Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 6, 2019

That’s a reason why some are quick to portend “a new bubble” but this post sets out to show that would be a misunderstanding of the market and in fact by historic levels this may be amongst the best times to invest in seed and early-stage funds. More on that later. Follow the money.

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Venture Capital IPO Mezzanine Early Stage 292

Scalable Startup

AUGUST 9, 2018

Raising seed capital is a tricky business. They come in lots of different flavors and stages of fundability. Most are making major mistakes in their approach when seeking capital. At this stage you’re essentially selling yourself and your cofounders.

Technical Cofounder 20

Technical Cofounder Silicon Valley Early Stage Cofounder 20

View from Seed

DECEMBER 1, 2015

In our latest episode, Ben Einstein , Founder/Partner of BOLT , an early-stage VC investing in hardware startups, shares the stories of several connected devices and hardware companies and their tricks and challenges. Raising seed capital. (In Subscribe on iTunes , SoundCloud , or Stitcher. . to learn more.

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Seed Capital Early Stage Startup Channel 120

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 11, 2019

So these startups should look to raise seed capital either before launch or once they can show early revenue for proof points. B2B companies can often be post-product and pre-revenue for an extended period. This might involve an alpha/beta phase were the product is built and refined with “live” but unpaid customers.

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Seed Stage B2B Seed Capital Revenue 149

View from Seed

JANUARY 28, 2015

In the last six months, we’ve been asked and answered several key questions about seed-stage startups and raising seed capital. All we do is seed — we focus on it, we want to be the best seed partner, and we obsess over helping startups through that first, formative 18-24 month period.

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Seed Stage Seed Capital IPO Startup 120

View from Seed

DECEMBER 10, 2014

He is currently a second year student at Harvard Business School and will be focused on supporting the early-stage startup community in Boston and its schools. This is his first post to The View From Seed. And done well, local seed capital can be the catalyst for the new Harvard engineering campus in Allston.

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Boston Seed Stage San Francisco Startup 328

K9 Ventures

JUNE 5, 2015

I still wanted K9 to be the first institutional money in a company and work with “frighteningly early-stage” companies. Your early stage investment portfolio may no longer really be early stage. There is an influx of capital into venture, and venture as we used to know it is changing.

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Seed Stage Venture Capital Early Stage Valuation 48

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 28, 2017

Instead I will make a few observations about how an investor might think about the impact of ICOs / token launches on the venture capital industry, in particular, and some of the downstream ramifications that need to wrestled with. Need for growth capital. Shift of value from equity holders to token holders. Fuzzy Governance.

Early Stage 20

Early Stage Equity Venture Capital Government 20

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 28, 2017

Instead I will make a few observations about how an investor might think about the impact of ICOs / token launches on the venture capital industry, in particular, and some of the downstream ramifications that need to wrestled with. Need for growth capital. Shift of value from equity holders to token holders. Fuzzy Governance.

Early Stage 20

Early Stage Equity Venture Capital Government 20

Haystack

AUGUST 18, 2019

.” 2/ Lateral Competition – The number of “seed” funds has also grown during this boon. More and more seed capital has flooded into the market, making the situation for funding seed rounds ~$2M-ish total size more competitive. Samir Kaji from First Republic has been writing on this for years.

Seed Stage 108

Seed Stage Cap Table Early Stage Malaysia 108

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2014

I had witnessed a number of early-stage tech startups in LA raise seed capital from the Bay Area and relocate. We formed a partnership with some of our favorite early stage investors and friends including Jim Andelman at Rincon Ventures and Peter Lee at Baroda. We had a specific goal in mind.

Early Stage 290

Early Stage Venture Capital Los Angeles Coder 290

Business Plan Blog

DECEMBER 12, 2013

angel investors invested $19 billion in 55,000 deals in 2008, with most of the investments being made in start-up or very early-stage companies. Download our free Raising Capital from Angel Investors eBook. This guide will walk you through the process of obtaining seed capital for your startup. Want To Learn More?

Angel Groups 40

Angel Groups Angel Investor Software Review Accredited Investor 40

Rob Go

MAY 14, 2012

Sure, there is more availability of seed capital in the past, although if you watch carefully, you will notice that most of the elite seed funds have slowed down their pace considerably over the last 12 months. But it’s much easier to identify authentic entrepreneurs going after non-obvious opportunities.

