Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

After all, growth equals high valuations and loads of venture capital! And so do entrepreneurs who are quick to pivot to new businesses or to sell in an acquihire. Instant growth = huge valuation from follow-on investors = big VC mark-up on our quarterly reports = LP interest. And headlines. And approbation. Grow or die.

Silicon Valley 390

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Startup Technical Review 390

Duct Tape Marketing

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

Helping Entrepreneurs Buy And Sell Their Agencies written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing. In this episode, she’s sharing how she’s helped many entrepreneurs buy and sell businesses. Look, if you work in sales, wanna learn how to sell or just peek at the latest sales news. This is great.

Entrepreneur 78

Entrepreneur Technical Review Cofounder Valuation 78

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

This was an audience of mostly first-time entrepreneurs. It is great for entrepreneurs and great for VCs. So here is what I have been telling entrepreneurs privately for the past 6 months. They have seen one side of a market where many of us have seen the ebb and flow multiple times. I believe that. Why does all this matter?

Saudi Arabia 309

Saudi Arabia Valuation IPO Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 8, 2016

The startup industry may be “resetting,” which doesn’t mean a “crash” but rather just a resetting of valuations, timescales, winners/losers, capital sources and the relative emphasis of growth rates vs. burn rates. We entrepreneurs have been spinning that line for decades in every boom cycle. Start early.

Burn Rate 150

Burn Rate Cap Table Balance Sheet Valuation 150

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 26, 2012

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” Many entrepreneurs stumble at this point, losing the deal or most of their ownership, by having no answer, saying “make me an offer,” or quoting an exorbitant number.

Valuation 270

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 270

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 5, 2012

My initial reaction to Adeo when we spoke was that while it may have solved some issues (debt versus equity) it didn’t solve the ones that I’ve been warning entrepreneurs about most loudly. Was Paul Graham right in his “high resolution” financing post? But entrepreneurs – convertible notes have no MINIMUM!

Ratchet 354

Ratchet Liquidation Preference Equity Stock 354

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

And the loosening of federal monetary policies, particularly in the US, has pushed more dollars into the venture ecosystems at every stage of financing. What Has Changed in Financing? On the one hand, you’re over paying for every investment and valuations aren’t rational. even before the pandemic itself has been fully tamed.

Pre-Money Valuation 471

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Venture Capital Early Stage 471

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

= profitable and companies like Amazon who chose to focus on growth > profitability were not losing money on each book sale (ie they were gross margin positive). The tl;dr version is this: Many have been taught to focus on LTV/CAC ratio and if that number is substantively > 1 said entrepreneur feels great. End of story.

Metrics 150

Metrics Cost Acquisition Startup 150

Tim Keane

MARCH 9, 2011

How to prepare a sales forecast for a business plan » March 09, 2011. How should I finance my new venture? It’s a deceptively simple question:  what is the optimal way to finance a new startup?   Sometimes, the bonus in bootstrapping is that the venture finds it doesn’t need acceleration financing. 

Finance 83

Finance Bootstrapping Startup Equity 83

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2: As expected at least one person accused me of writing this post because I want to see lower valuations. I have conversations with entrepreneurs and other VCs on a daily basis about fund raising, the prices of deals, how much companies should raise, etc. You can be pissed off, but I don’t set prices. That’s stupid.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 28, 2015

This past summer, the Lightspeed Summer Fellowships program invited selected guests to provide aspiring entrepreneurs a perspective into all aspects of starting a new company. The program provides entrepreneurs the resources and mentoring they need to build their companies and develop their skills. ” The Cost of Financing. .

Convertible Security 100

Convertible Security IP Technical Review Software Review 100

Tim Keane

JANUARY 12, 2010

Term-sheets and Valuations: Thinking about Negotiations. Please see later version of this post on May 16, 2010 Entrepreneurs are often not experts in the area of term-sheet negotiations and all of the surrounding issues.   Investors sometimes “present” the terms they’d like and expect the entrepreneurs to react.

