 215

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 27, 2023

Taking stock of the venture capital market in 2023, it’s clear to see that we’re in a transition point. In today’s market, I believe small is beautiful, and that specialisation matters. Essentially, show that you can build a great portfolio and deploy all capital pre series A.”

Venture Capital 215

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Institutional Investors 215

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 9, 2022

You have an edge in the highly competitive world of early stage investing that comes from some combination of your experience, industry knowledge, and personal network. NextView is a thematic, seed-stage VC firm focused on the Everyday Economy with $500M+ of capital under management. You act as an “ invited guest.”.

Technical Review 156

Technical Review North America Seed Stage Bandwidth 156

ReadWriteStart

JUNE 1, 2020

The next reason is to establish a competitive advantage over your competition and quickly acquire a substantial market share. Let’s take an example – In the case of an internet or app business, the user traction and market penetration is a must. These usually play a role in the very early stage of your business, primarily pre-revenue.

Startup 150

Startup Entrepreneur Elevator Pitch Seed Stage 150

Genuine VC

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

Chad is the CEO of thoughtbot, a consulting firm that makes web + mobile apps for early-stage startups. I shared a link to Code Climate with a number of CTOs/VPs of Engineering in my network, both inside and outside the NextView portfolio, just asking for their quick opinion.

Software Review 191

Software Review Chad Ruby PHP 191

View from Seed

APRIL 27, 2020

We can stay busy by expending time and effort supporting the existing portfolio, which is the right thing to do and a good use of time. Like most VC’s, we’ve been engrossed in helping our portfolio company founders navigate these challenging times while thinking through how we will approach this market going forward.

Cofounder 194

Cofounder Software Review Portfolio Technical Review 194

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

As a result of the IPO window shifting we saw a massive inflow of public-market capital into the latest stages of venture. In this post I set out to explain why the seed market emerged as its own category in the first place and why it’s declined as of late. ( The “A Round” of my startup in 1999 was $16.5

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage IPO 328

techcrunch.com

AUGUST 12, 2012

Zachary Bogue And Matt Ocko Launch Data Collective, An Early Stage Fund For Big Data Startups. Data Collective has already made 46 investments from its first fund, which it calls “comparable with other seed and early stage funds” (Ocko and Bogue wouldn’t reveal fund size.). Headphones. CrunchBase.

Early Stage 70

Early Stage San Francisco Los Angeles Southern California 70

Steve Blank

APRIL 23, 2014

The Innovation Portfolio. Companies manage these three types of innovation with an innovation portfolio – they build innovation internally, they buy it or they partner with resources outside their company. Ventures that are further along and now executing their business model are no longer startups, they are now early-stage companies.

Acquisition 332

Acquisition Intellectual Property Silicon Valley Startup 332

View from Seed

APRIL 2, 2024

But market forces continued to drive these industries to evolve in similar ways. Similarly, I’d argue that the early-stage venture “product” has elevated across the board. VC’s across the board have generally upped their game and are much more involved in the startup ecosystem and with their portfolios.

Merger 343

Merger Non-Compete Early Stage Venture Capital 343

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 1, 2011

Running a company is distinctly different from simply having operating experience – (working in bus dev, sales or marketing.) Every potential early-stage Venture Capitalist should take a year and do it before he or she makes partner. Market/technology acuity (patterns of success, domain expertise). Here’s why.

Venture Capital 332

Venture Capital Early Stage Technical Review Startup 332

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2016

At the Upfront Summit in early February, we had a chance to have many off-the-record conversations with Limited Partners (LPs) who fund Venture Capital (VC) funds about their views of the market. I suspect those days will end soon, and 61% of LPs polled said they felt VCs were coming back to market too quickly.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital LP Silicon Valley Marketing 150

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 8, 2017

Although Ginny is new to the team, she has many connections to the NextView family, as she started her career at our portfolio company Shareaholic , and worked closely with both Jay Acunzo (our first head of platform) and Joe Chernov (the VP of Marketing at our portfolio company Insight Squared ).

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Boston Early Stage Portfolio 120

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 8, 2017

Although Ginny is new to the team, she has many connections to the NextView family, as she started her career at our portfolio company Shareaholic , and worked closely with both Jay Acunzo (our first head of platform) and Joe Chernov (the VP of Marketing at our portfolio company Insight Squared ).

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Boston Early Stage Portfolio 120

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

Prorata rights are one of the most important rights of a private market technology investors and yet are seldom fully understood. They often create the biggest tensions between investors who are investing at different stages in the business. I have seen bad behavior from later-stage VCs, believe me.

Technical Review 336

Technical Review Later Stage Early Stage LP 336

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 20, 2019

Among these opportunities, the chance to pitch an investor and secure funding is perhaps the greatest of all — at least in the early stages of your startup career — as it can ultimately determine the long-term fate of your company. Poor founder dynamics or a focus on small or shrinking markets can also sink your chances.

Technical Review 140

Technical Review Due Diligence Early Stage Differentiation 140

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2013

Santa Monica is the place where the highest concentration of early-stage startups are created if you consider also the contiguous geography of Venice Beach. Our portfolio companies value us as sparring partners. Like many modern VCs, we’re committed to investing in the community and in our portfolio companies.

