Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

Any CEO worth his or her salt knows that her investors get an insane amount of emails and often spend 8+ hours / day in meetings (board meetings, pitches, partner meetings, LP meetings, corporate relationship meetings) so often email is done on the run on one’s iPhone or in the early morning / late evening.

Advisory Board 365

Advisory Board CTO Hire Fractional CTO Los Angeles 365

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 23, 2014

At the other end of the spectrum large funds have gotten even larger in the past few years which has massively increased the amount of consolidation in our industry as 66% of LP money into venture is now concentrated in late-stage or full-cycle VCs. Why is this?

Technical Review 398

Technical Review Venture Capital Valuation Pre-Money Valuation 398

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 18, 2017

Yves didn’t want to step down — he is still as active as any partner on our team — but he wanted me to take responsibility for: Strategy, recruiting, team development, LP relations, financial planning, etc. He did what every LP did, looked at returns, talked to portfolio companies, talked with our competitors and so forth.

Leadership 161

Leadership LP Venture Capital Silicon Valley 161

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 26, 2014

But for now … Every year we run a big VC, LP & Tech Summit in Los Angeles (this year downtown) to showcase the best of our community and invite others from around the country. Our event this year will feature many portfolio companies and also emerging LA tech companies such as Tinder & Whisper. I will tell more.

Los Angeles 290

Los Angeles LP Startup Portfolio 290

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

If your idea is so amazing that it warrants my hard-earned angel money or the money of my LP investors from our fund then why should I take a risk on you if you won’t take a risk on yourself? I want our associate to have empathy for the customers we serve — our portfolio companies. Why should I be? Was I too harsh? I don’t think so.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur CTO Hire South America Salary 293

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2014

Last week displayed the best of LA last week for a gala event of all of Upfront’s portfolio companies + the CEOs of many of LA’s top technology companies + 75 VC firms from LA, SF, NY & Boston + 25 LP Funds + the Chairman of Yahoo! And I’m proud of that, too.

Los Angeles 318

Los Angeles Silicon Valley LP Warrant 318

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 21, 2020

Biggest Advice I Give to Portfolio Founders? But when a fund writes checks into a portfolio company it typically “reserves” money to invest in future rounds. Harry asked me whether I thought LP “defaults” (not funding the VC commitments it made) would go up. This is not a 2-month v-shaped correction.

Marketing 263

Marketing Valuation Churn Rate Balance Sheet 263

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 4, 2016

” There are a lot of data points that one can observer to get a sense of the venture capital markets – both LP fundings into venture and VC financings of startups. We surveyed 73 LP firms to get their views on the market. “This is the year the tortoise may gain on the hare.” How do I know?

LP 150

LP Valuation Burn Rate Pre-Money Valuation 150

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 6, 2019

If you get into the best deals it has never been a better time to be a VC or LP, and the best have developed strategies to capture more value Given that the best deals are pushing out their exit dates it means that many firms aren’t seeing as quick of liquidity as they might have 20 years ago.

Venture Capital 292

Venture Capital IPO Mezzanine Early Stage 292

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2016

I was speaking recently to the team at NuOrder , an LA-based company we’re an investor in about “realism in startups” — an impromptu talk I have given to any of our portfolio companies who ask. I was asked again in an LP meeting later in the week and then again at a founder breakfast gathering we hosted yesterday.

Early Stage 254

Early Stage Non-Compete LP Later Stage 254

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 14, 2015

I spoke at Michael Kim’s excellent annual Cendana VC/LP conference today. Today I called it, “our own little VC led, portfolio-by-portfolio company version of RIP Good Times from 7 years ago.” Here’s my take away. When you accelerate too quickly often a pull back is inevitable as you recalibrate.

Burn Rate 150

Burn Rate San Francisco Private Equity LP 150

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

I spend tons of time each day on portfolio company issues. I spent a late morning meeting with a product exec at one portfolio company. I spent time talking with 2 senior execs who are separately joining two of my portfolio companies. We call these investors “LPs” for limited partners. Marketing.

