View from Seed

JANUARY 27, 2021

In our first two funds, we’ve been fortunate to seed five unicorns ( Attentive , Whoop , Grove Collaborative , Skillz , and TripleLift ) and 10 companies with $100M+ exits or recent valuations. Thirteen of these 15 companies were seeded pre-revenue, and many were at concept stage or had rudimentary early products.

LP 411

LP Early Stage Seed Stage Venture Capital 411

View from Seed

AUGUST 3, 2021

As seed stage investors here at NextView Ventures , we have the privilege of working with a wide profile of founders at the company conception stage — from early-career first time entrepreneurs , to seasoned execs turned founders , to repeat successful entrepreneurs.

Cofounder 156

Cofounder Seed Stage Portfolio Revenue 156

View from Seed

AUGUST 3, 2021

As seed stage investors here at NextView Ventures , we have the privilege of working with a wide profile of founders at the company conception stage — from early-career first time entrepreneurs , to seasoned execs turned founders , to repeat successful entrepreneurs.

Cofounder 156

Cofounder Seed Stage Revenue Acquisition 156

BeyondVC

JANUARY 29, 2017

Great blog post by CockroachDB on open source business models and their plans to make money: If you’re serious about building a company around open source software, you must walk a narrow path: introduce paid features too soon, and risk curtailing adoption. Optimizing for Price at Seed Stage is a Mistake.

Revenue 60

Revenue Developer Open Source Seed Stage 60

View from Seed

AUGUST 3, 2021

As seed stage investors here at NextView Ventures , we have the privilege of working with a wide profile of founders at the company conception stage — from early-career first time entrepreneurs , to seasoned execs turned founders , to repeat successful entrepreneurs.

Cofounder 136

Cofounder Seed Stage Portfolio Revenue 136

View from Seed

MARCH 22, 2016

Even if you’re in the pre-revenue, pre-seed or seed stage, there are still ways to get on a reporter’s radar. That means avoiding a pitch to a software-centric publication about your biotech startup. Similarly, releasing your software or, worse still, putting out that Version 2.0 Start the presses! …

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage San Francisco Startup CTO Hire 120

BeyondVC

JANUARY 3, 2019

No matter what economic cycle we go through, Fortune 500 companies need to invest in software.”. Designing software with a privacy-first mentality becomes a core theme in 2019. The 10 year bull market where every company’s revenue chart is up and to the right is over. Fortune December 2019 Investor Roundtable.

Stealth 79

Stealth Advisory Board Cloud Virginia 79

Agile VC

APRIL 17, 2011

Kayak Software Corporation. How They Make Money: Majority of Kayak’s revenue actually comes from advertising on their site (55%), not lead generation or referral fees to travel suppliers as you might think (more on this below). Financial Snapshot: 2010 Revenue: $170 million. Distribution revenue is CPC and CPA. .

Pre-Money Valuation 113

Pre-Money Valuation Liquidation Preference Dividend Common Stock 113

View from Seed

APRIL 30, 2015

NVV: Let’s talk about the seed stage specifically. With venture debt as a source of low-cost capital to fuel growth or buy time during later stages, should a founder approach their fundraising from VCs any differently today ? Traction and revenue? NVV: What do debt providers look for in a company’s track record?

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Term Sheet Equity Startup Seed Stage 120

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

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

You don’t need to buy expensive software – there are free open source solutions for nearly everything. 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. Price MUST be in a certain range.

LP 311

LP Technical Review Early Stage Silicon Valley 311

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2011

If you are new to the entrepreneurial world of startups, you are likely confused by the terminology of seed-stage, lean startups, micro-VCs, and Super Angels. Seed-stage means promising companies that don’t yet have a revenue stream, and may not yet have a proof of concept. Series-seed round. Super Angels.

Early Stage 231

Early Stage Seed Stage Angel Investor Silicon Valley 231

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 16, 2012

If you are new to the entrepreneurial world of startups, you are likely confused by the terminology of seed-stage, lean startups, micro-VCs, and Super Angels. Seed-stage means promising companies that don’t yet have a revenue stream, and may not yet have a proof of concept. Series-seed round. Super Angels.

Early Stage 253

Early Stage Finance Seed Stage Entrepreneur 253

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. However, our overall goal is to invest in the full spectrum of seed. Belief #1: The best time to invest is early.

