Tim Keane

JANUARY 12, 2010

Term-sheets and Valuations: Thinking about Negotiations.   I’ve sat down with entrepreneurs and a copy of a term sheet guide I like [ “Term Sheets & Valuations - A Line by Line Look at the Intricacies of Venture Capital Term Sheets & Valuations ” by Alex Wilmerding, Aspatore Press.] The Valuation Question.

Term Sheet 68

Term Sheet Valuation Dividend Liquidation Preference 68

thebarefootvc

JANUARY 27, 2014

Do I think we are in a valuation bubble? I think that later stage valuations are frothy (for reasons I explain below) while earlier stage valuations are starting to stabilize from previous highs (with the exception of the superstar serial entrepreneur) - turns out scaling in a sea of competition (both startup and entrenched) is not so easy.

Technical Review 63

Technical Review Valuation Venture Capital Investment Bankers 63

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 2, 2019

If you are an aspiring entrepreneur, or an existing business, and haven’t yet sized any of these opportunities, you may be already late to the game. Usually these are revenue-generating e-commerce sites, or have the potential to be revenue-generating. Community means more than supply and demand.

Cuba 246

Cuba Venture Capital Community Valuation 246

The Startup Magazine

JUNE 1, 2023

We’re hitting record revenue months, weeks, and margins. There are currently tons of “zombie” startups that have runway, but growth has slowed and they have valuations that they won’t be able to grow into. And they probably never will be unless business model viability is reassessed across the board.

Early Stage 115

Early Stage Los Angeles Silicon Valley Cofounder 115

Version One Ventures

OCTOBER 15, 2020

And >40% of that revenue is coming from in-game purchases. P2P exchanges like HodlHodl were early adopters of Lightning, but have put the project on “hodl” while waiting for more consumer demand and technology advancements. For major games like Fortnite, it may make sense to have their own internal game currency. At least not yet.

Networking 168

Networking Global OTC Security 168

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 19, 2018

For example, if you have a proven product, real revenue, a big potential market, and are ready to scale up the business, every investor will be interested. At this point, most Angel investors and a few early-stage VCs will be happy to talk, assuming you have the business model validated, and a large opportunity.

Angel Investor 184

Angel Investor Intellectual Property Investment Bankers Private Equity 184

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, September 22, 2008 The three drivers of growth for your business model. The AARRR model (hence pirates, get it?) He also has a discussion of how your choice of business model determines which of these metric areas you want to focus on. Choose one.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 4, 2014

For example, if you have a proven product, real revenue, a big potential market, and are ready to scale up the business, every investor will be interested. At this point, most Angel investors and a few early-stage VCs will be happy to talk, assuming you have the business model validated, and a large opportunity.

Angel Investor 232

Angel Investor Intellectual Property Investment Bankers Private Equity 232

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 22, 2016

According to most experts , business traction is evidence that somebody really wants your product. It’s business momentum, independent of whether you have a product delivered, proven the business model, or significantly penetrated the opportunity. Validate every key element of your business model.

Metrics 143

Metrics Advisory Board Startup Lean 143

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

Many of the creator economy startups have conjured different ways for creators to generate revenue outside of advertising, which has been the bread and butter of ‘influencer’ platforms like Instagram, Youtube, TikTok etc. “The Creator economy is in crisis, now lets fix it”, Li Jin’s newsletter.

Startup 207

Startup Social Media Venture Capital Audio 207

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 9, 2022

5) Is the post-money on your last round north of $30mm and you’ve yet to show meaningful and repeatable revenue traction that comes with positive contribution margins? So, yeah, that’s going to come down—especially because they likely got over their skis on valuation. 3) Do you need to raise a large amount of growth capital in 2022?

Stock 97

Stock Marketing Valuation Later Stage 97

Steve Blank

MARCH 18, 2011

The signals are loud and clear : seed and late stage valuations are getting frothy and wacky, and hiring talent in Silicon Valley is the toughest it has been since the dot.com bubble. VC’s worked with entrepreneurs to build profitable and scalable businesses, with increasing revenue and consistent profitability – quarter after quarter.

