Hunter Walker

SEPTEMBER 5, 2021

Startup CEOs Should Test Strength of Cap Table Every ~6 Months To Know Where They Stand. If we’ve got an oversupply of demand, is this the round your firm usually starts stepping back from pro rata?”. Lastly, Jason has a single very practical suggestion on what to do if your cap table is tapped out.

Cap Table 127

Cap Table Seed Stage Syndication Syndicate 127

Gust

OCTOBER 8, 2014

Entrepreneurs started demanding that VCs call their first-round financings “seed” rounds even if they were $3 million. It is less about actual money and more about structure of your Cap Table. Invested Interests cap table venture capital' So VCs started writing some smaller A-rounds. and there''s always a but].

Cap Table 136

Cap Table Silicon Valley Term Sheet Non-Compete 136

Feld Thoughts

JULY 15, 2014

2) Keeping the number of entries on our cap table relatively small. The only negatives so far are the days of uncertainty where do you don’t know how much is going to get filled and if you need to generate more demand or turn people away on a daily basis. 2) Ability to diversify their funds without a huge minimum ticket.

Syndicate 149

Syndicate Syndication Cap Table Due Diligence 149

Board Effect

MAY 13, 2019

Let’s not waste time listing everything startups could be doing to more effectively manage their cap tables. When it comes to cap table management in startup companies, it’s unrealistic to expect perfection. What does your cap table need to address at each stage of growth? Defining Cap Tables.

Cap Table 40

Cap Table Management Liquidity Event Dilution 40

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 11, 2019

Eventually, I joined Jenny Lefcourt in the initiative called Founders for Change, where we’re amplifying the voices of the founders who are demanding greater representation and diversity not only within their organization, their cap table, and their board rooms, but also in terms of the makeup of all of these organizations.

Founder 68

Founder Lean Venture Capital Cofounder 68

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 22, 2011

I understand the appeal of having many VC firms on your cap table. You may feel as I did in 1999 that the more smart people around the table the more intros you’ll have, the more sage advice you’ll receive and the more impressive you’ll seem to outsiders. The Perils of Many.

Dilution 314

Dilution Cap Table Due Diligence Option Pool 314

Haystack

OCTOBER 7, 2018

The opportunities for these new funds are endless.

Cap Table 147

Cap Table Venture Capital Portfolio Pay to Play 147

Hunter Walker

NOVEMBER 20, 2013

I’m an individual investor in AngelList (pre-Homebrew) and remain excited about opening up supply and demand within early stage investing. While these are all credible let’s be honest – it’s a little boring.

Syndicate 121

Syndicate Syndication South America Cap Table 121

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

Satisfying LP demands and streamlining the valuation process are primary drivers in those clients’ adoption of Ipreo’s portfolio monitoring and valuation solutions, iLEVEL, iVAL, and Qval. . EShares is an increasingly popular tool in our portfolio for tracking private company cap tables.

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Technical Review 60

Hippoland

OCTOBER 18, 2018

2) Was a marketplace with high engagement Marketplaces tend to be “winner take all” businesses, because they are only valuable if both the supply and demand sides are both liquid and efficient. This is why you see companies like Bird, Lime, et al raise so much money.

Bootstrapping 90

Bootstrapping Cap Table Salary .Net 90

Feld Thoughts

JUNE 2, 2015

But, I’ve seen some angels ask for it (or even demand it), especially when there is ambiguity around this and the round happens much higher than the cap. This mess is especially yucky if the lawyers don’t focus on the final cap table and the capitalization opinion until the last few days of the process.

Liquidation Preference 70

Liquidation Preference Cap Table Angel Investor Post-Money Valuation 70

Rob Go

AUGUST 29, 2016

The main reason for this, I think, is that there has been such a proliferation of convertible notes, SAFE’s, and other instruments that it becomes tough for a new investor to feel confident that they fully understand a company’s cap table prior to an investment.

Post-Money Valuation 52

Post-Money Valuation Valuation Cap Table Term Sheet 52

Spencer Fry

APRIL 17, 2017

What I worry about is the demand on every one of your potential customer’s attention and time. As a bootstrapper, you have nobody above you on the cap table (note: investors sit above you in their liquidation preference), so it’s your way or the highway. Competition is everywhere. Nobody can tell you what to do.