Email 314

Email Product Term Sheet Portfolio 314

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 24, 2015

When many venture investors are seeing their personal public portfolios tank it creeps into their business lives and creates an emotion that is less risk tolerant whether they’re aware of it or not. This doesn’t happen with every LP and it probably doesn’t kick in unless things get worse. So, too, investments.

Stock 150

Stock Finance Marketing Valuation 150

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

Thomson Reuters data shows that around $10 billion of LP money went into VCs per year pre bubble. By 2000 the total LP commitments had mushroomed to more than $100 billion. LP contributions to VC firms shrunk from 2000 and by 2005-2008 had stabilized to around $30 billion per year. The Funding Problem.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Mobile 347

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

Since funds were driven by extreme successes in their portfolios where just one deal could return 5x the entire fund while 95% of the fund may have done well but not amazing, not missing out on deals was critical. The Valley has obsessed with a quick up-and-to-right momentum story because we were thought to live in “winner take most” markets.

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital LP Valuation Later Stage 363

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 7, 2018

I literally have a Google Sheet for nearly every portfolio company who is in the process of raising a round. I figured I was wasting my time unless the LP was leaning in on my first meeting. The hardest thing is that after you’ve had a great first meeting with a VC (or LP) you expect it’s all going to start happening!

LP 215

LP San Francisco Minneapolis Partner 215

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2016

And we felt terrible not being able to let every LP in but we were forced to make some hard compromises yet we opened up our fund to Sapphire even though they were a first time LP. We have many LPs who come from industry and this is truly a value-add in a LP/VC relationship 3.

LP 150

LP Entrepreneur United States Venture Capital 150

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

But the short answer is that the best intro is from a portfolio company of that VC or by other entrepreneurs whom that VC respects. You need to build genuine relationships with these portfolio startup founders as well as trust with them and the rest will follow. I wrote a longer post on how to access VCs that you should read.

Developer 366

Developer Silicon Valley PR Las Vegas 366

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2014

One measure of CincyTech’s overall impact is that in 2013, its portfolio companies represent 80% of total seed and early stage capital invested in Southwest Ohio. Our fund has more interest from potential LP investors than our fund needs. This includes AssureX Health that has raised $71 million including capital from Sequoia.

Silicon Valley 390

Silicon Valley Kansas City Startup Venture Capital 390

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2010

As a reminder, VC funds are comprised of money from LP’s (Limited Partners) that include university endowments, pension funds, high-net-worth individuals, insurance companies and large corporations. In a single fund of $100 million you might have 30 difference LPs. Now, let’s get more ominous.

Pre-Money Valuation 226

Pre-Money Valuation Venture Capital LP Term Sheet 226

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2016

They either had a portfolio company in market and weren’t getting offers as quickly as expected or they knew a friend in the biz who was recounting this to them in a session VCs strangely call “comparing notes.”.

Balance Sheet 150

Balance Sheet Burn Rate Valuation Forecast 150

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 3, 2015

And instantly I had people I had relationships with or even portfolio companies all asking me for intro’s to Jason. And was fortunate enough to get a reference call from an LP asking me this very question. But Jason took Quora usage to 11. There were many years where people questioned whether VCs should build brands.

LP 150

LP Technical Review Deal Flow 150

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 30, 2016

We did what many VC funds did – we presented our annual results, we stood up and talked about our portfolio companies, we invited a few to also present and then we had dinner & drinks at some posh restaurant. Before making this change I called our LPs to ask for advice and input. So we planned a Technology Summit.

Community 150

Community Los Angeles LP Portfolio 150

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2017

This is key because in a permanently low-interest-rate environment parking large pools of capital in assets that benefit from interest is not possible so LPs seek “higher yield.” Here is the entire survey, which can also be downloaded and shared. If you need the original keynote slides for any reason — just ask.

LP 286

LP Silicon Valley Venture Capital Startup 286