Both Sides of the Table

JULY 27, 2014

We both agree that the later-stage valuations are being driven up to a point that feels irrationally priced [he uses b-round SaaS valuations as an example and I am willing to be even more broad based]. Most of those industries are fee-based and are competing on revenue growth. I don’t totally agree with that view.

Valuation 309

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Later Stage Non-Compete 309

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014

Like many established finance & media companies, GLG knows that the tech startup sector is a growing part of the economy. We’re backed by Bessemer Venture Partners, Silver Lake Partners, and individual investors like Ron Conway, among others. We’re not mainly for B2B companies or later stage companies or anything like that.

New York 114

New York Technical Review Networking Advisory Board 114

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 27, 2019

Analytics vs. Finance?—?what’s In reality, these two domains require quite different skill sets (more on this later). Finance is about reporting on historical performance and future planning through the lens of financial metrics. This is a bit of an oversimplification as there are many sub-disciplines within finance?—?accounting/controller,

Analytics 149

Analytics Hiring SQL Forecast 149

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 3, 2013

I’m super proud to announce that DataSift has just completed a $42 million financing round coming at the end of a year where its revenue grew several hundred percent year-over-year. Considering our revenue is SaaS revenue this achievement is even more remarkable. Not so DataSift. We knew we had a winner.

Iran 358

Iran API San Francisco Nigeria 358

Reid Hoffman

MARCH 9, 2021

But I knew that there was a ton of work to be done to scale the business into multiple business lines, and that we would be better off with a CEO who was a grand master of organizational growth and had the product vision to serve as a later-stage co-founder. But for some companies the secret sauce might be engineering or finance.

Leadership 42

Leadership Technical Review Cofounder Later Stage 42

Gust

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

How to finance a new seed-stage startup? ” Ressi in particular seems to be passionate about removing the “debt” component from convertible debt seed financing transactions. .” I won’t rehash all of the customary convertible note financing deal terms and points of negotiation here. (For

Finance 134

Finance Convertible Security Equity Seed Stage 134

Reid Hoffman

JUNE 11, 2020

I met Jeff through one of my other partners at Greylock , James Slavet , who had worked for him at Yahoo. When a company no longer has active co-founders, the professional managers running it will focus on business metrics — EBITDA, revenue, CAC, LTV — business-oriented MBA stuff. How did Jeff become CEO at LinkedIn?

Cofounder 36

Cofounder Leadership Metrics Later Stage 36

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 12, 2012

These people are highly focused on investment areas they know, which have a large opportunity for growth, revenue projection of $20M or more in five years, and a high return that can be realized via an exit within five years. Angel groups almost never supply financing for real estate purchases, or personal loans. Real estate.

Angel Groups 237

Angel Groups Angel Investor Early Stage Startup 237

Austin Startup

JUNE 26, 2019

We tried, and opted out of, potentials for pivots; we pitched for game-changing partners and acquisitions that did not ultimately convert. You might notice what’s not on that list above: revenue, investors. We pitched everyone from Angels to partners at Andreessen Horowitz on Sand Hill Road. Thank you Ifundwomen supporters !)

Silicon Valley 54

Silicon Valley Startup B2C Sweat Equity 54

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 29, 2011

Some have done earlier-stage deals and done well. Others have chased earlier-stage but lack the skills or relationships to do this effectively. Some have moved into later stage investments in an effort to “put logos on their websites.&# These trends have put pressure on traditional VCs. There are also others.

Venture Capital 296

Venture Capital Software LP Early Stage 296

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 14, 2011

These people are highly focused on investment areas they know, which have a large opportunity for growth, revenue projection of $20M or more in five years, and a high return that can be realized via an exit within five years. Angel groups almost never supply financing for real estate purchases, or personal loans. Real estate.

Angel Investor 217

Angel Investor Angel Groups Early Stage Startup 217

K9 Ventures

JUNE 5, 2015

Together this means that Seed stage companies need to run longer and at a higher expense structure, meaning they need to raise a lot more capital. A re-jiggering of deal stages and sizes had begun in 2013. Moving up stream is a natural evolution of a venture fund, especially as you get more money and more partners.

Seed Stage 48

Seed Stage Venture Capital Early Stage Valuation 48

Ben's Blog

MAY 24, 2021

Editor’s Note: This testimony was delivered by a16z managing partner Scott Kupor to the U.S. By way of background, I am the Managing Partner for Andreessen Horowitz, a $16.5 billion multi-stage venture capital firm focused on IT-related investments… I also serve on various investment committees, including for the St.

SEC 36

SEC Accredited Investor IPO Technical Review 36

Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2010

Certain VC’s like the new class of Super-Angels and small VC funds specialize in the early stage of a startup where you are searching for a business model. And some larger funds that specialize in later stage deals may have a partner or two who likes to invest at this stage. Is it for your technology?

Founder 231

Founder Vesting Later Stage Early Stage 231

View from Seed

JUNE 16, 2015

In my opinion, VCs shy away from directly answering the questions pertaining to “at what point a company is fundable” or give a generic answer regarding revenue. So, the bar will be different for each investor, and for very early stage fundraising, the goal is to find true believers more than convincing skeptics. (My

Boston 120

Boston Syndicate Syndication eCommerce 120

Gust

JULY 1, 2012

These people are highly focused on investment areas they know, which have a large opportunity for growth, revenue projection of $20M or more in five years, and a high return that can be realized via an exit within five years. Angel groups almost never supply financing for real estate purchases, or personal loans. Real estate.

