Feld Thoughts

MARCH 24, 2017

Foundry Group is best known for our investments in startups, but our vehicle currently investing in other venture funds, Foundry Group Next, is off to what we believe to be a great start and I wanted to share an update about it by talking about our new investment in a fund managed by Founder Collective.

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Founder LP Technical Review Seed Stage 75

ReadWriteStart

OCTOBER 2, 2021

Why should a founder entertain this idea? Lower tax rates allow an LLC to be more flexible with finances. No founder wants to start a business that would only survive for one or two years. One primary consideration in creating a tech startup is the long-term strategy, per the owner/founder’s goals, especially regarding exit.

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Technical Review LLC IPO Stock 78

View from Seed

MARCH 24, 2021

Doing Reference Checks on VCs “Try to speak to at least one founder that the investor has worked with in a failed investment. The Seed VC Decision Tree “If the market is attractive and there just isn’t great founder/market fit, we will be open minded as well. This is not always easy to do. ” (Rob Go).

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Seed Stage Hiring IPO Analytics 177

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Even though the Initial Public Offering (IPO) alternative for a successful startup seems to be coming back into vogue, it is relatively rare. IPOs in 2008, the market was up to a still trivial 159 in 2011. Even in most of these cases, the original startup founders were pushed out, or heavily supplemented, with “experienced” executives.

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Exit Strategy IPO Investment Bankers Entrepreneur 239

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

I recently spoke at the Founder Showcase at the request of Adeo Ressi. I said that at the Founder Showcase, too. And this is happening in mezzanine (pre-IPO) deals as well. And post IPO deals, although these tend to correct more quickly. Or worse yet they may never get financed. Why does all this matter?

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Saudi Arabia Valuation IPO Technical Review 309

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 23, 2017

by Joe Duncan, founder of Duncan Capital LP. This is a major issue and the role of data analytics will continue to expand as per a January article from Global Banking and Finance Review which cited that the world’s top investment banks were fined a total $43 billion over the last seven years for failures in customer reporting.

Technical Review 154

Technical Review Artificial Inteligence Software Review IPO 154

ReadWriteStart

MARCH 31, 2020

Every expert agrees that VC investing faced a huge setback last year with the IPO flops of major companies such as WeWork, Uber, Slack, and Lyft as the facts show. Investors would be more strict in their grilling of startup founders and leaders, hoping to expose every hint of “ overpromising and underdelivering.”

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Technical Review Artificial Inteligence Startup Term Sheet 175

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.

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Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

The Startup Magazine

SEPTEMBER 10, 2019

There is a myth among first time tech founders that product is everything. Here are five financial concepts that every startup founder should know to build an everlasting company. Compared to Accounting, Finance is ruthlessly forward looking. Asset valuation. Alpha generation. venkatarag. getfilecloud.

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Founder Valuation Dividend Startup 118

The Startup Magazine

JULY 29, 2021

As part of our Founder Interview series, The Startup Magazine caught up with entrepreneur Ola Sars, Founder and CEO of music-tech leader, Soundtrack Your Brand. Ola Sars, Founder and CEO of Soundtrack Your Brand. Currently, we are at a point where an IPO is the most logical path for us in terms of exit.

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Founder B2C B2B Audio 156

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? They might be ideas they hatch internally (via a Foundry) or a founder who just left SpaceX and raises money to search for an idea.

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Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Venture Capital Early Stage 471

Start Up Blog

MAY 13, 2019

Last Friday night, I did a TV interview on ABC regarding Uber’s long awaited IPO. An IPO is when a company first becomes a publicly traded stock that anyone can buy and hold. So get ready for some finance meets tech nerdocity below. Amazon IPO 1997 – 2 years after it was founded.

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IPO Valuation Stock Cost 48

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

I’ve decided to take all of my private conversations and subjective points-of-view on the topic and make them public in a keynote speech at the Founder Showcase in San Francisco on June 15th. That’s the deal you get when you’re raising in a good market for startup financing. The risk wouldn’t be appropriate.

