Feld Thoughts

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

Once again, as we find ourselves in the middle of a significant public market correction, especially around technology stocks, there’s an enormous amount of noise in the system, as there always is. I have two simple rules for founders in my head from this experience. Go read it now – I’ll wait.

Cap Table 70

Cap Table Down Round Liquidation Preference Founder 70

Eric Friedman

NOVEMBER 18, 2022

I have had a few founder friends reach out to me asking about how much equity to give to an advisor, and had some operators reach out asking how to become an advisor for an early stage founder. I have been on both sides of the cap table of advisors. These advisors are somewhere in the 1%-3% range. Some are not.

Early Stage 103

Early Stage Equity Vesting Cap Table 103

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2016

It’s a very personal topic and I’d like to offer you a framework to decide for yourself, based on the following factors: How Long is it Taking to Raise Capital at Your Stage in the Market? And recaps hurt founders so often people just avoid doing them. How Complicated is Your Cap Table?

Burn Rate 150

Burn Rate Cap Table Valuation Software Review 150

Hearpreneur

AUGUST 20, 2023

#4- Find the right relationships Photo Credit: Mike Pio Roda “Never leave money on the table” might seem tempting, but it's not always the wisest path for founders and business owners. By remaining adaptable and responsive to feedback and market trends, I was able to make timely adjustments to my strategies and offerings.

Entrepreneur 76

Entrepreneur Cap Table Dividend Cofounder 76

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

From RBI, Flexible VCs borrow the ability to reap meaningful returns without demanding founders build for an exit. Every Flexible VC structure allows founders to access immediate risk capital while preserving exit, growth trajectory, and ownership optionality. . Flexible VC 102: Variations.

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

Hunter Walker

FEBRUARY 20, 2024

What Happens When TikTok Is Your Marketing Department [David Segal/New York Times] – Was it organic? Founder Vesting [Jared Hecht/USV] – Jared joined USV earlier this year and it’ll be interesting to see how his writing changes as he adds ‘institutional VC’ to his founder and angel investor knowledge.

Founder Vesting 59

Founder Vesting Vesting Cap Table Founder 59

Hunter Walker

JANUARY 2, 2017

” But we also knew that most Fortune 500 M&A transactions aren’t at unicorn levels (actually well sub-$250m), so we advise founders to not over-raise capital until they’re using it to fund profitable growth (or a clear path to profitability). OR, the team and/or investors will be ready to take their money off the table.

Technical Review 115

Technical Review Cap Table Acquisition Startup 115

Hunter Walker

MAY 13, 2023

I was on both sides of these transactions – buying startups for Google/YouTube and angel investing in high quality technical founders. Those who do, often believe they can hire from the open market without the hassle of an acquisition. Starting our venture fund Homebrew professionalized and scaled my insights into soft landings.

Early Stage 117

Early Stage Cap Table Acquisition Sales 117

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 18, 2016

Remember that investors at this stage have heard primarily from the founder, and only reviewed written business plans and collateral. Customer and market interaction. This element is usually called technical due diligence and typically consists of a day with your engineering and marketing team led by internal team leaders.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Due Diligence Cap Table Intellectual Property 120

NZ Entrepreneur

JUNE 21, 2022

Welcome to ‘500 Founders’ where we ask startup founders and innovators from around New Zealand, What is one piece of advice you would give to people working on their first startup and why? Don’t underestimate how difficult it is to enter a new market and how hard your competitors will work to keep you out of it.

Founder 88

Founder Cap Table Cofounder New Zealand 88

View from Seed

OCTOBER 11, 2022

At the seed stage and as companies scale, helping the founders I work with identify and reach their goals, personally and professionally, gives me energy and purpose. As I hit the ground running, I’m cognizant that this is a time of uncertainty and turbulence for founders and investors alike.

North America 156

North America San Francisco Cap Table Cofounder 156

Hunter Walker

SEPTEMBER 24, 2017

It’s in a founder’s natural disposition to want to convince people of their point of view. Earlier this summer an engaging and forward-thinking founder told me a story from her in-process seed fundraise. “We sat down to discuss my company and he basically said, ‘I don’t think your market is going to exist.

Founder 126

Founder Cap Table Conversion Operations 126

Hunter Walker

OCTOBER 31, 2021

Fund people/ideas ahead of consensus — that is, find founders and markets that aren’t currently being chased by the mainstream and get to conviction ahead of the pack. If you can be more valuable than that, I’d love to bring you on to the cap table of the next seed round we lead. Close the fun and get to work.