Term Sheet 68

Term Sheet Valuation Dividend Liquidation Preference 68

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2010

My advice to entrepreneurs was and is “ when the hors d’oeuvres tray is being passed take two ” (e.g. So I agreed to offer my current thinking on the economy and what it portends for the VC industry & fund raising for entrepreneurs. The housing market is not recovered : Sales in existing homes in the US fell 27.2%

Entrepreneur 298

Entrepreneur Technical Review Balance Sheet Government 298

View from Seed

MARCH 24, 2021

What Are Your Valuation Expectations? But mainly we did it because these corporate VCs were among the only groups willing to invest at PayPal’s somewhat inflated post-money valuation, during the middle of the dot-com crash when traditional VCs pulled back sharply and other sources of funding were constrained.” ” (Rob Go).

Seed Stage 177

Seed Stage Hiring IPO Analytics 177

Hearpreneur

SEPTEMBER 21, 2018

Podcasts are booming and especially for entrepreneurs and business owners it is a way to continue to grow and develop our leadership, marketing and even sales skills while continuing to run our ventures. Thanks to Reuben Swartz, Mimiran Sales Acceleration ! #2- 8-Cool Things Entrepreneurs Do. 1- The Forecast Podcast.

Entrepreneur 75

Entrepreneur Hosting Cofounder Forecast 75

The Startup Magazine

AUGUST 15, 2022

If all else fails, your advisor may be able to salvage the sale by reengaging other interested parties. The first step in creating a business plan to sell your startup to an acquirer is to create a valuation of your company. As an entrepreneur, you already built a marketable startup. Preparing for the sale.

Merger 158

Merger Acquisition Due Diligence Valuation 158

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 6, 2010

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” Many entrepreneurs stumble at this point, losing the deal or most of their ownership, by having no answer, playing coy, or quoting an exorbitant number.

Valuation 234

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Startup 234

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 22, 2021

Yet in my experience on both sides of this equation, I find that many aspiring entrepreneurs focus only on the best idea , assuming that it will attract the right investors. Investors love entrepreneurs who come across as constantly on the lookout for new ideas, and able to grasp the larger implications for market change.

Intellectual Property 352

Intellectual Property Equity Bootstrapping Valuation 352

Gust

NOVEMBER 18, 2012

Once you have a potential investor excited about your team, your product, and your company, the investor will inevitably ask “What is your company’s valuation?” Many entrepreneurs stumble at this point, losing the deal or most of their ownership, by having no answer, saying “make me an offer,” or quoting an exorbitant number.

Valuation 187

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation NPV Intellectual Property 187

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2023

Some businesses require very little capital and the founder can self-finance the enterprise and retain 100% of its ownership and control from ignition through liquidity event (startup through sale). And even with the significant cost of credit card debt, many entrepreneurs aggressively use existing cards to finance a startup.

Private Equity 118

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 118

Up and Running

AUGUST 17, 2022

Failing to qualify for investment isn’t a failure, it’s a chance to improve your business and abilities as an entrepreneur. This filtering process is a good thing for many entrepreneurs who have the sense to listen to it. Investors want to have a real shot at growing your valuation when they write you a check.

Venture Capital 146

Venture Capital Intellectual Property Angel Investor Bootstrapping 146

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 5, 2011

500 Hats , January 10, 2010 Developing new startup ideas - Chris Dixon , March 14, 2010 Batch Processing Millions and Millions of Images - Code as Craft , July 9, 2010 jQuery Plugin: Give Your Characters a NobleCount - The Product Guy , March 23, 2010 How do the sample Series Seed financing documents differ from typical Series A financing documents?

Silicon Valley 378

Silicon Valley Startup Term Sheet Venture Capital 378

ReadWriteStart

MARCH 24, 2011

This week's One Million by One Million roundtable was our 75th session, and we worked today with three entrepreneurs from the Midwest region of the United States. The discussion today was around Social Media financing and go-to-market strategy. As an entrepreneur CEO, she ran three companies: DAIS, Intarka, and Uuma.

Illinois 114

Illinois Entrepreneur Silicon Valley Chicago 114

Lightspeed Venture Partners

OCTOBER 7, 2012

The company has done $400k in sales in less than two years and had an early test deal with a local supermarket chain that they were massively overperforming on. He had been at it for 6 months and had no sales or distribution lined up yet. In this way, they remind me of the Lifter Hamper entrepreneur. Fair enough too.

Technical Review 110

Technical Review Technical Cofounder Valuation Pre-Money Valuation 110

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 26, 2020

Btw, the definition of each startup financing stage has changed in the last decade. For a Series A round you want to prove you have built a repeatable and scalable sales/revenue model and understand all parts of the business model. On the other hand, in a SaaS business $1 in recurring annual revenue equals ~10x in valuation.).

