Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2013

This post is about the rise of Chinese venture capital and how it helped build the countries entrepreneurial ecosystem. The Rise of Chinese Venture Capital. The second wave of technology investors were Chinese banks, who provided the majority of the later stage investments in the Torch Program. Like the U.S.

Venture Capital 163

Venture Capital China Offshore SBIR 163

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

They often create the biggest tensions between investors who are investing at different stages in the business. These tensions seep out in some angels or seed funds publicly or semi-privately deriding later-stage VCs for their “bad” behavior. I have seen bad behavior from later-stage VCs, believe me.

Technical Review 336

Technical Review Later Stage Early Stage LP 336

thebarefootvc

JANUARY 27, 2014

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. Which leads to….

Technical Review 63

Technical Review Valuation Venture Capital Investment Bankers 63

This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Well, they did ask David Chao of Doll Capital, who said that the " frothy bubble is over ". David's firm most recently participated in the $77 million second round financing of SoFi, a one year old startup focusing on student loans. The other entrepreneur quoted in the story is from a guy pitching a Pinterest clone.

Venture Capital 114

Venture Capital Marketing Term Sheet Software Review 114

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. What stage? When you are raising a large, later-stage round given by this time you’ve likely got a fairly large business to run. Your skills are much appreciated later in our business. What kind of deals should I be doing?

Early Stage 361

Early Stage Deal Flow Investment Bankers Technical Review 361

Feld Thoughts

NOVEMBER 2, 2016

This quarter they interviewed me as part of it on Quarterly VC Update: Brad Feld on the State of Venture Capital Investing. If so, how does that influence the venture market or your investment strategy? This is mostly impacting the later stages. Each quarter Cooley does a VC market update.

Venture Capital 70

Venture Capital Private Equity Early Stage Valuation 70

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2021

We’ve had two companies where we had to bridge finance them several times before they eventually IPO’d We had a portfolio company turn-down a $350 million acquisition because they wanted at least $400 million. Early-stage venture capital is about extreme winners. It sold to Amazon for > $1 billion.

Bankruptcy 294

Bankruptcy Bridge Financing Portfolio Angel Investor 294

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. What stage? When you are raising a large, later-stage round given by this time you’ve likely got a fairly large business to run. Your skills are much appreciated later in our business. What kind of deals should I be doing?

Deal Flow 347

Deal Flow Early Stage Investment Bankers Technical Review 347

VC Adventure

AUGUST 15, 2018

Back in the olden days of venture capital, company boards had wide discretion in pricing company options. These reports are generally quite lengthy and not always particularly comprehensible to non-finance professionals. Similarly I assumed that later stage companies would also show a smaller gap. I was wrong.

Valuation 48

Valuation Common Stock Cap Table Software Review 48

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

But markets have changed and I think investors, founders and experienced executives who want to join later-stage startups can all benefit from playing the long game. This “overnight success” was first financed in 2004. It literally drove FOMO. Case in point, Procore just went public and is trading at an $11 billion valuation.

Venture Capital 363

Venture Capital LP Valuation Later Stage 363

Berkonomics

AUGUST 3, 2023

The subject of raising money is critical to many businesses and a passing option to others, depending upon the capital efficiency of the enterprise. And even with the significant cost of credit card debt, many entrepreneurs aggressively use existing cards to finance a startup. For those of you who fit that description, nice work.

Private Equity 118

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 118

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 24, 2015

I’m not saying I’m not investing – just that I’m generally aware that the market does drive venture capital fundings and I’m very interested to see how September plays out. At least later stage investors. This could have an impact on later-stage valuations.

Stock 150

Stock Finance Marketing Valuation 150

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 28, 2017

Goldman Sachs and CB Insights recently reported that startups have raised over $1 billion in Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) this summer — more than the total amount of venture capital raised during the same period. Need for growth capital. A company that can successfully raise money in an ICO may never need venture capital again.

