Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

In his tenure as CEO of DataSift we have never missed a monthly revenue figure. He has grown our US operations from 1 employee (him) to a global organization of 75 employees that will finish the year with 8-digit revenues (90+% recurring) and more than 350% year-over-year growth. In his spare time he raised nearly $30 million.

Advisory Board 365

Advisory Board CTO Hire Fractional CTO Los Angeles 365

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. In SaaS (or any recurring revenue business) this is also a very difficult task.

Metrics 150

Metrics Cost Acquisition Startup 150

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2018

Until recently it was headquartered 2 blocks from our offices in Santa Monica so we literally saw it emerge under our feet and we proudly invested in the last 3 rounds of financing. I think it’s quite possible that Bird could be the fastest growing company to reach a billion dollars in run rate revenue. having raised $300 million?—?less

San Francisco 256

San Francisco Valuation Technical Review Los Angeles 256

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

This financial leader could well have come through the finance org at another startup or at a larger company but they often also can come from strategy consulting (Bain, BCG or McKinsey) or through investment banking (Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, etc.).

Operations 286

Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 9, 2013

I was sitting with the financing guy who was trying to upsell me everything from pre-paying service to prepaying dent repair coverage, etc. I was chatting with the finance guy and he was cycling through all the things he wanted to bait-and-switch me to and he asked if I wanted a lease in stead of a purchase. But I digress.

Software Review 398

Software Review Technical Review China Mexico 398

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

The “big boom” in startup financing started around March 2009?—?more Public-company tech investors creates competition in late-stage financings and these investors can afford to be less price sensitive if they choose. Unprecedented revenue growth + companies staying private longer =. more than 5 years ago?—?and

Technical Review 398

Technical Review Venture Capital Valuation Pre-Money Valuation 398

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2014

By September 26th we had submitted a term sheet which was signed on October 4th and financing was closed in less than 30 days. Again, I think the company would slug me if released revenue data, but … wow. Massive success after just one week of launching that has continued into the third week (this week) with their first property.

Technical Review 373

Technical Review North America Los Angeles Cofounder 373

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 11, 2021

Digital advertising spend is projected to grow 25% this year to $191 billion, and Google (69%), Facebook (59%), Snapchat (116%) and Twitter (87%) all just reported rapid growth in their year over year advertising revenues. For these companies, it looks like a rosy picture. But if you ask anyone in the ecosystem of customer acquisition?—?founders,

Founder 424

Founder Product Cofounder Acquisition 424

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

It encourages a bit too much FOMO (fear of missing out) and over-valuation in companies and a desire to do huge financing rounds to be perceived as the “knock-out winner.” In revenue terms our first two years of sales were $2.1 We sold the company when we hit $36 million in bookings and $16 million in SaaS GAAP revenue.

Silicon Valley 390

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Startup Technical Review 390

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 11, 2016

It has grown recurring revenue by more than 500% and deal-size by 276%. Importantly, we recently announced a $30 million financing that gives us the resources we need to build a global enterprise software company. For years I struggled to convince people that phone calls mattered.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Fractional CTO Cofounder Early Stage 150

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

Ah, but today’s Internet companies have real revenue! Or worse yet they may never get financed. Raise at “ the top end of normal &# but not so high that future financings in a corrected market become impossible. I said that at the Founder Showcase, too. and profits! That happened a lot in 2002 and again in 2008.

Saudi Arabia 309

Saudi Arabia Valuation IPO Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

So angel and seed stage investors’ returns will be dependent on good times continuing or on the ability of their portfolio companies to get financed. Revenue must come from a primary source (as opposed to advertising or other third party sources). Nobody understands this better than First Round Capital.

LP 311

LP Technical Review Early Stage Silicon Valley 311

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2013

Yet our initial customer success didn’t translate into big revenue growth and we faced issues such as: Do we support developers, end-users or both? To watching Fred lead our sales, marketing and implementation efforts and driving the recruiting & financing of the company. Founder” is a state of mind, not a job description.”

