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Top Hat Raises $22.5M Series C in a Tough Vertical: What Can We Learn from their Success

Version One Ventures

This funding is big news, particularly since 2016 was a weak year for Ed Tech funding. Generally speaking, Ed Tech has proven to be a tough vertical, primarily due to the fact that it’s hard to charge consumers (students) directly. Series C in a Tough Vertical: What Can We Learn from their Success appeared first on Version One.

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2016 VC Half-Thoughts: The Industry Has Shifted Back to Investing in Technology, Not Business Models

Hunter Walker

Observing a handful of companies, such as Uber, Airbnb, Warby Parker, founders were taking those models and trying to apply them to other verticals. A ton of private label vertical commerce. They were making an assumption about the team, business model and operating excellence. Labor marketplaces for a variety of professions.

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How to value your SaaS company

VC Adventure

So no surprise that when River Cities Capital released an overview of SaaS operating and valuation benchmarks, I hung on every juicy detail. They took the 92 public SaaS companies and analyzed their key operating metrics. In 2016 there were over 2,000 financing rounds of private SaaS companies ($18.5Bn invested).

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How Boards Need to Evolve Over Time

Both Sides of the Table

Reviewing financial & operational performance. By bringing in an industry player with startup DNA we brought somebody that could push the team much harder on how their value prop would resonate (or not) with customers, which verticals to target our offering to and importantly what others solutions were in the market and how we stacked up.

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Spectacles and $SNAP’s $20B Valuation

Austin Startup

User Growth Snap’s user growth came to a near stop after Instagram launched a direct clone called Stories in September of 2016: Snap’s daily active users grew just 3% in Q4 2016. The smartphone is for everyone, we don’t have to think the iPhone is about a certain demographic, or country or vertical market: it’s for everyone.

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How Lemming VCs Cause Venture Recessions

Mucker Lab

The “venture recession” of 2016 is in full swing. Vertical integration of different funding risks. I also believe that the ebb and flow of the venture investment cycle has been exacerbated by the recent vertical integration of early, growth, and even late stage venture funds. The average (or even above average) horse never wins.

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Demo day arrives for Springboard’s Internet of Things accelerator

The Next Web

The eighth is currently operating in stealth mode (yes, even on demo day) but we’re digging to find out more about them. The company said it also has other products in the pipeline that “do the same magic” for other verticals, including using crowd-sourced data and environmental protection. TOPPOT wants to change the way you cook.

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