Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

One of them used to be a lead developer at [insert hot consumer tech company here]. Early customer development talks are going great which keeps the team really excited. Three months in, the burn is now at $70k/month. At month six, one of the early hires leaves, a developer who turns out wasn’t a good fit.

Burn Rate 152

Burn Rate Equity Software Review Early Stage 152

crowdSPRING Blog

SEPTEMBER 19, 2014

Inside the Mind of a Technical Founder | OpenView Blog by Larry Kim – crowdspring.co/1u7Fz1b. Are startup burn rates out of control? Livescribe Notebooks by Moleskine marry analog and digital technology – crowdspring.co/1lYTFTX. The Myth of Venture Capital | Re/code by Jon Oringer – crowdspring.co/1tNFeV7.

Social Media 94

Social Media Small Business Design Media 94

Tim Keane

DECEMBER 14, 2009

  Paul goes on to develop the story of "vanilla" documents prepared by the angel's attorney.    When this happens, (due in part to the need to keep fees low) things get both left out and included that later wisdom will suggest should've been included or left out.    Yup. 

Burn Rate 60

Burn Rate Angel Groups Seed Stage Startup 60

Professor VC

SEPTEMBER 26, 2011

Dan Frommer, in Moneyball for tech startups , interviewed Fred Wilson, Chris Dixon, Paul Graham and Ben Horowitz on the topic. And given that four of the most important tech investors in the world seem skeptical of it, if someone can figure out a good formula that works, they may be able to exploit it". How Much Diligence is Due.

Technical Review 38

Technical Review Early Stage San Jose Angel Investor 38

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 7, 2016

Way back in the early eighties, I was privileged to be part of the original IBM PC development team, led by Don Estridge. For IBM, the Personal Computer was a paradigm shift from their big business legacy, built with new technologies for totally new markets, and battleships turn very slowly.

Technical Review 214

Technical Review Entrepreneur Silicon Valley Burn Rate 214

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 6, 2020

Then he started a company called PostEra, which uses machine learning to identify promising compounds for new drug development. They've collected and sorted thousands of possible compounds, and now have multiple drugs in development in a lab in the UK. As Alpha explained, it's "not in any way tied to PostEra's commercial operations.

Artificial Inteligence 60

Artificial Inteligence Open Source Cofounder Design 60

Professor VC

SEPTEMBER 16, 2010

DEMO has always been one of my favorite tech conferences. Labels: #democon , DEMO , tech conferences , vuvuzela. How Much Diligence is Due. I take CFO roles in early stage companies and participate on the management team during the early financings and business model development phases. All product, all the time.

Technical Review 38

Technical Review San Jose Angel Investor Silicon Valley 38

Professor VC

APRIL 7, 2011

Technically, the start-up is insolvent from the day they take the first dollar of investment. How Much Diligence is Due. I take CFO roles in early stage companies and participate on the management team during the early financings and business model development phases. Why Invest in an insolvent company? ► January.

San Jose 36

San Jose Technical Review Angel Investor Valuation 36

Professor VC

DECEMBER 18, 2008

Some have developed working prototypes, while others are still at the concept stage and only on posterboard. This team had a working prototype of the first solar powered wetsuit using nano-solar technology. She has developed a new twist on the micro-lending concept. How Much Diligence is Due. Steve Bennet.

San Jose 28

San Jose Silicon Valley Technical Review Angel Investor 28

Professor VC

FEBRUARY 26, 2008

He was the first American in 30 years to graduate from the 5-year brewing program at the Technical University of Munich , the highest technical degree in brewing engineering. How Much Diligence is Due. Why I Hate Convertible Debt.Let Me Count the Way. ► February. (1). A Lot of Horn Tooting over a Kazoo sized deal.

Technical Review 28

Technical Review San Jose Angel Investor Silicon Valley 28

Professor VC

JANUARY 27, 2008

During the next four months, we will examine over a dozen entrepreneurial ventures from a diverse mix of industries - technology, service, food & beverage, and fashion. After a successful career in a technology leader (Intel, Microsoft, Cisco, etc.) How Much Diligence is Due. ► February. (1). ► January. (1).

San Jose 28

San Jose Technical Review Angel Investor Venture Capital 28

Professor VC

FEBRUARY 12, 2008

Of course, rigorous diligence is performed, the team is challenged, and assumptions are tested. I first met Jeff about 8 years ago when he was finishing his first year at the Stanford GSB and was beginning to raise money for a business plan he developed for a secondary market ticket exchange. How Much Diligence is Due.