North America 36

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 36

View from Seed

MARCH 19, 2015

He’s dubbed the approach “ pretotyping ,” and it shares many of the same principles as both its similar-sounding (if later-stage) cousin, prototyping, as well as the more well-known lean startup movement. ” So I left Google to do another startup, Agitar Software. Another success. So I thought, “I am good!”

Product 120

Product Technical Review Marketing Lean 120

Gust

JULY 8, 2012

If you are new to the entrepreneurial world of startups, you are likely confused by the terminology of seed-stage, lean startups, micro-VCs, and Super Angels. Seed-stage means promising companies that don’t yet have a revenue stream, and may not yet have a proof of concept. Series-seed round. Super Angels.

Early Stage 177

Early Stage Finance Seed Stage Entrepreneur 177

Genuine VC

JANUARY 3, 2013

According to all of the blogosphere chatter over the past month, seed-funded internet startups are entering this year gearing up for the now-near-infamous Series A Crunch. to become not just ramen-profitable, but sustainably profitable. In the end, just as always: startups are risky and a majority of them do not survive.

Seed Stage 166

Seed Stage Venture Capital Audience New York 166

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 27, 2024

A founder asked me what makes a $2M round “pre-seed”? especially if the startup already has a product and revenue? And why do we still sometimes hear about pre-seed rounds that look more like a series A in pricing and size? So far there’s not much that has changed, so why should pre-seed look any different in 2024?

Valuation 186

Valuation Software Review Generative AI Technical Review 186

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

FEBRUARY 26, 2010

I'm a mentor and investor in CapitalFactory , a seed-stage startup mentorship program in Austin, TX. Twenty entrepreneurs who have actually been in your shoes — creating companies from scratch, growing to millions in revenue, and often selling them. No posers, no one who was "there for the ride." Present at Demo Day.

Seed Stage 211

Seed Stage Startup PR Programming 211

Diego Basch

MARCH 14, 2013

I avoid the entertainment industry, and anything where the revenue stream is based on advertising. As an electrical engineer and software developer with decades of experience building internet infrastructure, there are certain areas where I believe I could contribute much more than the puny sums that I can invest.

San Francisco 55

San Francisco Startup Silicon Valley Seed Stage 55

Gust

OCTOBER 16, 2012

This summer I conducted our third annual survey of the pre-money valuation of pre-revenue companies recently funded by angel groups in North America. For the first time, we asked for data from specific business sectors, as follows: All pre-revenue deals. Pre-revenue life Science, biotech and medical device deals. Organization.

Angel Groups 169

Angel Groups Valuation Pre-Money Valuation North Dakota 169

K9 Ventures

OCTOBER 10, 2017

A Seed round today — like the Series A round of yesteryear — requires some kind of traction or product. In contrast, you *don’t* need much to qualify as a Pre-Seed stage company. Pre-Seed investors should *not* be looking for any kind of traction. It is no longer cheap to start a software company.

Seed Stage 82

Seed Stage Finance Later Stage Equity 82

View from Seed

JANUARY 26, 2016

In the next post, I’ll talk about how we think about pre-seeds at NextView. It’s become increasingly common for startups to raise several seed rounds, and this has led to a bifurcation in the seed stage between what are known as “pre-seed” (or “genesis”) and institutional seed rounds.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Early Stage Cofounder Finance 120

Agile VC

JANUARY 27, 2012

Something has clearly changed within the last 5-6 years in terms of the speed with which monster startups are created in the software and internet space. Multi-billion dollar valuations for late stage startups like Dropbox, et al. I co-founded NextView Ventures , a seed-stage VC firm based in Boston, in 2010.

Hockey Stick 113

Hockey Stick Seed Stage Silicon Valley Syndicate 113

View from Seed

MARCH 16, 2016

Look out for bootstrapped CarGurus , one of the leading used-car properties, targeting over $150M in revenue this year. This group includes firms like Hyperplane , focused on machine learning, and Procyon Ventures , focused on next-gen infrastructure, machine learning, and the IoT software spaces. Want the next TripAdvisor or Wayfair?

Boston 215

Boston Early Stage Artificial Inteligence Semantic 215

Agile VC

AUGUST 22, 2011

But the reality is that most software-based startups aren’t really platforms. A software platform is truly a foundation on which entire businesses can be built. I co-founded NextView Ventures , a seed-stage VC firm based in Boston, in 2010. Simply having an API doesn’t make your company a platform.