Internet 335

Internet IPO Silicon Valley Agile 335

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 13, 2016

For example, if you have a proven product, real revenue, a big potential market, and are ready to scale up the business, every investor will be interested. At this point, most Angel investors and a few early-stage VCs will be happy to talk, assuming you have the business model validated, and a large opportunity.

Matching 120

Matching Angel Investor Intellectual Property Investment Bankers 120

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 8, 2016

Remember you can’t sustain a business or social cause with no revenue or profit. Validate your business model on real customers. Giving free beta copies of your solution to customers to elicit testimonials does not validate a business model. Be able to differentiate your offering from competitors.

Intellectual Property 120

Intellectual Property Entrepreneur Elevator Pitch Exit Strategy 120

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 5, 2013

At this stage you were expecting to be working on creating a good business valuation to attract future buyers, or at least funding college accounts for your kids. Maintenance contracts are another great way to create a brand-new revenue stream. Streamline management costs. But don’t worry. Marty Zwilling.

Entrepreneur 234

Entrepreneur Vertical Reputation Valuation 234

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 11, 2016

If you are an aspiring entrepreneur, or an existing business, and haven’t yet sized any of these opportunities, you may be already late to the game. Usually these are revenue-generating e-commerce sites, or have the potential to be revenue-generating. Community means more than supply and demand.

Cuba 120

Cuba Marketing Venture Capital Community 120

Austin Startup

AUGUST 20, 2017

Keep the valuations consistent with company progress. The bottom line is that the pedigree of your investors will have much to do with your ultimate valuation and with your enjoyment of the startup experience. Do they perceive enough value to pay prices that create for you a profit margin that matches your business model?

Technical Review 48

Technical Review Software Review Cap Table Securities and Exchange Commission 48

Steve Blank

APRIL 1, 2020

But other businesses like law firms, contracting firms, real estate firms, will take hits, too. Your revenue plans are no longer valid. What’s your monthly cash burn at your new low revenue level? Others are cutting their valuations. Days 3 and 4: Prepare new business model and operating plan.

South Korea 334

South Korea Salary Business Model China 334

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 6, 2012

At this stage you were expecting to be working on creating a good business valuation to attract future buyers, or at least funding college accounts for your kids. Maintenance contracts are another great way to create a brand-new revenue stream. Streamline management costs. But don’t worry. Marty Zwilling.

Startup 236

Startup Vertical Reputation Valuation 236

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 8, 2015

If you are an aspiring entrepreneur, or an existing business, and haven’t yet sized any of these opportunities, you may be already late to the game. Usually these are revenue-generating e-commerce sites, or have the potential to be revenue-generating. Community means more than supply and demand.

Cuba 120

Cuba Entrepreneur Venture Capital Community 120

www.forentrepreneurs.com

FEBRUARY 2, 2010

Business Model I would like to propose that in addition to team, product, and market, there is actually a fourth, equally important, core element of startups, which is the need for a viable business model. It appears that LTV should be about 3 x CAC for a viable SaaS or other form of recurring revenue model.

Acquisition 103

Acquisition Cost Customer Entrepreneur 103

Cracking the Code

NOVEMBER 13, 2008

Fifteen CFOs participated - about half of them from Bessemer portfolio SaaS companies (Cornerstone On Demand, Intacct. It is time to fix your key SaaS metrics: P&L: MRR = MRE: you control your destiny when your monthly revenue equals your monthly expenses Sales & Marketing: Your cost of capital doubled, so if a CAC ratio > 0.5

Software Review 48

Software Review Technical Review Valuation Portfolio 48

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 21, 2017

Revenue multiples, profit multiples, premium over the previous financing — these are metrics used by sellers to help determine a minimum acceptable price. Even for startups, it takes years for a new product to become good enough to demand many millions of dollars in revenue.). Yet mobile advertising revenues were paltry.

Balance Sheet 242

Balance Sheet Vertical Acquisition Revenue 242

Steve Blank

JANUARY 4, 2010

Now with customers and early revenue, it was out raising its first round of venture money. In fact, Google’s offer for $15 Million was equal to the highest valuation from the venture firms. They used Customer and Agile development to search for a scalable and repeatable business model to become a large company.

Hockey Stick 299

Hockey Stick Venture Capital Startup Cofounder 299

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 28, 2011

At this stage you were expecting to be working on creating a good business valuation to attract future buyers, or at least funding college accounts for your kids. Maintenance contracts are another great way to create a brand-new revenue stream. Streamline management costs. But don’t worry. Marty Zwilling.