Early Stage 20

Early Stage Equity Venture Capital Government 20

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 28, 2017

Goldman Sachs and CB Insights recently reported that startups have raised over $1 billion in Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) this summer — more than the total amount of venture capital raised during the same period. Need for growth capital. A company that can successfully raise money in an ICO may never need venture capital again.

Early Stage 20

Early Stage Equity Venture Capital Government 20

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 19, 2017

How Much Capital You Have Raised / Your Runway In general I recommend that in early-stage startups you try to raise at least 15-18 months of runway. In general you should allow yourself 4–6 months of time to fund raise (longer if you’re later stage and require a much bigger round) so calculating anticipated burn rate is pretty easy.

Burn Rate 212

Burn Rate Startup .Net Venture Capital 212

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 4, 2016

” There are a lot of data points that one can observer to get a sense of the venture capital markets – both LP fundings into venture and VC financings of startups. They point to some widely known facts: financings & valuations are up massively over the past 7 years and non-VC money has entered the system.

LP 150

LP Valuation Burn Rate Pre-Money Valuation 150

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014

Professional expert networks allow you to efficiently convert your financial capital into relationship capital. Like many established finance & media companies, GLG knows that the tech startup sector is a growing part of the economy. We’re not mainly for B2B companies or later stage companies or anything like that.

New York 114

New York Technical Review Networking Advisory Board 114

View from Seed

JANUARY 5, 2015

Raising venture capital at any stage of company growth requires tremendous effort from entrepreneurs. Note that this list was created specifically with seed-stage startups in mind. We hope this helps you stay on-task and efficient! Click to download your copy of the Post-Seed Checklist for Entrepreneurs.

Seed Capital 120

Seed Capital Seed Stage Entrepreneur Venture Capital 120

Steve Blank

JUNE 15, 2010

Certain VC’s like the new class of Super-Angels and small VC funds specialize in the early stage of a startup where you are searching for a business model. And some larger funds that specialize in later stage deals may have a partner or two who likes to invest at this stage. Is it for your technology? (In

Founder 231

Founder Vesting Later Stage Early Stage 231

K9 Ventures

JUNE 5, 2015

A re-jiggering of deal stages and sizes had begun in 2013. In that presentation, I said that Seed is not the first round of financing any more and that K9’s investments were mostly “pre-seed”. Scaling venture capital breaks it. There is an erosion of valuation discipline across all stages of venture capital right now.

Seed Stage 48

Seed Stage Venture Capital Early Stage Valuation 48

Up and Running

AUGUST 17, 2015

Between my experiences as a management consultant, as well as my product and marketing roles at multiple tech companies, I felt that I had enough operational experience to make that leap sooner than later. Additionally, I had already studied Economics and Finance during undergrad, making the academic part of an MBA seem a little redundant.

Entrepreneur 60

Entrepreneur Cofounder Angel Investor eCommerce 60

Growthink Blog

MAY 10, 2012

Early Stage Investment (Series A & B) 4. Later Stage Investment (Series C, D, and so on) 5. Mezzanine Financing Most companies that raise equity capital and are eventually acquired or go public receive multiple rounds of financing first. Stage #4: Later Stage Investment (Series C, D, etc.)

Equity 88

Equity Mezzanine Later Stage Venture Capital 88

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

The earlier you invest the higher the chances the company won’t work out and thus you pay a lower price than later-stage investors. That’s the deal you get when you’re raising in a good market for startup financing. So how exactly are prices determined? There is no great science to it. That’s fine.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

K9 Ventures

OCTOBER 10, 2017

You see, Dan knows more about venture than most people; and if Dan isn’t aware that “pre-seed is a thing,” then I haven’t done a good enough job of explaining to the world what I and K9 do! Q: What amount of financing is considered Pre-Seed? Typically, Pre-Seed rounds are less than $1M in aggregate capital raised.

Seed Stage 82

Seed Stage Finance Later Stage Equity 82

Gust

SEPTEMBER 27, 2014

To begin with, it is important to understand some basic facts about the world of entrepreneurial finance: There are many more entrepreneurs than there are investors, with the result that only one company out of every 400 that seeks venture funding actually receives it.