Silicon Valley 113

Silicon Valley Seed Stage Startup Syndicate 113

BeyondVC

FEBRUARY 12, 2014

BOLDstart helps founders at the seed stage accelerate their growth from idea/ alpha phase to product market fit and successful Series A round. helps founders at the seed stage accelerate their growth from idea/ alpha phase to product market fit and successful Series A round”.

Seed Stage 110

Seed Stage Agile Viral API 110

Agile VC

MARCH 8, 2012

The secondary wave of VC-backed IPOs has also come to fruition… both consumer facing (Yelp, Demand Media, Pandora, Carbonite, HomeAway, Angie’s List, et al) and B2B (Jive Software, Brightcove, Imperva, Responsys, etc). I remember when it was a rare, extraordinary thing for a software/internet startup to even file an S-1.

IPO 100

IPO Silicon Valley Revenue Seed Stage 100

View from Seed

JUNE 30, 2015

Over a third of our investments happen pre-product (so by definition, before PMF), and two-thirds are pre-revenue. Does that mean we are invest “pre-seed”? Does this mean we are an “institutional seed fund”? FWIW, at NextView, we invest from inception to strong PMF.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Syndicate Syndication Dilution 120

Agile VC

DECEMBER 5, 2011

Objective Logistics has created a game layer on top of very sophisticated scheduling algorithms which increase revenue, save time, and improve customer and staff satisfaction. Part lives in the cloud and part is embedded in point of sale (POS) software systems. We’re psyched to help in whatever small ways we can. Author howerl.

Silicon Valley 100

Silicon Valley Seed Stage Syndicate Syndication 100

Mucker Lab

APRIL 6, 2023

If you work in B2C or e-commerce, you optimize that Add to Cart flow like crazy because that is your revenue. For example, Amplitude is a product analytics software. You still have a revenue goal to hit this quarter, something like that. And they already know the software so you just need to negotiate price.

Product 78

Product CTO Hire Startup Fractional CTO 78

adamac.blogspot.com

MARCH 9, 2010

Adam MacBeth Tuesday, April 07, 2009 10 Startup Red Flags Ive worked on a number of startups: from seed-stage through IPO, as a founder, employee, advisor, and consultant, as well as evaluating a bunch from the outside, so Ive seen my share of screw-ups. Adamac Attack! Thats a REALLY bad sign. Well, its not a joke.

Technical Review 41

Technical Review CTO Hire Fractional CTO Startup 41

Steve Blank

AUGUST 27, 2009

Yet we used the product development model not only to manage product development, but as a road map for finding customers and to time our marketing launch and sales revenue plan. We’ll look at the model stage-by-stage. Product Development In stage two, product development, everyone stops talking and starts working.

Silicon Valley 260

Silicon Valley Product Startup Product Development 260

Agile VC

MAY 23, 2012

E-commerce accounts for the vast majority of LL Bean’s revenue today ( it crossed 50% in 2010 though was as low as 15% in 2000 ), but because LL Bean is over a hundred years old and started as catalog & physical store retailer we typically don’t refer to it as an internet company. It means that for quite a while (e.g.

Internet 182

Internet Silicon Valley IPO Seed Stage 182

Hippoland

OCTOBER 16, 2016

But, most early stage investors probably think along similar lines: 1) Super high tech companies 2) High infrastructure companies 3) Free consumer apps 4) Everything else — aka companies that can make money immediately Also, there is a lot to say in each category, but there isn’t enough space in this blog post to do so here.

Startup 48

Startup Vertical Early Stage Bootstrapping 48

ReadWriteStart

OCTOBER 20, 2011

He talked about everything from raising funding for pre-seed entrepreneurs to get them to the seed stage, crowd funding, social media marketing and open source. I reminded him that commercial open source is a classic freemium model, where the free software comes with paid customer support and training.

Massachusetts 113

Massachusetts Entrepreneur Open Source Silicon Valley 113

Jeff Hilimire

AUGUST 30, 2013

While I’ve loved working in digital marketing, I’ve always wanted to try my hand at building software for actual people rather than for companies. And I’ve been dying to get my hands back into a true startup. Backed by his $5 million Atlanta Ventures fund, Cummings hopes to “de-risk” such investments.

Atlanta 77

Atlanta B2C Georgia Los Angeles 77