Version One Ventures

OCTOBER 7, 2014

At first glance, Hubspot and Moz are very similar companies: both are popular marketing platforms, use web-based subscription models, and primarily target the SMB market (although larger brands use both). However, as Scott Krager points out in his post, the companies have vastly different approaches for generating revenue.

Initial Public Offering 148

Initial Public Offering IPO SEC Valuation 148

Version One Ventures

JULY 20, 2015

I often get asked about how to determine the valuation for a marketplace startup that is starting to scale. Our rule of thumb is that marketplaces at scale are valued at roughly 1x annualized GMV (typically about 6-8x annual revenue). Our assumptions for this valuation: Scale: > $1b GMV. YoY growth of at least 30%.

Valuation 60

Valuation Early Stage IPO eCommerce 60

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 4, 2014

For example, if you have a proven product, real revenue, a big potential market, and are ready to scale up the business, every investor will be interested. Investors call this the seed stage , where money is required to build a market and a real product. The final product works great, and all the early users love it.”

Angel Investor 232

Angel Investor Intellectual Property Investment Bankers Private Equity 232

Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2011

A tech bubble is the rapid inflation in the valuation of public and private technology companies that exceeds their fundamental value by a large margin. Today, the signs of the new bubble are the Linked-In initial public offering (IPO), Facebook’s stratospheric valuation and the rapid rise of early-stage startup valuation.

Silicon Valley 330

Silicon Valley Stealth Valuation Mississippi 330

ReadWriteStart

FEBRUARY 13, 2020

For most startups, it’s no secret that a significant part of their long-term plans is to go public and become the next market darling for investors. You also have to discount the performance of companies like Facebook and Google, who were performance outliers even at the time they made their market debuts.

IPO 147

IPO Startup Stock Initial Public Offering 147

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 13, 2016

For example, if you have a proven product, real revenue, a big potential market, and are ready to scale up the business, every investor will be interested. Investors call this the seed stage , where money is required to build a market and a real product. The final product works great, and all the early users love it.”

Matching 120

Matching Angel Investor Intellectual Property Investment Bankers 120

Version One Ventures

OCTOBER 7, 2014

At first glance, Hubspot and Moz are very similar companies: both are popular marketing platforms, use web-based subscription models, and primarily target the SMB market (although larger brands use both). However, as Scott Krager points out in his post, the companies have vastly different approaches for generating revenue.

Initial Public Offering 77

Initial Public Offering IPO SEC Valuation 77

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 7, 2015

Entrepreneurs often ask me why investors expect financial projections for a new startup even before the product is built and while the market is still being defined. I recently saw a startup projecting $50 million in revenue for the first year. Revenue projections show penetration of target opportunity. Neither extreme is good.

Liquidity Event 120

Liquidity Event Startup Initial Public Offering Equity 120

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

The signals are loud and clear : seed and late stage valuations are getting frothy and wacky, and hiring talent in Silicon Valley is the toughest it has been since the dot.com bubble. VC’s worked with entrepreneurs to build profitable and scalable businesses, with increasing revenue and consistent profitability – quarter after quarter.

Internet 334

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 334

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2012

For instance, if your company is only a few weeks old and you have zero customers and your product offering is still in design, don’t expect someone to hand over $10 million to fund your efforts. Companies at this stage must have a large market, good traction, and be focused on scaling infrastructure and market adoption.

Investment Bankers 241

Investment Bankers Venture Capital Startup Initial Public Offering 241

Version One Ventures

JUNE 29, 2017

What I missed in most of this commentary was the fact that Matt Salzberg and his team had created a company with over $800m in revenues and a $2b valuation in a short 5 (!) This is an incredible entrepreneurial achievement that very, very few founders ever get to.

IPO 141

IPO Stock Valuation Business Model 141

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 13, 2010

For instance, if your company is only a few weeks old and you have zero customers and your product offering is still in design, don’t expect someone to hand over $10 million to fund your efforts. Companies at this stage must have a large market, good traction, and be focused on scaling infrastructure and market adoption.

Investment Bankers 231

Investment Bankers Venture Capital Startup Initial Public Offering 231

Gust

NOVEMBER 22, 2011

For instance, if your company is only a few weeks old and you have zero customers and your product offering is still in design, don’t expect someone to hand over $10 million to fund your efforts. Companies at this stage must have a large market, good traction, and be focused on scaling infrastructure and market adoption.

Venture Capital 171

Venture Capital Investment Bankers Angel Investor Initial Public Offering 171

Austin Startup

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

Just this week, entrepreneur and investor Tim O’Reilly wrote a powerful piece in which he challenged Hoffman’s blitzscaling strategy, which often encourages companies to grow as fast as possible by raising venture capital to dominate new markets, a strategy leveraged by Uber among other unicorns (i.e. Certainly.

Silicon Valley 48

Silicon Valley Technical Review Venture Capital San Francisco 48

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 2, 2018

Tiny markets may excite your passion but won’t sustain a business or leave you with a long-term positive legacy. Investors look for a team with business, financial, marketing, and operational skills, as well as a social passion. Includes balanced and hard-hitting marketing and sales.

Intellectual Property 48

Intellectual Property Initial Public Offering Merger Acquisition 48

Pascal's View

MARCH 9, 2010

Putting that point aside, for a moment, what is absent is a quoted liquid market in their equity and debt securities, which means that the determination of the book value of those private companies is necessarily subjective.

Government 31

Government Private Equity Institutional Investors Venture Capital 31