Technical Review 74

Technical Review Seed Capital Early Stage PR 74

View from Seed

MAY 14, 2019

A number of blog posts recently have mentioned this, but we seem to be experiencing a rise in repeat founders starting new businesses and raising seed capital. Some investors are really great after PMF, but are not great before PMF, even if they work at early stage funds.

Founder 256

Founder Agile Cofounder Seed Capital 256

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

The companies I spoke to all agreed that the community there was extremely supportive, especially in the critical ulta-early-stage. Then, create an encouraging environment for early-stage companies. You dont need massive amounts of capital available for VC investment - modest amounts will do.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Continuous Deployment 113

Gust

SEPTEMBER 29, 2011

Given that convertible debt financing has become the de facto standard for small (<$1MM), early stage deals in recent years, I thought I would write a primer on the elements of a term sheet and definitive documents for entrepreneurs looking at the earliest stage financing rounds.

Finance 178

Finance Term Sheet Preferred Stock Bridge Financing 178

ReadWriteStart

APRIL 26, 2012

If you’re looking for seed or startup capital, the time to make your move is now. The study found angel interest in early-stage investing is growing. Last year, 42% of angel investment was seed and startup capital, reversing a two-year decline in the percentage of angel capital going to early-stage companies.

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New Hampshire Early Stage Seed Capital Angel Investor 120

Hunter Walker

NOVEMBER 20, 2013

Additionally, funds such as Foundry Group and Google Ventures have taken their own approaches – the former creating a separate early stage entity , the latter encouraging their seed stage partners to create standalone personal syndicates.

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Syndicate Syndication South America Seed Stage 98

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 12, 2016

What stops a majority from moving ahead to the execution stage is funding. Most businesses – online or offline, need seed capital to get established and without access to these funds, launching a business can seem like an improbable dream. In the early stages of business, sweat equity can often be a good substitute for cash.

Cofounder 100

Cofounder Sweat Equity Startup Seed Capital 100

Haystack

SEPTEMBER 2, 2018

The point is — there are so many companies forming, and so many seed rounds, and so many different types of seed rounds, and so many little preferences around those processes, that is hard to know what is kosher and what is not. Most of the rounds I participate in today are priced equity rounds. Payment may be delayed.

Seed Stage 76

Seed Stage Seed Capital Equity Europe 76

View from Seed

OCTOBER 21, 2014

As the seed-stage startup fundraise process has received more transparency in recent years, ranging from published advice on how to raise seed capital to increased availability through AngelList, Funders Club, and various accelerator programs, I’ve noticed another trend emerging.

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Valuation Founder Seed Stage Angel Investor 336

Feld Thoughts

AUGUST 12, 2011

Feeling overwhelmed, Dick emailed his friend Josh, the CEO of an early-stage startup in Boulder, to see how they figured out all of this stuff. While John was trying to be helpful, his advice missed the mark because he didn’t have a lot of experience at the early stages. as a C-Corp in Delaware.

Balance Sheet 136

Balance Sheet Forecast Cap Table Early Stage 136

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 1, 2014

We pride ourselves on being early-stage (thus the name, Upfront) but in this case it’s as early as it gets. After 9 months it was time to raise seed capital and go test drive our new software and processes. Sam moved back to NY and we announced our seed round of capital, which we led.

Technical Review 380

Technical Review Software Review Cofounder CTO Hire 380

Growthink Blog

MAY 10, 2012

When seeking equity investments, the source of capital is, for the most part, tied to the stage of capital being raised. You see, equity capital is raised in stages or rounds. The five main stages include the following: 1. Pre-Seed Funding 2. Seed Funding 3.

Equity 88

Equity Mezzanine Later Stage Venture Capital 88

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 26, 2014

Contrary to popular opinion I actually believe crowd-funding is best used after seed capital or venture capital. I often recommend that super early-stage teams hire somebody in-house first – either full-time or possibly a part-time contractor or small agency. So be careful.