Cap Table 122

Cap Table Cofounder Early Stage Portfolio 122

Hunter Walker

AUGUST 8, 2023

At the time, this is last quarter and the stock market has trended upwards nicely since then (a potential leading indicator of private tech valuations), we all agreed venture portfolios were probably still 25-40% overvalued. Soft Acquisition Market. Whatever gets reported is just the tip of the iceberg.

Portfolio 98

Portfolio Cap Table LP Valuation 98

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 4, 2022

For most founders, fundraising is a struggle. Morality aside, I’d say given the inherent riskiness of startups, I’m not sure this would be a great addition to your cap table. What’s that investor going to be like in a board meeting when you as a female founder need their support or worse, actually their vote?

Cap Table 163

Cap Table Cofounder Private Equity Finance 163

Haystack

SEPTEMBER 16, 2018

And when it comes to fundraising advice, the investment market itself offers the best advice. Many founders will seek out other other founders to get advice on their early rounds. One of those sources will tell the founder just starting out “Hey, I think you should just raise a huge round now, go for it!

Cap Table 110

Cap Table Marketing Early Stage Founder 110

Hunter Walker

NOVEMBER 21, 2018

Only Jason’s was in the “hard pivot” category that Fred describes (“Changing the product, market, and business entirely. At the same time, investors should give the founders some space to figure out if they want to push on or not. Essentially starting over from scratch.”)

Founder 96

Founder Cap Table Seed Stage Cofounder 96

Hunter Walker

SEPTEMBER 15, 2023

And while I’m quite optimistic about the coming years, we’re not yet through the pain for many existing companies navigating the transition from a hypergrowth market to one which rewards a different style of operating. When $20B outcomes occur everyone on the cap table eats well. Gotta own enough of your winners.

Cap Table 93

Cap Table Valuation Salary Seed Stage 93

Austin Startup

OCTOBER 27, 2017

TL;DR : “Founder friendliness” should mean not being hostile, but also not being submissive, to founders. Common Stock Ask the Users Because we’re known as Startup/VC lawyers who don’t represent VCs (just companies), I often get asked about my thoughts on “founder friendliness.” Good entrepreneurs and advisors know that.

Founder 48

Founder Cap Table Preferred Stock Common Stock 48

Up and Running

JULY 2, 2014

You can’t underestimate the importance of selecting an attorney who “gets” your business model, your market opportunity, and most importantly, your fundraising and exit strategy. This should be clearly spelled out in your Capitalization Table , or “Cap Table” as it’s commonly called.

Technical Review 118

Technical Review Angel Investor Due Diligence Dilution 118

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2018

When you raise money from investors you produce information that you are told they want and care about: A fund-raising deck that articulates your company strategy, plans, team, market, competitors and so forth. I never thought of this until I became the Founder & CEO of my first startup company. So how does this work in practice?

Cap Table 336

Cap Table Due Diligence Forecast Churn Rate 336

Genuine VC

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

The following is a first pass at a checklist of items for Founder CEOs to take care of in the first couple weeks after they’ve closed their initial round of seed funding. Communications with New Board & Investors Ensure all of your investors have all legal documentation of the round, including an electronic version of the final cap table.

Founder 156

Founder Cap Table Stock Options PR 156

OnlyOnce

OCTOBER 28, 2021

My co-founders, I’ve worked with for an average of 15 years – we know and trust each other tremendously. And for the most part, the same is true about our cap table. No institutional debt like a messy cap table, legacy people issues, leases for offices we don’t want or need any more.

Cap Table 62

Cap Table Early Stage Cofounder Leadership 62

www.informationarbitrage.com

FEBRUARY 24, 2010

Read more » Recent Press The New York Times April 22, 2009 - A Company Plans to Market Illiquid Assets CNBC.com April 8, 2008 - Social Stock Picking Reuters April 6, 2009 - Bit.ly Main February 23, 2010 Advice for CTO Founders: Dont Let Business Kill the Business Founding a technology company is an amazing thing.

CTO Hire 40

CTO Hire Founder Cap Table Vesting 40

Austin Startup

AUGUST 20, 2017

Are they consistent with your founding team, are they competitive in the market, and will they not create precedents that you’ll regret in the next round of hiring? Your Cap Table is something that deserves constant care and attention. Messy cap tables can come back to haunt you when you do a financing or sell the company.