Los Angeles 343

Los Angeles Las Vegas San Francisco Baltimore 343

View from Seed

DECEMBER 6, 2018

They make room for exceptions, and they are very sensitive to when things change in the market. Being dogmatic looks like: – Arbitrarily saying that VC’s must own a certain % (I remember people criticising USV early on because they “only” targeted 15% instead of the gold standard of 20%). It’s the crutch of lazy thinking).

Early Stage 120

Early Stage Florida Deal Flow Venture Capital 120

David Teten

FEBRUARY 7, 2012

Before making the decision to join ff Venture Capital , I did some research on early-stage tech investing as an asset class and how it’s evolving. Although any given early-stage company is quite risky, when aggregated across a large portfolio, returns are very attractive. They’re also inflation-hedged.

Early Stage 148

Early Stage Private Equity Portfolio Aggregator 148

YoungUpstarts

AUGUST 24, 2020

by Sheryl Jones, Senior Marketing Specialist at Uplers. When you are already juggling several tasks at the early stages of web development, focusing on the content and content quality may not rank high in your list of priorities. Sheryl Jones is a Senior Marketing Specialist at Uplers – an affordable SEO services company.

SEO 147

SEO Semantic Web Development Engineer 147

Version One Ventures

MAY 3, 2023

billion people, India itself represents a massive market. With the right product or service for the Indian market and strong execution, an “India for India” start-up can see incredible growth. Micro VC’s, dedicated seed funds, domestic funds and a domestic LP ecosystem are all still in the early stages of development.

India 87

India LP Silicon Valley Vertical 87

Hunter Walker

JANUARY 3, 2021

Or you could, of course, use this OKR template from Homebrew portfolio company Coda. Highlighted Homebrew Portfolio Jobs. They’re hiring lots of folks across engineering, product, design, marketing, sales and such! In Q4 teams also set metagoals for the next year. Photo by Jeffrey F Lin on Unsplash.

Early Stage 145

Early Stage Management Startup Portfolio 145

Version One Ventures

DECEMBER 20, 2021

And if you haven’t seen it already, you can read our Year in Review post, where we reflect on the incredible pace of the start-up market in 2021. . Everyone (investors and founders alike) has underestimated the size of the addressable market for tech over the past decade. Our top three topics from the year: . 1/ Is 10x the new 3x?

Venture Capital 60

Venture Capital Technical Review Software Review IPO 60

Steve Blank

JUNE 27, 2017

Initially, a startup has no business model and no market share to defend. But often the legal obstacles confronting startups have been put in place by companies that look to the government and regulators as their first line of defense against new market entrants. Startups can do anything. to stifle competition.).

Startup 275

Startup New York City Valuation Distribution 275

David Teten

MAY 20, 2016

Our meetup is focused on how to use technology to enhance investing in private markets, including VC, growth, buyout, and distressed. Membership in the Meetup is open exclusively to: Institutional investors in private markets (VC, growth, buyout, distressed, etc.) who use tech solutions in their day-to-day process.

Private Equity 113

Private Equity Equity Cap Table Venture Capital 113

YoungUpstarts

AUGUST 25, 2017

Due to lowering capital costs, global competition that spans industries and continents, quicker market validations, and facilitated iteration, the nature of the investment game has changed. The most pressing advantage for startups, in this, is an increased number of options when it comes to staying alive in the early days of the company.

Venture Capital 193

Venture Capital Technical Review Kenya Startup 193

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 21, 2020

Harry was gracious enough to invite me back so this past week we recorded an episode discussing the current market environment. Nobody will be immune because in a bull market executives are paid to “innovate” so they sign software contracts and run projects. Biggest Advice I Give to Portfolio Founders? Raise when you can.

Marketing 263

Marketing Valuation Churn Rate Balance Sheet 263

The Startup Magazine

OCTOBER 23, 2019

Given your lack of experience, the forthcoming market spikes and drops, which are unavoidable, will probably result in a substantial amount of stress and anxiety. If they are unsure about the market and decide to wait five years before investing, which means that they only invest the money for half of the term, they will have $8,052.55

Technical Review 61

Technical Review Due Diligence Early Stage Portfolio 61

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

The extreme example of this are algorithmic investors in the public markets, who design algorithms which trade on the designer’s behalf, as opposed to making trading decisions directly. High-frequency trading, algorithmic by its nature, is estimated to account for at least 50% of US equity markets trading volume. . 1) Market fund.

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Technical Review 60

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2021

Shots on Goal Being great as a startup technology investor of course requires a lot of things to come together: You need to have strong insights into where technology markets are heading and where value in the future will be created and sustained You need be perfect with your market timing. Being too early is the same as being wrong.

Bankruptcy 294

Bankruptcy Bridge Financing Portfolio Angel Investor 294

YoungUpstarts

MAY 7, 2019

If followed, we believe it can help startup teams navigate the critical early stages of development – and avoid joining a majority of early stage companies that end up on the entrepreneurial scrap heap. Read on to discover why successfully traversing the Traction Gap is critical to early stage companies.

Cleveland 217

Cleveland Early Stage Framework Startup 217

VC Cafe

MAY 29, 2022

Building on my post on ‘ Advice for startups in a downturn (May 2022 edition) ‘, this week I continued to follow with interest the impact of the current correction on startups and venture capital, particularly in early stage. Carta’s State of Private Markets Q1 2022. The bull market is over.

Venture Capital 184

Venture Capital Early Stage Valuation Startup 184