View from Seed

APRIL 30, 2019

2019 is off to an exciting start for IPOs of VC-backed startups. All three have different business models… SaaS, media/ad, and consumer transactional. All three are impressive and valuable businesses in their own right. Google was a one such company when they went public in 2004 and Facebook was too at their 2012 IPO.

IPO 180

IPO B2B B2C Institutional Investors 180

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. So what would a search process for a business model look like? In 2004 I funded IMVU, a startup by Will Harvey and Eric Ries.

Lean 288

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 288

Steve Blank

APRIL 29, 2010

Berkeley’s Haas Business School since the fall of 2004 and in a joint MBA with Columbia since 2005. Back in 2004, Jerry Engel the head of the Entreprenuership program at Haas Business School at U.C. While the Customer Development class was cutting edge theory in 2004, by 2009 the class was getting stale.

Customer Development 227

Customer Development Lean Developer Customer 227

BeyondVC

FEBRUARY 4, 2009

" I first started using Phanfare in late 2004 and have been a fan since.    Andrew and I go way back as I invested in his first startup, Flashbase, which we subsequently sold to Doubleclick a year later.    And now Phanfare has staked its claim in the mobile market with its iPhone app ( get it here ). 

Caching 60

Caching Software Review Mobile Distribution 60

Growthink Blog

NOVEMBER 15, 2010

Not mentioned in the movie is the unbelievable story of a Peter Thiel one of the founders of PayPal investing $500,000 in 2004 in exchange for approximately 5% of Facebook. Through this professional and personal network, Thiel sees lots of great startups. At a current U.S. Most of them are duds, but a few are world-beaters.

Social Network 72

Social Network Networking Technical Review Flash 72

YoungUpstarts

DECEMBER 5, 2013

I have been involved in many of these innovations, mainly through my last startup venture, a company that became the world’s leading provider of credit card loyalty solutions with bank customers in 30 countries. Loyalty experts will swear this is not true, and will use complex models to demonstrate ROI of their systems.

Programming 150

Programming Turkey Social Media Redemption 150

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 13, 2012

For years, the most desirable exit strategy for startup companies was to go public through an initial public offering. Today, many startups are succumbing to the temptation to sell their companies early. A review of recent case studies from similar startups may make this decision a little easier. Questionable business model.

IPO 162

IPO Exit Strategy San Francisco Startup 162

Agile VC

APRIL 30, 2019

2019 is off to an exciting start for IPOs of VC-backed startups. All three have different business models… SaaS, media/ad, and consumer transactional. All three are impressive and valuable businesses in their own right. Google was a one such company when they went public in 2004 and Facebook was too at their 2012 IPO.

IPO 100

IPO B2B B2C Institutional Investors 100

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. So what would a search process for a business model look like? In 2004 I funded IMVU, a startup by Will Harvey and Eric Ries.

Lean 180

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 180

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 9, 2022

2) Do you sell something that isn’t truly a must-have product to startups or other tech companies? If your business model literally can’t work without you raising $50-100mm more, then you’re playing a pretty dangerous game that was always obviously heavily reliant on friendly capital markets that might disappear.

Stock 97

Stock Marketing Valuation Later Stage 97

Scalable Startup

AUGUST 26, 2014

Red Hat was one of the first of these types of companies bridging open source with big finance, leveraging Linux support into a profitable business, also leveraging the enterprise. They kind of invented this business model. Google has optimized this open source to freemium model in almost all of its products.

Founder 42

Founder Los Angeles PHP Open Source 42

ReadWriteStart

NOVEMBER 5, 2019

As an entrepreneur, you have probably heard or read the “maxim” that only 10% of startups are successful, but is this true? Fortune published an article titled , Conventional Wisdom Says, 90% of Startups Fail. Having a good product but a wrong business model. Data Says Otherwise. Why do so many companies fail?

Venture Capital 77

Venture Capital Cofounder Finance United States 77

Reid Hoffman

MARCH 19, 2019

What makes this tricky is that markets evolve, and an innovative technology or business model can transform a normal market into a Glengarry Glen Ross market. In it we explicitly state: “The real value creation comes when innovative technology enables innovative products and services with innovative business models….What

Cofounder 28

Cofounder Business Model IPO Non-Compete 28

BeyondVC

JUNE 2, 2004

Rather than go into the software (which I really like btw, combination RSS reader, bookmark manager, and simple collaboration tool), I wanted to share some of our thoughts about consumer-based web businesses circa 2004. The post Web-based businesses circa 2004 appeared first on BeyondVC.

Web 60

Web XML Guerilla RSS 60

VC Cafe

MARCH 4, 2024

Since I’ve started writing about Israeli startups in 2004, there has never been any event like October 7 and the war that followed. Now, 150 days after October 7th, the Israeli startup ecosystem is once again in a tough spot. Creating companies, raising funding, completing multi million M&A deals.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Cofounder Venture Capital 78

reidhoffman.org

NOVEMBER 12, 2013

What I’ve honorably been able to do, however, is share the deck I used to pitch LinkedIn to Greylock for a Series B investment back in 2004. the consumer internet landscape in 2004 vs. today. In 2004, the consumer internet was just beginning to rebound. In 2004, investors regained interest in the consumer internet again.

Entrepreneur 111

Entrepreneur Revenue Viral Networking 111

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2010

This lasted from about 2001-2004. It’s basically office space where as a startup you can be located with dozens of other companies at a similar stage to your own. I’ve already started the business modeling. I spent a couple of days hanging out in DogPatch San Francisco and I was both impressed and envious.