Technical Review 48

Technical Review Software Review Cap Table Securities and Exchange Commission 48

David Teten

AUGUST 19, 2019

RBI normally requires founders to pay back their investors with a fixed percentage of revenue until they have finished providing the investor with a fixed return on capital, which they agree upon in advance. For background, see Revenue-Based Investing: A New Option for Founders who Care About Control. Decathlon Capital.

Revenue 60

Revenue Technical Review Software Review Equity 60

Pascal's View

JULY 9, 2017

While VC deals remain marketed on a pre-money basis, sophisticated investors know that what matters most is the post-money (how much of the company will I own after all of the new shares have been issued). The most serious unintended consequence occurs from “note waterfalls”— converting multiple notes that have multiple valuation caps.

Post-Money Valuation 49

Post-Money Valuation Valuation Cap Table Covenant 49

OnlyOnce

DECEMBER 1, 2021

Sometimes a founder or a founder’s spouse even steps in on this front. Are you way under market in compensation and trying to overcome that by offering equity or “perks” to attract top talent? (This is the second post in the series…the first one on How to Engage with Your CFO is here.).

Hiring 117

Hiring Cap Table Finance Equity 117

Hunter Walker

FEBRUARY 2, 2023

Or ask your cap table who is the best “XYZ” that they know and give them some skin in the game. What should your relationship (as a founder) be with this person? Sometimes founders will question whether it’s truly a ‘good hire’ if they need to throw extra equity at an outside advisor.

Hiring 60

Hiring Cap Table Equity Dividend 60

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 27, 2022

Besides, there were a limited number of places where I could do my job in venture capital anyway—and while I might be a go to for a pitch from super early stage pre-seed and seed founders looking for quick answers and decisive term sheets in New York City, the reality is that I would be pretty far down the list in the Valley. Plenty of bros.

Ukraine 128

Ukraine Russia Cap Table New York City 128

Altgate

JUNE 25, 2012

—————– Dead equity — equity held by employees and founders no longer working at the company — is a large and growing problem. Instead, the dead equity languishes on the cap table, weighing down the startup and making it harder to attract and motivate the people who could impact its growth.

Equity 44

Equity Vesting Cap Table Technical Review 44

View from Seed

DECEMBER 11, 2019

I’m thrilled to announce that I’m joining [New Firm] as a Partner where I will continue to invest in great Founders across the industries I care about.”. “I Bonus points if they’re a Founder of the firm. “I have exciting personal news.”. As a result, paper markups are weak and temporary signals of feedback, at best. Track record.

Venture Capital 204

Venture Capital Cap Table Partner LP 204

Hunter Walker

JUNE 14, 2018

Information, relationships, pattern matching for marketplaces, SaaS, financial services, agriculture, media, etc etc – our backgrounds and/or portfolio suggest that we might have ability to help the founders move faster and with greater accuracy in testing their market hypotheses. Who support them as people and their growth.

Cap Table 81

Cap Table Portfolio Vertical Reputation 81

View from Seed

JUNE 11, 2019

At this point, founders find themselves in a luxurious situation of being able to build the best possible syndicate. This makes sense, because it’s more likely that a firm with a weaker competitive position is willing to stretch and pay a price way above market in order to win what they think is a competitive deal. And stay in touch!

Syndicate 202

Syndicate Syndication Seed Stage Lead Investor 202

The Next Web

OCTOBER 21, 2013

Neil Rimer is a Partner and co-founder of Index Ventures. Yet, surprisingly, we continue to come across founders who have made significant mistakes in their early capital raises that we suspect go against their own instincts and jeopardize the foundations of the businesses they are building.

Cap Table 128

Cap Table Option Pool Angel Investor Entrepreneur 128

keen.io

FEBRUARY 5, 2013

And if the CEO says, “Salaries will be adjusted to market value soon,” that’s probably a best-case scenario. The founders had been dropping hints that they wanted me to join them. I knew this meant that the founders had come to some conclusion about what to offer, and now I was going to find out what it was.

Salary 50

Salary Equity Startup San Francisco 50

Gust

OCTOBER 8, 2014

Equally silly were advisors & entrepreneurs insisting that founders use convertible notes but we funded a few of those, too. It is less about actual money and more about structure of your Cap Table. Invested Interests cap table venture capital' My personal definition? Reblogged via [link].

Cap Table 136

Cap Table Silicon Valley Term Sheet Non-Compete 136