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Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

The Startup Magazine

OCTOBER 14, 2021

The Startup Magazine continues our Founder Interview series with entrepreneur Richard Lavina, Co-Founder and CEO of accounting services platform, Taxfyle. Richard Lavina, CPA, Co-Founder and CEO of Taxfyle. TSM: What is the most important thing you tell other startup founders?

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CPA Founder Vertical Cofounder 138

Version One Ventures

JULY 22, 2014

More money is flowing in from a new crop of angels, newly wealthy from a number of tech IPOs. AngelList makes it easier for founders to reach angels and there are hundreds of accelerators and incubators to choose from. If not, revenue from your customers will be your best source of financing. Is your opportunity at least $100M?

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Finance Seed Money Bootstrapping Angel Investor 167

Feld Thoughts

MAY 28, 2015

For example, from a post in 2008 about Rally’s $16.85m financing , I riffed on the origins of the company. About a year after he got started, he was ready to raise a venture financing. Ryan was encouraged to team up with Tim and shortly after that happened we co-led the first round VC financing with Boulder Ventures.

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Software Technology Agile SCRUM 70

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2017

Why do these founders get to stay around? Because the balance of power has dramatically shifted from investors to founders. — Unremarked and unheralded, the balance of power between startup CEOs and their investors has radically changed: IPOs/M&A without a profit (or at times revenue) have become the norm.

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Founder Technical Review CTO Hire IPO 252

www.startuplessonslearned.com

MAY 4, 2012

Founders Dilemmas: Equity Splits. The following is an excerpt from HBS Professor Noam Wasserman’s new book, The Founders Dilemmas: Anticipating and Avoiding the Pitfalls That Can Sink a Startup. On average, the founders who keep the most control over their company make the least amount of money. Lessons Learned.

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Equity Founder Technical Cofounder Cofounder 72

Up and Running

AUGUST 18, 2014

In comparison to traditional business ventures, startups are expected to grow rapidly, at a rate of between 5% and 7% per week in their initial stage – Paul Graham, co-founder of Y Combinator. Startups have some unique struggles, especially in regard to financing. Key difference #2 – the relationship with funding.

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Small Business Exit Strategy Cofounder Angel Investor 154

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 5, 2015

I challenge any entrepreneur, for example, to define the difference between "seed-stage" and "early-stage" financing. Ron Conway , of SV Angels, and Reid Hoffman , LinkedIn's founder, are names often mentioned in this category. Yet, knowing this distinction is important. A micro venture capital firm.

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Seed Stage Finance Early Stage Startup 120

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

In the old days there weren’t many fights about whether angels would take their prorata rights in financing rounds. Have you noticed the increase of founders selling their personal stock in what is known as a “secondary?” That is the most founder friends AND angel friendly way of doing it that I have found.

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Technical Review Later Stage Early Stage LP 336

View from Seed

DECEMBER 4, 2019

Over the last 10 years, we’ve been in a bull market with considerable froth in late stage financing activity and valuations. These growth rounds may be more dilutive than planned, but will still occur without punitive terms and allow founders, teams, and early investors to emerge with very successful outcomes at the very end.

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LP IRR Distribution Portfolio 256

Rob Go

DECEMBER 28, 2011

And that’s true pretty much across the board – from exits, late stage financings, scaling companies, and seed activity. IPO’s/Exits. Still led by its founder, Steve Kaufer. Kayak: Registered for an IPO but on hold. Raised $174M in its IPO in April, current market cap ~$550M. market cap.

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Technical Review Boston Software Review IPO 54

View from Seed

MAY 3, 2022

I’ve had the privilege of joining Flyp’s Founders, James Kawas and Dani Arnaout , on their journey; my tenure on the company’s board started a year ago in leading their seed round of financing and will continue going forward.

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Syndicate Syndication IPO Matching 156

Duct Tape Marketing

SEPTEMBER 29, 2022

A Startup Journey With GrubHub Founder Mike Evans written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing. Questions I ask Mike Evans: [1:46] Could you give us a high-level overview of the startup of Grubhub to IPO to what you’re doing now? Marketing Podcast with Mike Evans. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Mike Evans.

