Feld Thoughts

JUNE 10, 2022

Rather, when you have a choice between a financing at a lower valuation and a financing with all kinds of crazy structure to try to maintain a previous valuation, negotiate the best price you can but do a clean financing with no structure. .” Now, I’m not encouraging anyone to do a down round if unnecessary.,

Down Round 162

Down Round Ratchet Liquidation Preference Participating Preferred 162

The Startup Magazine

DECEMBER 18, 2018

The way they see it, they’re going to need all these employees eventually , so why not hire them now? The problem is, the majority of startups are in the red throughout their first year, and overstaffing is one of the surefire ways to ratchet up debt. A business is only as strong as its weakest employee.

Ratchet 123

Ratchet Startup Hiring Employee 123

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

At an accelerator … Me: Raising convertible notes as a seed round is one of the biggest disservices our industry has done to entrepreneurs since 2001-2003 when there were “full ratchets” and “multiple liquidation preferences” – the most hostile terms anybody found in term sheets 10 years ago. Me: I know.

Venture Capital 417

Venture Capital Liquidation Preference Valuation Term Sheet 417

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 7, 2009

As the product matured, they were able to ratchet up the quality to prevent regression on features that had been truly embraced by their customers. Starting instead from a position where feedback cycle time is the priority and allowing quality to ratchet up as the product matures provides a more natural lead in to continuous deployment.

San Francisco 131

San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review Lean 131

abovethecrowd.com

APRIL 20, 2016

Why the Unicorn Financing Market Just Became Dangerous…For All Involved. All Unicorn participants — founders, company employees, venture investors and their limited partners (LPs) — are seeing their fortunes put at risk from the very nature of the Unicorn phenomenon itself. By January of 2016, that number had ballooned to 229.

IPO 40

IPO Term Sheet Silicon Valley Valuation 40

Gust

SEPTEMBER 17, 2014

Me: Raising convertible notes as a seed round is one of the biggest disservices our industry has done to entrepreneurs since 2001-2003 when there were “full ratchets” and “multiple liquidation preferences” – the most hostile terms anybody found in term sheets 10 years ago. It’s like we need a finance 101 course for entrepreneurs.

Liquidation Preference 153

Liquidation Preference Valuation Term Sheet Stock 153

Tim Keane

JANUARY 12, 2010

For angel groups, the distinction between groups and VCs on this issue is dwindling, especially as angel groups do bigger rounds of financing.   Note that this applies only to earl stage Series A-type equity financings and assumes no cash dividends are paid to investors.   First , dividends.

Term Sheet 68

Term Sheet Valuation Dividend Liquidation Preference 68