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Announcing a Deal I’ve Wanted to Talk About for a Year

Both Sides of the Table

” So Ethan went to work as a product manager at Google Video. I told Ethan on the spot that I wanted to be the lead investor in his new company. In industry this is known as “yield management” and of course it needs to exist. When Ethan was considering leaving Google we talked about it.

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Sometimes a Good Loss is Better than a Bad Win

OnlyOnce

Your win might not be sustainable, and you’ve put your reputation at risk. Or you negotiate the highest possible valuation from a new lead investor, only to discover that new lead investor, now on your Board, expects you to triple it in four years and is way out of alignment with the rest of your cap table.

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Sometimes a Good Loss is Better than a Bad Win

OnlyOnce

Your win might not be sustainable, and you’ve put your reputation at risk. Or you negotiate the highest possible valuation from a new lead investor, only to discover that new lead investor, now on your Board, expects you to triple it in four years and is way out of alignment with the rest of your cap table.

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And When My Time Is Up, Have I Done Enough: Fred Wilson’s Post on ‘Time & Money’

Hunter Walker

Like we do at the seed stage, USV almost always plays the role of “ lead investor.” ” And later: “The truth about these situations is a few seed investors will massively over deliver and the rest will massively disappoint.” But it often is not.”

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Corporate Venture Capital: Obligatory or Oxymoron?

David Teten

Previously she was Co-Founder and CEO of SNAZZ, a cloud-based event management platform. Some corporate funds now lead rounds. Others follow independent financial lead investors and most require that independent investors be part of the syndicate. Teten: What makes for a good vs. bad corporate venture investor?

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How VCs Structure a Syndicate and Recruit Coinvestors

David Teten

The challenge with most such independent investors is that they, quite reasonably, all have their own independent decision-making and due diligence process. They don’t automatically invest just because we invested; they usually move more slowly than the company’s management team wants. .

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You Think You Screwed Up? Have I Got a Story for You!

Babbling VC

We often think we can change people, even managers. They kept changing the responsible investment manager for the deal as well hence we never really knew whom to speak to when we needed something. Running around Europe trying to find lead investors for these businesses was priority number 1. This cost me money!