San Jose 31

San Jose Technical Review Venture Capital Angel Investor 31

Professor VC

JUNE 6, 2008

In most of these cases, the founder relinquished the CEO role within the first 18 months following institutional funding, but remained in a critical technical or visionary role, often as the companys external evangelist. How Much Diligence is Due. Why I Hate Convertible Debt.Let Me Count the Way. ► February. (1).

San Jose 28

San Jose Technical Review Norway Angel Investor 28

pandodaily.com

JULY 18, 2012

But it’s possible that as the secret sauce of new media swings farther from disruptive technology and business models to a focus on curated and quality content, it’s the older entrepreneurs who are in the pole position. That aesthetic took decades to develop. “This one is just so much fun.” 25 comments.

Entrepreneur 45

Entrepreneur San Francisco Silicon Valley Technical Review 45

Transformify

AUGUST 27, 2017

Their investors may push them into that direction too, as the high burn rate is often seen as a prerequisite for high growth. You don’t have the right people on board, you are burning cash and the work is not done, at its worst, your product is already live and you are losing clients due to software bugs and poor user experience.

Hiring 64

Hiring Software Review Burn Rate Startup 64

Professor VC

SEPTEMBER 16, 2008

A: Technology companies and Drug dealers While the fall semester is in full swing, summer doesnt officially end for another few days. I do have one investment in a company that has developed a platform for in game mobile advertising - Greystripe. How Much Diligence is Due. Why I Hate Convertible Debt.Let Me Count the Way.

San Jose 28

San Jose Technical Review Angel Investor Silicon Valley 28

Professor VC

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

I'm doing a new academic experiment now - an incubator at Menlo College where we are bringing the start-ups to campus and giving the students an opportunity to see how they develop and work as interns. How Much Diligence is Due. Will write about this in an upcoming post. November 11, 2010 1:56 PM. Lafayette Jefferson said.

San Jose 43

San Jose Silicon Valley Las Vegas Venture Capital 43

Steve Blank

APRIL 20, 2009

Berkeley Haas Business School was courageous enough to give me a forum teach the Customer Development Methodology. There is a earlier phase *prior to Vacuum Tubes* in Santa Clara Valley tech history as well involving Federal Telegraph and “Federal-Poulsen Arc Converter&# radio transmitter. Who would have known? Good link BTW!

Silicon Valley 294

Silicon Valley RSS San Francisco Technical Review 294

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

I wassurprised recently when I realized that all the worst problems wefaced in our startup were due not to competitors, but investors.Dealing with competitors was easy by comparison. Then you can gradually transformyourself from a consulting company into a product company, and haveyour clients pay your development expenses.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

techcrunch.com

FEBRUARY 26, 2013

He knows how to advise entrepreneurs on hiring/firing, running teams, managing funding, when/how to control burn rate, and making other tough management decisions in the real environment of startups. Good board members also bring different skills and points of view, developed though years of experiences (and failures).

Burn Rate 87

Burn Rate Hiring Engineer Entrepreneur 87

www.chubbybrain.com

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

Also worth a read after you review these startup failure post-mortems. A month ago, half way through my angel funds raised from family members, I decided to review the progress I’ve made and figure out what still needs to happen to make this a viable business. We focused too much on technology. Too much PR, too early.

Software Review 79

Software Review Startup Technical Review Vesting 79

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 6, 2011

R&D outside SV is normally cheaper, so it helps you keeping your burn rate low. How do you review documents in non-english languages, where structures can be quite different from what we are used to in the US? Start with a short (a few weeks) trip to SV and attend all the tech events there. Network and talk to people.

Silicon Valley 104

Silicon Valley Startup Seed Stage Delaware 104

Professor VC

OCTOBER 11, 2010

While the flick has gotten rave critical reviews (93% on Flixster), the question of what percentage of the movie is true has also gotten a lot of discussion in the blogosphere. This is a good review of the movie and both books. How Much Diligence is Due. The last blogger in Silicon Valley. Monday, October 11, 2010.

Social Network 28

Social Network Networking Software Review San Jose 28

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 30, 2009

Build a world-class technology platform, with patent-pending algorithms and the ability to scale to millions of simultaneous users. Without conscious process design, product development teams turn lines of code written into momentum in a certain direction. This is why agility is such a prized quality in product development.

San Francisco 150

San Francisco Lean Agile Continuous Deployment 150