View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

Most of these rhyme with what we’ve said in the past, but some have also evolved to fit the changing landscape and our own convictions about what really matters for founders and their investors at the seed stage. Belief #1: The best time to invest is early. And by early, we mean pre-traction. This is not what Nextview is about.

North America 120

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 120

YoungUpstarts

JUNE 20, 2019

Specifically, there are five challenges that emerging business typically put on the backburner between funding rounds: Seed to Series A: Customer Testing. Hypotheses should be tested extensively and disproven, which is where customer testing plays a central role for seed-stage startups. Seed to Series D: Collaboration.

Technical Cofounder 104

Technical Cofounder Burn Rate Seed Stage Cofounder 104

Mucker Lab

JULY 11, 2023

Understanding the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) A good way to think about search is essentially as roadmaps drawn by targeted keywords, which branches outward to create intersections that become digital real estate - websites, media, ads, and more. High authority often leads to higher search engine rankings.

SEO 78

SEO Technical Review HTML Software Review 78

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 18, 2016

In fact, there’s a glow among the Twitterati that alignment between founders and investors is getting back to normal. Startup salaries — especially on the engineering side — are at near record highs. The post Seed-Stage Startups: Beware the “Stickiness Squeeze” appeared first on NextView Ventures.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage San Francisco Startup Valuation 120

View from Seed

APRIL 16, 2015

An easy way to think about it is that value over time doesn’t go up and to the right in a straight line like this: Instead, it’s more of a stair step like this: So, what are the value inflection points that create the stair steps, and how does one think about it at the earliest stages? These might include: Bring on a technical co-founder.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Cofounder Early Stage Startup 120

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

This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 12, 2016

That was the Datadog pitch in late 2010, my first full year of leading deals, that I got from two software engineers. I'm much more open these days to checking my industry knowledge at the door and leaving it to the founders to explain the market to me. Makes sense, no? Doesn't sound crazy, does it?

Software Review 60

Software Review Due Diligence Seed Stage Marketing 60

View from Seed

NOVEMBER 4, 2019

One of the biggest rookie mistakes I see among founders pursuing seed rounds is that they’ve spent too much time building something vs. proving something. Increasingly, seed rounds occur after some sort of pre-seed or at least some period of bootstrapping. But this is a trap.

Seed Stage 180

Seed Stage Bootstrapping Demand Early Stage 180

Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2010

Finally, when everyone else had their turn, the grey-haired VC turned to the founder and said, “If you do what we tell you to do and fail, we’ll fire you. In contrast, in a startup following the Customer Development process, this is when the founders realize that something is wrong with the business model (because revenue is not scaling.)

Business Model 332

Business Model Agile Customer Development Startup 332

Genuine VC

JANUARY 23, 2012

And along the way we’ve met with or observed a larger number of seed-stage startups attempting to start them. Communities like those of uTest (software QA testers), as well as NextView portfolio companies GrabCAD (mechanical engineers) and thredUP (parents), which resulted in marketplaces had origins in this approach.

Engineer 201

Engineer Vertical Portfolio Seed Stage 201

Agile VC

JANUARY 4, 2012

Founders Hardi Meybaum and Indrek Narusk originally started building the company in their native Estonia before moving to Boston to join the hub of SaaS / CAD software companies located here. In addition to compelling founders, we were drawn to the company by their vision for a professional community for mechanical engineers and designers.

Community 100

Community Estonia Syndicate Syndication 100

Austin Startup

NOVEMBER 25, 2014

Experiment Engine, an Austin-based SaaS start-up, proudly announces the close of a $1 million seed round. Founder Collective, based in NY and Boston, joined the seed stage round with other notable support from Texas-based Mercury Fund. Digital experiment engine Funding'

Engineer 75

Engineer Seed Stage Cofounder Boston 75

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 5, 2019

*This post is part of our “pitch deck” series where we dissect the seed stage pitch deck and discuss the ideal flow for a pitch. However, we’ve found that it’s frequently the most over-engineered, and often filled with extraneous information. Director of Marketing at Facebook, VP Engineering at Startup X, Ph.D.

Seed Stage 218

Seed Stage Engineer Restful Founder 218

Hippoland

OCTOBER 9, 2016

(revenue / traction / setting up infrastructure / etc) This can set you apart, because the vast majority of businesses I see at the seed stage are just ideas with no action. At the seed stage, there are companies who have been around for 5 months and others for 5 years. 2) Speed matters.