Angel Groups 159

Angel Groups Elevator Pitch Software Review Deal Flow 159

Gust

DECEMBER 1, 2011

We have no measure of the changes in available capital resources from entrepreneurs and their friends and family, but we have no reason to believe they have changed radically over the past few years. Strategic investors tend to be later stage sources, and will not be addressed here.

SBIR 120

SBIR Startup New York City Angel Investor 120

Austin Startup

AUGUST 30, 2018

Of these rounds, nearly every one was classified as a Series B or later-stage round, with the exception of a few debt and equity financing rounds. A trend towards larger, later-stage companies typically means investors are looking to take on less risk and invest in more established companies.

Austin 48

Austin Early Stage San Francisco Later Stage 48

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 31, 2019

He’ll be speaking at this year’s Lean Startup Conference , and also has a new book (for which I very happily wrote a short foreword) coming out next month: Secrets of Sand Hill Road: Venture Capital and How to Get It. What is venture capital, really? And what does a venture capital firm do?

Lean 108

Lean Venture Capital Conversion IPO 108

Berkonomics

JUNE 8, 2017

The subject of raising money is critical to many businesses and a passing option to others, depending upon the capital efficiency of the enterprise. And even with the significant cost of credit card debt, many entrepreneurs aggressively use existing cards to finance a startup. For you who fit that description, nice work.

Private Equity 106

Private Equity Valuation Cap Table Accredited Investor 106

The Equity Kicker

FEBRUARY 9, 2016

There’s been a lot of talk recently about what will happen to startup financing in 2016, including here on this blog. The consensus is definitely negative, but one thing that has buoyed my optimism about the prospects for our portfolio is the number of new funds raised in London recently.

Marketing 60

Marketing Institutional Investors Venture Capital Later Stage 60

K9 Ventures

OCTOBER 12, 2015

I define #PeakVC as the point in time when the maximum amount of $$s are entering the Venture Capital industry. That is because the venture capital industry operates in cycles. That increases the overall money supply coming in to venture. It doesn’t matter whether you believe in the Peak Oil theory or not.

Venture Capital 48

Venture Capital Seed Stage LP Valuation 48

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 28, 2010

He says they are just as selective on seed investments as they are in later stage deals. And Mike believes that entrepreneurs often need less capital to get started these days. Venture Financings we Discussed. Tags: This Week in Venture Capital. You can hear his full argument in the interview.

San Francisco 230

San Francisco Los Angeles Cofounder SMS 230

Up and Running

JANUARY 30, 2014

Accelerators focus on early-stage startups, while incubators are geared toward later-stage startups. An accelerator usually offers a small amount of capital, office space, and mentorship in exchange for a small amount of equity, usually less than 10 percent. Accelators.

Incubator 105

Incubator New York City Venture Capital Startup 105

David Teten

JANUARY 21, 2021

V: Should you raise venture capital from a traditional equity VC or a Revenue-Based Investing VC? VI: Revenue-based financing: The next step for private equity and early-stage investment. This is a summary of: Revenue-Based financing: State of the Industry 2020. We plan to raise $2.5m

Equity 78

Equity Revenue Cofounder Colorado 78

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 29, 2011

Yesterday I wrote Part 1 of the series on the changes to the software industry over the past decade that has led to changes in the venture capital industry itself. Some have done earlier-stage deals and done well. Others have chased earlier-stage but lack the skills or relationships to do this effectively.

Venture Capital 296

Venture Capital Software LP Early Stage 296

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

Private equity and venture capital investors are copying our sisters in the hedge fund world: we’re trying to automate more of our job. . Data companies focused on early-stage startups include Aingel , fundsUP , Preseries , PredictLeads , and Sploda. ff Venture Capital hired two full-time engineers to build out Totem.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Austin Startup

MARCH 7, 2021

in the last four years we’ve seen a 250% increase in venture capital funding and have doubled the number of startup development organizations in our community.” It is the tech hub of Texas and has the most local venture capital and attracts the most venture capital. billion invested across the state.

Texas 90

Texas San Antonio Houston Dallas 90