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Founder Chicago Kansas Startup 82

David Teten

MARCH 14, 2018

Managers of VC funds typically want to grow their business aggressively, just like the founders we back. Among the sites we have found most helpful with practical guides for founders: Biztree , First Search , Foundersuite , Goodwin Founders Workbench , Guides.co , Inc.com , and StartupRocket. .

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Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Cofounder 60

Hunter Walker

MAY 11, 2022

Think Of Your First Non-Investor Board Member As a Senior Hire, And Not Your IPO Board. So you’d think that founders would take advantage of every resource available to help them out. Every company has a Board of Directors, whether it takes financing or not. Being a CEO and running a startup is hard!

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Startup IPO Finance Equity 106

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

So super angel and seed funds are proliferating – As a result there has been an explosion in the number of amazing early-stage investors such as Softtech VC , Floodgate , Felicis Ventures , K9 Ventures , OATV , Lowercase Capital , Founder Collective , and many, many more. But in bad economies many angels get burned.

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LP Technical Review Early Stage Silicon Valley 311

Scalable Startup

AUGUST 26, 2014

Red Hat was one of the first of these types of companies bridging open source with big finance, leveraging Linux support into a profitable business, also leveraging the enterprise. Will Amazon try to acquire all of Acquia before the inevitable IPO? They kind of invented this business model. What will come next?

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Founder Los Angeles PHP Open Source 42

Business Plan Blog

NOVEMBER 13, 2013

Most startup founders do not have enough capital to launch their companies and need to raise money at some point. The return only happens when there is an exit via acquisition or an IPO. Convertible Debt Financing. Among the most common methods of funding used by startups when raising seed capital is “Convertible Debt Financing.”

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Finance Accredited Investor Angel Investor Seed Capital 93

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 8, 2014

billion 2013 figure) have been massive financings at Honest Company ($70mm), JustFab ($85mm), ZipRecruiter ($63mm) and lord only knows how much SnapChat has actually accumulated. But many people forget that we have 2 relatively recent IPOs that are substantive companies: TrueCar (Upfront backed) & Cornerstone OnDemand.

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Los Angeles Silicon Valley Entrepreneur Seattle 376

Hunter Walker

APRIL 3, 2014

In advance of the IPO I reconnected with their SVP Product & User Experience Alex Kinnier, whom I know from our days together at Google. I couldn’t ask Alex specifically about the IPO or future plans but wanted to get some more info on a company that gets less press than your typical social app but is poised for an amazing run.

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IPO Product Japan Australia 106

www.entrepreneur.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

Entrepreneur Homepage Startups Starting a Business Home How-To Guides Startup Basics Business Ideas Business Planning Startup Financing Success Stories Home-Based Business Starting a Business Play Video How to Take a New Product from Just an Idea to a Business (Video). Financing Some Jobs Act Proposals Make Headway.

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Sweat Equity Equity Fractional CTO CTO 55

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 5, 2011

Even though the Initial Public Offering (IPO) alternative for a successful startup seems to be coming back into vogue, it is still extremely rare. companies made the IPO transition in 2009, out of thousands of startups. Only about a dozen U.S.

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Exit Strategy IPO Investment Bankers Entrepreneur 235

Austin Startup

JUNE 9, 2017

You can think of it as the private company equivalent of an S-1 , the long disclosure document that companies produce when going IPO. Delivering an Austin tech investor a PPM would send an immediate signal that the founders aren’t being well-advised, which itself signals poor judgment in choosing advisors.

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Finance Accredited Investor Private Placement Texas 54

Hunter Walker

AUGUST 26, 2022

Hunter Walk: Ok, so we first met when you were leading comms at enterprise software company Box, a startup you joined when they were still pretty early and stayed at until post-IPO. I had gone to high school with the founders in the Seattle area, and we had recently reconnected. First, congrats! Enter Box. They gave me a shot.

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IPO Cofounder Early Stage Portfolio 91

Hunter Walker

MARCH 3, 2022

That’s the tweet sent by the venture capitalist after a big IPO by a startup they decided not to back years earlier. Maybe there’ll even be a screencap of their pass email, or similar ‘proof’ that they were in conversation with the founders during their fundraises. Tell me the last time an investor publicly shared a loss or miss?

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Portfolio IPO Email Founder 88