Cofounder 431

Cofounder Seed Stage Valuation Metrics 431

Startup Company Lawyer

MARCH 14, 2010

After the recent announcement of the Series Seed Financing documents by Marc Andreesen, Brad Feld points out that there are now four sets of “open source&# equity seed financing documents: TechStars Model Seed Funding Documents (by Cooley). Y Combinator Series AA Equity Financing Documents (by WSGR). under $500K).

Finance 70

Finance Software Review Term Sheet Liquidation Preference 70

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 9, 2011

Valuations were enormous relative to progress in companies. Companies with less than $2 million in revenue were asking for $50-60 million valuations and getting them. I spent my days meeting companies, figuring out what areas of the market interested me and trying to get a sense for how VCs thought about fair valuations.

Stock 305

Stock Technical Review Marketing Greece 305

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2009

But any entrepreneurs raising capital should keep in mind that this opening of the markets could possibly be temporary. They should heed the age old advice that raising slightly more money while you can is always better than trying to optimize future valuations. Short answer – yes.

Burn Rate 263

Burn Rate Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Private Equity 263

Up and Running

DECEMBER 9, 2014

Are you an entrepreneur or small business owner with questions about funding your small business? Bates: Good morning and welcome to our CEO panel, “How to Fine-Tune Your Small Business Finances From Funding to Growth” which I think is the direction that we would all like to be going. My name is John Bates.

Small Business 95

Small Business Finance Forecast Metrics 95

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

I recently wrote a post on angel financing covering the topic of convertible notes but I realized I was thinking about the issue more from investor perspective and a very narrow topic of how to price the round. So if you’re casually reading and don’t really care about angel financing – abort now! That’s OK.

Silicon Valley 291

Silicon Valley Ireland Technical Review Valuation 291

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Of course it is super helpful if a VC can drop you in to important people for business development, recruiting, PR, sales and eventually M&A. Most entrepreneurs I encounter seem to make their decisions more on perceived brand, past successes and ability to intro. Connections? There are times you just need help getting s**t done.

Portfolio 364

Portfolio Chicago Sales Incubator 364

reidhoffman.org

NOVEMBER 12, 2013

. × At Greylock , my partners and I are driven by one guiding mission: always help entrepreneurs. It doesn’t matter whether an entrepreneur is in our portfolio, whether we’re considering an investment, or whether we’re casually meeting for the first time. Entrepreneurs often ask me for help with their pitch decks.

Entrepreneur 111

Entrepreneur Revenue Viral Networking 111

Mucker Lab

MAY 28, 2020

Some entrepreneurs think that (more) money will solve all their company’s problems. These lost startups land higher valuations, have larger teams, outsource more product development and spend more money on customer acquisition than their peers. Before you indulge in marketing, sales and blinged-out offices, find product-market fit.

Startup 78

Startup Cofounder Burn Rate Technical Review 78

www.seriesseed.com

DECEMBER 9, 2012

Series Seed Financing Documents Blog. Series Seed Financing Documents. Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Series Seed Financing Documents : 1 Reblog. Sets the valuation at the time of the investment. My quest is to simplify financing for seed stage investments. SeriesSeed.com. Blog Archives.

Finance 40

Finance Term Sheet Vesting LLC 40

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

Yes, via conversion rights at a valuation cap. Yes, via conversion rights at a valuation cap. Part of the magic of revenue-based financing is how historical performance and strong, achievable financial projections are ultimately the backbone of how RBI/RBF investment decisions are made.” Flexible VC: Compensation-based.

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

OnlyOnce

JULY 30, 2020

If you’re a founder entrepreneur who has led your company for several years, the odds are you have a significant amount of emotional investment in your company, too. If you’re a founder entrepreneur who has led your company for several years, the odds are you have a significant amount of emotional investment in your company, too.

Cap Table 48

Cap Table Institutional Investors Startup Early Stage 48

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

The movie, “The Social Network” might have had more of an impact on creating future entrepreneurs than any other event of the past 5 years. Yes, it’s true that FOMO (fear of missing out) is driving some irrational behavior and valuations amongst uber competitive deals and well-financed VCs. Bottom of the sales funnel.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Mobile 347