Seed Stage 48

Seed Stage CTO Hire Email Later Stage 48

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

From RBI, Flexible VCs borrow the ability to reap meaningful returns without demanding founders build for an exit. Every Flexible VC structure allows founders to access immediate risk capital while preserving exit, growth trajectory, and ownership optionality. . Flexible VC 102: Variations.

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

BeyondVC

JANUARY 3, 2019

Thanks to all of the amazing founders, advisors, co-investors, corporate partners, and others that helped make 2018 an amazing year. To that point, we are most excited when our founders are able to go from slide deck to product-market fit and Series A and beyond. AWS Reinvent Survivor Dinner with founders, Fortune 500 execs, and VCs.

Stealth 79

Stealth Advisory Board Cloud Virginia 79

View from Seed

DECEMBER 10, 2014

This is his first post to The View From Seed. Chief among them was an initial study done by EverTrue founder and CEO — and Harvard Business School grad — Brent Grinna. Harvard’s new master plan in Allston is to build an entire science and engineering campus … from scratch. Boston’s talent pool is unparalleled.

Boston 328

Boston Seed Stage San Francisco Startup 328

Rob Go

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

Most of these rhyme with what we’ve said in the past, but some have also evolved to fit the changing landscape and our own convictions about what really matters for founders and their investors at the seed stage. Belief #1: The best time to invest is early. And by early, we mean pre-traction. This is not what Nextview is about.

North America 36

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 36

Rob Go

JULY 29, 2014

When we make our seed investments, we have a strong preference for preferred equity rounds and forming a board of directors that meets regularly. Founders have control and don’t really need to report to anyone. But we think they are important even at the seed stage of a business. Here are a few reasons: 1.

Seed Stage 65

Seed Stage Government Founder Finance 65

Mucker Lab

AUGUST 9, 2023

As part of Mucker’s ongoing Growth Series Webinars, we recently invited Eric Carrell , founder of DoFollow.io , to dig into the world of SEO, especially in the link-building space. Their significance in SEO is immense, acting as pathways that help search engines discover and prioritize content. Why is this the case?

SEO 78

SEO PR Reputation Engineer 78

Agile VC

APRIL 17, 2011

Kayak was started here in my backyard of Boston… co-founder & CTO Paul English and the product/engineering team is based here in Concord MA. Co-founder & CEO Steve Hafner and the business team are based in Norwalk, CT. What They Do: Travel search engine. Headquarters: Norwalk, CT & Concord, MA.

Pre-Money Valuation 113

Pre-Money Valuation Liquidation Preference Dividend Common Stock 113

www.informationarbitrage.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

Main February 23, 2010 Advice for CTO Founders: Dont Let Business Kill the Business Founding a technology company is an amazing thing. Too often, however, I have found CTO / Founders paired with business people who not only don't add value, but frequently detract from the value of the business. So my advice to CTO / Founders?

CTO Hire 40

CTO Hire Founder Cap Table Vesting 40

Hippoland

JULY 24, 2016

Valuation is a nebulous topic amongst early stage startups, so I thought I’d really spell it out in detail. In short: Valuations for seed stage companies are fairly arbitrary and driven solely by supply and demand. Supply - amount of your round and Demand - investor demand.

Seed Stage 48

Seed Stage Valuation Vertical Demand 48

View from Seed

MARCH 19, 2015

Founders laud their own “end-to-end” thinking. Engineers and even marketers proudly claim to be “full stack.” I recently caught up with Savoia, who shared how this process works and how seed-stage startups might adopt it to find product-market fit more quickly and more cheaply.

Product 120

Product Technical Review Marketing Lean 120

Hunter Walker

NOVEMBER 20, 2020

tldr: instead of choosing between in-person or remote, your seed stage company (or team) should be more hybrid, tied to the type/phase of project going on. This does err towards founders in the same city and if not, then founders who have worked together before and know how to manage the distance.

Early Stage 146

Early Stage Seed Stage Startup Software 146

Diego Basch

MARCH 14, 2013

I like to be able to take public transportation and have meetings with founders, sometimes spontaneously. I may find myself having an IM conversation with a founder, and think it would be best to just grab coffee and scribble on a whiteboard. If your seed-stage company fits the criteria above, please contact me.