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PR Venture Capital Hiring Seed Capital 319

Feld Thoughts

JANUARY 2, 2016

” When I go back a decade, we were just making the decision not to raise another Mobius Venture Capital fund. Venture Capital and entrepreneurship was dramatically out of favor. Early stage and seed capital was extremely difficult to find. My partners and I hadn’t yet created Foundry Group.

Venture Capital 70

Venture Capital Seed Capital Early Stage Partner 70

SoCal CTO

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

I recently got together with Aaron Shechet and an early stage startup to discuss the direction the company might want to take. You and I were talking about a startup recently and where they might go for seed stage funding, what is your impression on that aspect here in Los Angeles? Tell me a bit about your background.

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Los Angeles Southern California Startup SEO 150

Up and Running

MAY 2, 2014

I learned this lesson when I raised the first round of seed capital for my startup PopInShop , an online platform that connects brands and boutiques to facilitate short-term, cross-promotional shopping events. I heard about the investing group when PopInShop was still very early-stage.

Angel Investor 146

Angel Investor Seed Capital Venture Capital Early Stage 146

Business Plan Blog

JANUARY 7, 2014

With venture capital becoming more and more of a bygone dream for early-stage companies, many startups want to turn to angel funding to raise capital but don’t know where to start. Download our free Raising Capital from Angel Investors eBook. 6 Strategies When Searching For Angel Funding. Want To Learn More?

Search 55

Search Angel Investor Seed Capital Early Stage 55

Software By Rob

JANUARY 8, 2019

Hundreds and hundreds of tweets, re-tweets, likes, Hacker News upvotes, email responses…it was immediately obvious that there is pent up demand for this kind of alternative early-stage startup funding. 2: We Focus on Early Stage SaaS. We’re a SaaS accelerator, and accelerators focus on early-stage companies.

Early Stage 46

Early Stage Valuation Seed Capital Revenue 46

Campus Entrepreneurship

MARCH 8, 2011

Stanford is a leading campus when it comes to entrepreneurship and a new seed fund deepens the web of entrepreneurship on campus. Early stage investment firm North Bridge Venture Partners has joined with the Asia-Pacific Entrepreneurship Society (ASES) and announced a $75,000 seed capital competition.

Seed Capital 37

Seed Capital Seed Stage Early Stage Asia 37

Gust

OCTOBER 5, 2011

Last week , we gave some attention to the “why” behind convertible note financing for early stage startups. In most cases, an early stage startup will raise seed capital from more than one investor. In this installment, I’ll dig into the “how” by dissecting an example term sheet based on a real deal.

Finance 79

Finance Preferred Stock Term Sheet Early Stage 79

Business Plan Blog

JANUARY 2, 2014

government’s long standing restrictions on fundraising has given life to a new type of financing called crowdfunding that allows Angel and other early stage investors to quickly assemble a group of investors over the internet. Download our free Raising Capital from Angel Investors eBook. An easing on some of the U.S.

Angel Groups 51

Angel Groups Accredited Investor Angel Investor Due Diligence 51

ReadWriteStart

APRIL 2, 2012

Crowdfunding is an efficient way for entrepreneurs to raise seed capital," the editors wrote. It's a move that's not without controversy, and not even the people who are happy with it are completely happy with it. But it is also a good way for hucksters to fleece suckers.".

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IPO Startup Florida Seed Capital 121

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 3, 2015

Today, NextView Ventures is excited to release a pillar project in our Growth Guides series: pitch deck templates for raising seed capital. For context, last year, based on questions from our existing portfolio, we launched two board deck templates for seed-stage startups.

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Seed Stage Startup Seed Capital Audience 120

Austin Startup

APRIL 23, 2010

The company was founded with seed capital from Austin Ventures. The amount of capital committed is described as “in the low millions,&# and the only reason it is that substantial is because the company acquired some intellectual property from other companies (including FiveRuns) to help accelerate the development of the product.

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Intellectual Property Austin Early Stage Agile 79

Feld Thoughts

JULY 29, 2011

Finance Friday’s gets off the ground with today’s post by introducing you to an imaginary startup, the entrepreneurs that we’ll being following throughout the series, and their first challenges: splitting up the founders’ equity and addressing the case where one of the founders provides the initial seed capital for the business.

Equity 137

Equity Finance Pre-Money Valuation Denver 137