Startup 230

Startup Vertical Reputation Valuation 230

Steve Blank

JULY 15, 2010

Most of the startups they invested in either died by running out of money before they found a scalable business model or ended up in the “land of the living dead” by never growing (failing to Pivot.). Until 1995 startups going public typically had a track record of revenue and profits. Startup lifecycle in an IPO Market.

Venture Capital 303

Venture Capital IPO Liquidity Event Entrepreneur 303

Lightspeed Venture Partners

OCTOBER 22, 2012

The company has gotten off to a fast start, $150k in revenue in the first two months, with all the marketing coming from social media. The founders have more demand than they know what to do with, and want to raise $55k for 5% equity in the company to buy a second truck. This implies a pre money valuation of $1.045M.

Pre-Money Valuation 101

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Dilution Differentiation 101

Tim Keane

JUNE 22, 2006

Testing to Increase Valuations. If lowered risk translates into higher valuations when the business either attracts investors or is sold, then lowering risk for the lowest possible dollars creates very high returns. If customer interest can be obtained in a live test involving revenue, valuation may rise again.

Valuation 60

Valuation Wisconsin Angel Investor Startup 60

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

Tim Friedman, Founder, PE Stack , said, “If I could offer one piece of advice to today’s managers, it would be to take the time to understand the demands of the modern institutional LP. Lean Case provides standard business models & metrics, so you can apply a standard approach to business planning, modeling, and profitability tracking.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Hearpreneur

AUGUST 5, 2020

The global automakers and suppliers will be adapting their business models accordingly, forming new partnerships and investing in new technologies. These businesses have had to completely reimagine their business models and will likely be pivoting for a long time to come. parents and students) remain engaged.

Technical Review 157

Technical Review Software Review Entrepreneur China 157

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 3, 2012

Facebook and Google would be obvious choices for this, but so much has been written about each of them and they represent such special business models, I worried that it would be both hard for entrepreneurs to relate and hard for me to develop new insights. The first year of revenue (1999) was $4 million – a remarkable achievement.

Distribution 49

Distribution Lean Massachusetts Cofounder 49

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Chasing funding versus chasing customers and a repeatable and scalable business model, is one reason startups fail. Is there a profitable business model? The Traditional VC Pitch Entrepreneurs who pursue the traditional product development model don’t have customer data to answer these questions. Can it scale?”

Customer Development 267

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 267

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

Most venture capitalists who have been in this business for a long time foresaw this correction and have been talking about it privately for the better part of the last year or two. I have been talking about my concerns about valuations for the past couple of years because, well, they’ve been rising very rapidly the past two years!

Valuation 150

Valuation Down Round Startup Later Stage 150

Up and Running

FEBRUARY 17, 2016

A new system might be subject to delays, especially if demand from other breweries is high, but you’ll be able to design to your needs and specifications, and you’ll have support when issues arise (and they will). There’s no one model—or one business plan—for breweries. Each brewery will have its own unique model and plan.

Oregon 60

Oregon Jordan SBA Cofounder 60

www.pakman.com

SEPTEMBER 27, 2012

At the scale of Facebook, you could have your users share almost anything and still be able to build a large business, purely by loading the site up with lots of advertising that is (at very least) rudimentary targeted. At that scale, you can reach billions of dollars in revenue. But they do $50B in revenue. Matt DeLoca.

Social Media 47

Social Media Vertical Advertising Distribution 47

Software By Rob

AUGUST 18, 2010

The only thing that seemed to be consistent about my growth was that my revenue was relatively flat while my user base kept growing. This turned out to be a good move since it doubled their revenue that month. He has a great stats page that shows everything from monthly revenue to the breakdown of users by plan type.

Software Review 78

Software Review Software Revenue Cofounder 78

Up and Running

MAY 15, 2019

A new system might be subject to delays, especially if demand from other breweries is high, but you’ll be able to design to your needs and specifications, and you’ll have support when issues arise (and they will). There’s no one model—or one business plan—for breweries. What you need to know about buying new.

Oregon 24

Oregon Jordan Software Review Distribution 24