San Francisco 230

San Francisco Los Angeles Cofounder SMS 230

This is going to be BIG.

DECEMBER 26, 2011

(PS.there are various companies in this article I have or have had business involvements with. 2004 gave us widespread blogging and Meetups, and 2008 showed how the web could be a community organizing and fundraising tool. What's the business model? Reader beware.). Open Government.

Technology 128

Technology Valuation Community Restful 128

Up and Running

MARCH 2, 2015

So what’s his advice for startups? Just get on and do it, but do so with realistic income and cost forecasts,” he advises, “On the whole it’s wise to halve your income expectations and double your costs – if it still works then you have a chance at making your business work.”. For the love of business.

Indonesia 60

Indonesia Cofounder Forecast Government 60

ConversionXL

SEPTEMBER 28, 2017

It is also important to ask yourself the question: can my business realistically expect to acquire customers for considerably less than the amount that I can monetize them?”. When a model is balanced, it looks like this: Courtesy of Forentrepreneurs.com. Calculating LTV depends on your business model.

Metrics 121

Metrics Acquisition Conversion Revenue 121

Campus Entrepreneurship

OCTOBER 19, 2010

Bra guy” is a relatively new gig for Ohly, dating back to about 2004, when his MBA classmate and now Zyrra co-founder Christi Andersen mentioned that there was a pervasive problem with bra fit. So Ohly, who says he was overwhelmed by the number of women sharing Andersen’s gripes, set out in the bra business.

Software 37

Software Angel Financing Cofounder Finance 37

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?” An example of such a business is Salesforce, which defined a new category for SaaS and continues to be a benchmark for SaaS companies to follow.

Valuation 36

Valuation Balance Sheet Cofounder Forecast 36

www.chubbybrain.com

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

25 Best Startup Failure Post-Mortems of All Time. Update – As a followup, we analyzed all of these startup failure post-mortems to identify the top 20 reasons for startup failure. Also worth a read after you review these startup failure post-mortems. Post-Mortem Title : How My Startup Failed.

Software Review 79

Software Review Startup Technical Review Vesting 79

Austin Startup

MAY 14, 2019

Its founder, John McGann, discussed the community and productivity aspects of the space in this article from 2004 : “People are here to work. If you work remotely for a company five days a week, or you operate your own business that doesn’t need its own private office yet, a dedicated desk could be an ideal option for you.

Austin 48

Austin Community Networking America 48

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 16, 2012

TripAdvisor may be one of the most fascinating companies I know and so I was excited to dig into their business model as part of my series on scaling. TripAdvisor is more of a classic consumer Internet success story, but with even more powerful network effects and an amazing business model. Really hard. Magical, really.

Part-Time VPE 54

Part-Time VPE Software Review Costa Rica Technical Review 54

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 1, 2011

Mike Yavonditte is the founder of the “super hot&# Hashable , a startup out of NYC that has been described as a “ Mint.com for Social Capital ” Mike sold his previous company, Quigo , to Aol for $340 Million. Of course, monetization of search became one of the best business models in the history of business.

Semantic 302

Semantic Acquisition Valuation Angel Investor 302

The Startup Magazine

MAY 3, 2024

A business that still holds fundamental value today. The UN’s 2004 “Who Cares Wins” report was a major milestone, but it wasn’t until The Paris Agreement in 2015 that ESG took center stage, pushing companies to focus on environmental impact.

Artificial Inteligence 147

Artificial Inteligence Technical Review Software Review Cloud 147

ConversionXL

APRIL 24, 2019

Until 2004, when the U.S. A startup taxi service needs hundreds of drivers in a city before wait times can compete with Uber. A business model that requires a strong network effect is a long play. It’s one that many venture capital–funded startups deploy. If you left your provider, you lost your phone number.

Non-Compete 122

Non-Compete United States Networking Acquisition 122

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 3, 2011

We’ve hung out periodically over the past few years and I have enjoyed debating many startup topics. How did the Introduction of YouTube affect your business? JibJab has an ad model that relied on exclusive distribution deals with the big portals. Yesterday’s show floored me. It changed everything.

Viral 303

Viral Investment Bankers Video Business Model 303

Software By Rob

AUGUST 18, 2010

Join nearly 6,000 startup entrepreneurs by subscribing to my RSS feed. August 18th, 2010 | Micropreneurship , Startups Building your startup? Follow me Startups for the Rest of Us. If youre trying to grow your startup youve come to the right place. Rob, frankly I’m surprised you’re endorsing this business model.&#

Software Review 78

Software Review Software Revenue Cofounder 78

thebarefootvc

MARCH 5, 2017

Roomba vacuums, launched in 2004, are an example. Many of these teams are focused on sectors such as financial services and healthcare, which already have large data sets to build upon, and which can benefit from the aggregation and analysis of that data to create new services or business models in these sectors.

Artificial Inteligence 84

Artificial Inteligence Algorithm Valuation Aggregator 84

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 6, 2012

Ten years ago I started thinking about why startups are different from existing companies. I wondered if business plans and 5-year forecasts were the right way to plan a startup. Experienced entrepreneurs kept finding that no business plan survived first contact with customers. He called it the “Lean Startup.”.

Lean 318

Lean Georgia Michigan Business Model 318