Technical Review 303

Technical Review Cofounder Analytics Founder 303

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 13, 2011

They will often run all of the daily reports into them covering off for finance, sales, marketing, biz dev & HR. You can always spot these types because they can’t tell you what their revenue number for last month was or what their sales target is for next month. But ask yourself, what does a COO actually do?

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Due Diligence 325

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 29, 2009

Many people have speculated a variety of revenue sources such as charging 3rd parties for their data, charging power users for their accounts, charging “verified users&# for their certified accounts, etc. Finance and a host of other wonderful services brought to you by their sponsors.

Technical Review 286

Technical Review Advertising Early Stage Internet 286

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 6, 2014

And somebody who isn’t thinking necessarily thinking about how to maximize their ownership in your next round of financing. Experience. Relationships. Founder’s perspective. In the Growth Years. Unless you’re SnapChat, Instagram or similar this is probably 3-5 years into your existence.

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Early Stage Software Review Los Angeles 325

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 21, 2014

We’ve had an explosion of alternate sources of financing from crowd-sourcing, angels, accelerators, incubators, corporates, corporate incubators. And importantly we’ve had revenue. When I start to see revenue figures I always want to know the details behind the revenue: Who championed the project?

Marketing 354

Marketing Incubator Turkey Metrics 354

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Generally speaking in venture capital financings the legal documents will specify that only “major investors” (a threshold set in the agreement – which can be $500,000 investor or more). They have listed forward revenue figures that are highly questionable and bring the issue of SEC oversight to my mind.

SEC 352

SEC Venture Capital Early Stage Cofounder 352

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 19, 2017

Gross burn is your cost base and net burn is the difference between your revenue and costs. If your revenue grows you can afford to increase your cost base. Sometimes it means spending less on marketing or not adding new bodies so that revenue can catch up with expenses and thus reduce burn through revenue growth.

Burn Rate 212

Burn Rate Startup .Net Venture Capital 212

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

That’s the deal you get when you’re raising in a good market for startup financing. million post-money valuation with no revenue. We had companies pitching us that had almost no revenue at all and they were raising $10-15 million in capital at a $40-50 million pre-money valuation. That’s fine.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2010

Hmmm, “so who runs the company on a daily basis?&# “Oh,&# he responded, “we have a COO.&# The company had sub $1 million in revenue and was burning $850k / month. Who does finance report to? It had a strategy-setting CEO, a limelight-seeking President and a COO who ran the company. Who does sales report to?

Entrepreneur 286

Entrepreneur CTO Hire Cofounder Early Stage 286

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

It’s like we need a finance 101 course for entrepreneurs. Revenue multiple? In finance they call it “terminal value” but the truth is the price is as arbitrary at your A round as it is at your seed round. I really just want to champion Finance 101 to entrepreneurs. There were no metrics. Your A round?

Venture Capital 417

Venture Capital Liquidation Preference Valuation Term Sheet 417

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

As I’ve highlighted I believe we’re in a unique period similar to 2005-08 where the biggest tech firms of Silicon Valley (and some media companies) are scooping up small software companies as “talent acquisitions&# versus accretive revenue / profit generators. Companies ultimately go through multiple rounds.

Cap Table 283

Cap Table Angel Investor Liquidation Preference Deal Flow 283

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2009

Huge downturns have a real impact on the revenue line of start-ups and therefore the pressure on valuations. As a personal story, I sat on the board of one company with a very unhealthy burn rate relative to revenue or expected growth. They also make M&A activity more difficult and with lower outcomes.

Burn Rate 263

Burn Rate Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Private Equity 263

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 10, 2014

Another obvious hire is thus a financial controller or finance director – preferably somebody with business planning experiences and not just an accountant. You’ve now raised your $10 million and you’re doing $1-5 million run rate revenues so you actually have income. Act your stage.