San Francisco 55

San Francisco Startup Silicon Valley Seed Stage 55

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 4, 2017

by Paul Towers, founder & CEO of Task Pigeon. For startup founders and CEO’s it’s also just as common to see them place too much focus on the amount of money raised, and the pre-money valuation, rather than the value that each investor can bring to the table. Plus, founders and entrepreneurs talk. Industry Knowledge.

Pre-Money Valuation 167

Pre-Money Valuation Seed Stage IP Deal Flow 167

Hunter Walker

DECEMBER 25, 2016

So, we actually don’t think most new funds or seed investors are competitive with Homebrew in the traditional sense of “we’re all looking at the same deals and need to ‘win’ deals away from new funds.” And it’s probably one of the biggest differences in seed investing when you compare 2006 vs 2016.

Seed Stage 73

Seed Stage Cofounder Engineer Reputation 73

techcrunch.com

APRIL 26, 2013

Co-founder Naval Ravikant explains that 18 pilot companies in the program, including Transcriptic, Double Robotics and Tred, received $6.7 Investors included Founders Fund, 500 Startups and Marc Cuban. This is just the next phase of AngelList’s evolution into a one-stop shop for seed-stage companies and their backers.

SEC 61

SEC Accredited Investor San Diego New York City 61

Ben's Blog

JANUARY 31, 2012

That excitement took a sharp downhill turn when one of the top partners said to me, in front of my co-founders, “When are you going to get a real CEO?”. As we set out to design a venture capital firm that would enable founders to run their own companies, we began by asking: In what ways are professional CEOs superior to founder CEOs?

Venture Capital 78

Venture Capital Portfolio Cofounder Partner 78

Hearpreneur

MAY 4, 2019

Corporate innovation is failing at a DNA level because the Big to Bigger machine has been engineered to be incompatible with New to Big. It starts with a pilot, with often is pretty small: just one or two teams of co-founders dedicated to growth opportunity areas for six months or so. It is literally at war with growth.

Cofounder 66

Cofounder Founder Entrepreneur Venture Capital 66

K9 Ventures

APRIL 9, 2014

Instead, it was more of a result of over-funding at the seed stage. There was simply too much money coming in to the seed stage, which increased the supply of companies at the seed stage. Top engineering talent today has a bimodal distribution. Series C/D is the new Mezzanine.

Mezzanine 134

Mezzanine Seed Stage Early Stage IPO 134

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

At seed-stage startups, especially companies with well-networked founders and investors, finding applicants who can do a job on paper is not overly difficult. To help you more effectively build your early teams, we asked a group of founders to share their favorite interview questions when they build new startup teams.

Founder 120

Founder Seed Stage Cofounder Boston 120

Genuine VC

AUGUST 3, 2012

The company’s familiarity is along what we consider to be the three most important criteria for an investment in a seed-stage startup – team, market, and product: Team – Two of the co-founders were well-known to the NextView partnership years before a line of code was even written.

Seed Stage 199

Seed Stage Cofounder Portfolio Curation 199

Steve Blank

MAY 12, 2015

The SBIR/STTR program made ~6,200 seed stage investments in 2014, dwarfing the seed investments made by venture capital. The SBIR/STTR program represents a critical source of seed funding for U.S. In fact, half of all seed stages in tech companies in the U.S. Eleven U.S. were funded by the SBIR program.

SBIR 120

SBIR Maryland Lean Seed Stage 120

Hunter Walker

JULY 1, 2014

How early do you want a founder thinking about exit path? During a recent email exchange I advised a founder to remove the “potential exits” slide from the main section of his deck. Don’t try to reverse engineer. For clarity, I''m not an investor in this company, nor is Homebrew evaluating for investment].

Seed Stage 108

Seed Stage Business Model Founder Engineer 108

K9 Ventures

OCTOBER 10, 2017

So, I took it upon myself as a challenge to put together the definitive “ Pre-Seed FAQ.” I’ll start with all the questions I can think of, from many different perspectives: founders, LPs, the press, and even other VCs. A Seed round today — like the Series A round of yesteryear — requires some kind of traction or product.

Seed Stage 82

Seed Stage Finance Later Stage Equity 82