Angel Groups 143

Angel Groups Angel Investor Early Stage Startup 143

Berkonomics

JUNE 8, 2017

Some businesses require very little capital and the founder can self-finance the enterprise and retain 100% of its ownership and control from ignition through liquidity event (startup through sale). And even with the significant cost of credit card debt, many entrepreneurs aggressively use existing cards to finance a startup.

Private Equity 106

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 106

The Startup Magazine

FEBRUARY 6, 2020

trillion, it is by far the largest of its sort in the world and financed projects that in other settings may not have passed investment criteria screens. [3]. Second, the Board can usually avoid a public vote or referendum by leasing to a new partner, something politicians fear. Some attribute the lag to the uniqueness of the U.S.

Private Equity 129

Private Equity New York City Chicago Investment Bankers 129

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 3, 2010

These people are highly focused on investment areas they know, which have a large opportunity for growth, revenue projection of $20M or more in five years, and a high return that can be realized via an exit within seven years. Angel groups almost never supply financing for real estate purchases, or personal loans. Real estate.

Angel Groups 121

Angel Groups Angel Investor Early Stage Later Stage 121

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

You might start with a partner in the meeting or it might be a principal or associate. Sometimes engagement at the later stages seems to go dry. Sometimes I encourage teams to create new analysis on cohorts, future revenue projections, competitor reviews, pricing studies, etc. It doesn’t have to be a partner?—?every

Term Sheet 332

Term Sheet Due Diligence Campaign Sales 332

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

Many experienced partners are funds have 7-10 boards and most of these will need more capital. forward revenue for SaaS businesses when in the years before it had been less than 5x. So the multiples paid by publics matter and when they drop, the late-stage markets drop, too. Why Financing in Falling Markets is So Damn Difficult.

Valuation 150

Valuation Down Round Startup Later Stage 150

abovethecrowd.com

APRIL 20, 2016

Why the Unicorn Financing Market Just Became Dangerous…For All Involved. All Unicorn participants — founders, company employees, venture investors and their limited partners (LPs) — are seeing their fortunes put at risk from the very nature of the Unicorn phenomenon itself. By January of 2016, that number had ballooned to 229.

IPO 40

IPO Term Sheet Silicon Valley Valuation 40

techcrunch.com

FEBRUARY 19, 2010

Tweet View Comments Sarah Lacy Feb 19, 2010 Pepperdine has a new study out that attempts to shed some light on the clubby, shadowy world of private finance. Paglia, Pepperdiine’s Denney Academic Chair and Associate Professor of Finance. Think Again. Not a big shock, but things don’t look pretty, especially in the venture capital world.

Venture Capital 62

Venture Capital Technical Review Sweat Equity Valuation 62

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 2, 2016

So – for early stage companies (Pre-Seed, Seed, Series A), the terms tend to be clean and simple, and valuation is in a modest range that probably has a median around $5m. For growth companies (usually Series D or later), there are pretty clear market comparables based on growth rate, revenue, gross margin %, and type of company.

Venture Capital 70

Venture Capital Private Equity Early Stage Valuation 70

Rob Go

NOVEMBER 30, 2015

In October, we held our annual Limited Partners meeting at NextView. It’s a lot of work to invest in early stage companies, and it’s easier to try to chase anything with traction and pay up for those opportunities. But, looking further downstream, the later stage funding landscape has been incredibly robust.

Later Stage 28

Later Stage Marketing Early Stage Ratchet 28

Ben's Blog

AUGUST 17, 2020

OH in South Park, San Francisco (or on Zoom from Big Sky, Montana): “OMG, crazy – that firm just paid 100x revenue to invest in [insert hot startup here] – what could they be thinking?” Multiples are not only used to value companies today but also to value companies several years down the line.

Valuation 36

Valuation Balance Sheet Cofounder Forecast 36

pandodaily.com

NOVEMBER 29, 2012

But at a macro level, widespread failure this early is far less painful than if it came at later stages. As a result, Pandora is nowhere near profitable at more than $103 million in quarterly revenue, paying more than half of this sum to labels for content licenses. ” On a micro level, failure is always painful.

Technical Review 93

Technical Review Silicon Valley Incubator Syria 93

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 2, 2015

Richard Witten , is a former General Partner at Goldman Sachs with with 35+ years of experience in the global capital marketplace. Of the cohort that just graduated I think eight are completely self-sufficient and actually revenue positive and another 10 are in Series A round financing. . Kathryn : We definitely knew better.

Entrepreneur 120

Entrepreneur New York Cofounder Equity 120

Berkonomics

JANUARY 20, 2010

This post will be perhaps a bit longer than usual, but certainly of great interest for those with interest in or have need for more capital… This stage is critical to many businesses and a passing option to others, depending upon the capital efficiency of the enterprise. For you who fit that description, nice work.

Private Equity 69

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 69

Seeing Both Sides

JANUARY 13, 2015

My boss and mentor from Open Market, Gary Eichhorn , made the entire management team read it in the 1990s to hammer home its important lessons as we stumbled through the chasm on our way to scaling from zero to nearly $100 million in revenue in a few years. At each stage, there are different problems.

Mezzanine 20

Mezzanine IPO Finance Business Model 20

K9 Ventures

NOVEMBER 30, 2008

The birth of modern-day venture capital (not considering the European monarchs financing explorations and projects as venture capital) can be traced back to American Research and Development, which was started by Georges Doriot. The General Partners (GPs) are the operating guys. The business of venture capital is relatively young.

IRR 48

IRR Venture Capital LP Early Stage 48