Startup 381

Startup PR Finance Hiring 381

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 29, 2010

People buy companies for 3 primary reasons: 1) they want the management team / talent 2) they want the technology or 3) they want the market traction (revenue, customer base, profits, etc). Most importantly we talked about my good friends at Okta who were financed by Andreesen Horowitz. Check ‘em out!

Venture Capital 282

Venture Capital Term Sheet Valuation Stock Options 282

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2011

It’s nearly impossible to get a services company financed by VCs. They have created two internal technology “products&# and wanted to figure out how they could turn their services business into a product business that could be financed. You’re a small fish. This team is talented. They wanted advice.

Silicon Valley 332

Silicon Valley IP Dividend Finance 332

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 1, 2016

Because VCs tend to “mark to market” for private investments so you would often value a company based on the last financing. If a company has significant revenue you might value it based on some industry multiples but WhatsApp had very limited revenue.

LP 264

LP Jordan Cofounder Limited Partner 264

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 27, 2014

Most of those industries are fee-based and are competing on revenue growth. Scott pointed to B-round SaaS valuations in excess of $100 million in $15m+ financing rounds with companies with very limited proof of customer traction or revenue. I don’t totally agree with that view.

Valuation 309

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Later Stage Non-Compete 309

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 20, 2014

Yesterday MiTú Networks announced that Upfront Ventures led a $10 million financing in what is now the largest producer of Latino online videos – primarily driven through YouTube. originally raised $3 million in financing from some of the smartest people in the industry including Peter Chernin, Allen DeBevoise and Shari Redstone.

South America 291

South America Colombia Mexico Vertical 291

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 13, 2014

Helped merge company with Seedling – on track to do $20 million combined revenue in 2015 – will now become Chairman). Kara has worked in finance in Boston, NYC and Silicon Valley. Startup CEO experience (Founded P.S. XO along with my good friend Soleil Moon Frye. She has been in operations in Seattle and Los Angeles.

Partner 408

Partner Las Vegas Los Angeles Baltimore 408

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 4, 2010

They see it as a source of differentiation for them as a company because their less financed competitors can’t afford it (and often their careers are wrapped up in the multi-millions of dollars they’ve spent implementing it). You can’t take a $5 billion revenue stream and say “Fuck it. The incumbents curse.

Vesting 376

Vesting Framework Revenue Technology 376

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

Yes, it’s true that FOMO (fear of missing out) is driving some irrational behavior and valuations amongst uber competitive deals and well-financed VCs. Try charging customers for your product when you have 12 competitors giving the product away free finances by $20 million of VC. The Exit Problem. This never existed a decade ago.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Mobile 347

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 10, 2010

You have to be selected to present and it is typically reserved for companies that have already raised early-stage capital and are well into revenue growth. Venture Financing. Company generates revenue via premium accounts, targeted ads and transaction commission. Revenue of ~$160mm in 2008. Watch the show! students. -Is

IPO 242

IPO Venture Capital Private Placement Cofounder 242

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010

What micro VCs need to consider is what happens when several of your companies want to grow and require VC financing? Or when the economy turns downward and they all need financing extensions? They raised at $40 million pre-money for pre-revenue companies and when the economy corrected it became hard for them to refinance themselves.

Liquidity Event 308

Liquidity Event Silicon Valley Seed Stage Finance 308

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 14, 2015

You don’t have the revenue or profit to support that valuation.” ” The report also notes that 75% of mega financings are led by non-VCs. That is how absurd thing have gotten. No, I take that back. THIS is how absurd things have gotten: “I have to raise at a billion-dollar valuation” “Why?

Valuation 150

Valuation Silicon Valley Non-Compete Software 150

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 14, 2012

What I want to talk about today is one of the insider baseball discussions of our industry this past week: The odd fact of the $500 million financing round completed just before the company sold for a B. At least for a couple of years until you’ve grown into your new valuation / made enough revenue / captured enough customers / etc.

Valuation 316

Valuation Balance Sheet Dilution Term Sheet 316