Bootstrapping 63

Bootstrapping Cap Table Liquidation Preference Cofounder 63

OnlyOnce

FEBRUARY 9, 2022

They are typically founder-led, often by a first-time CEO with new or incomplete management teams who need a lot of mentorship/development, and with a diversified cap table of firms that don’t own operating or consulting practices to help guide the scaling process. We are changing the way the startup game is played.

Silicon Valley 62

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Cap Table Early Stage 62

Hippoland

OCTOBER 18, 2018

2) Was a marketplace with high engagement Marketplaces tend to be “winner take all” businesses, because they are only valuable if both the supply and demand sides are both liquid and efficient. This is why you see companies like Bird, Lime, et al raise so much money.

Bootstrapping 48

Bootstrapping Cap Table Salary .Net 48

Professor VC

AUGUST 14, 2012

And the company has only one investor on the cap table but can (if they wish) take advantage of a larger group network. The site was designed with the very simple registration process we are all demanding, including checking a couple of boxes to prove you are an accredited investor. I'm curious as to how the SEC will view FC.

Accredited Investor 42

Accredited Investor SEC Cap Table Angel Groups 42

Bryce Dot VC

JANUARY 5, 2015

Is it possible to maintain and independent attitude and ethos with an outside investor on your cap table? Would an early focus on cashflow and sustainability v. fundable milestones stunt growth or lay the foundation for a more scalable long-term culture?

San Francisco 40

San Francisco Cap Table Non-Compete Distribution 40

Austin Startup

SEPTEMBER 4, 2017

Luxury goods purveyors create demand by pricing high enough to keep the riff-raff from polluting their brands. If you do eventually expose your company to those professionals, all your dumb shareholders will get crushed in the new cap table. My sales team says price is the only thing that is keeping them from meeting quotas.

Cap Table 48

Cap Table Austin Founder PR 48

abovethecrowd.com

JUNE 2, 2021

On the demand side, the IPO process is limited to a handful of institutional investors and also ignores the vast majority of retail investors. Investment banks simply do not match supply and demand. When I share this, reporters often ask me, “why is management so gullible to sit there and listen to a demand imbalance goal of 30x-50x?”.

IPO 82

IPO Customer Matching Silicon Valley 82

Hearpreneur

AUGUST 20, 2023

And, over-fundraising can trigger a domino effect of complications, from cap-table issues to inflated valuations, which can ruin future fundraising. 16- Think outside the box Photo Credit: David Barkoe Demanding more when you know you’ve achieved what they’ve asked you to achieve but not getting what you want in return.

Entrepreneur 112

Entrepreneur Cap Table Dividend Cofounder 112

Ben's Blog

APRIL 1, 2011

I remember when I first became CEO, an investor asked me to send him the “cap table.” If the sales team made unreasonable demands on the product organization, then that was my fault. This means that you will face a broad set of things that you don’t know how to do that require skills that you don’t have.

Management 78

Management Cap Table Balance Sheet Bankruptcy 78

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

A lawyer I asked about it said: When the company goes public, the SEC will carefully study all prior issuances of stock by the company and demand that it take immediate action to cure any past violations of securities laws. In an IPO, it might not merely addexpense, but change the outcome.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

NZ Entrepreneur

DECEMBER 18, 2022

Deep tech spinouts have the added challenge of not only proving market demand, but proving the novel technology behind the company,” explains Pierre. When the time comes to put together a cap table, Pierre explains it’s a discussion between the university, its commercialisation office, company founders and investors.

Cap Table 52

Cap Table Technical Cofounder Artificial Inteligence Marketing 52

Hunter Walker

JANUARY 13, 2024

Fast forward a few years and we finally connect via mutual friends and Twitter threads, but Proof is Too Successful for our early stage capital, meaning I admire from afar versus from the cap table. The pandemic pushed companies forward 3 or 5 stages prematurely, mostly in response to false or temporary demand.

Hiring 96

Hiring Cap Table Cofounder Early Stage 96

abovethecrowd.com

APRIL 20, 2016

You can no longer simply look at the cap table and estimate your return. One response from the LP community might be to demand commitments from new funds that prohibit inside-led rounds and cross-fund investing. The adjustment does not happen now, it will happen later. Dirty term sheets are a massive problem for two reasons.

IPO 40

IPO Term Sheet Silicon Valley Valuation 40

This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 10, 2016

If you're going to take someone onto your cap table you should talk to other people that VC has invested in. I'm very conscious of not demanding too much time from my founders with LP references, so I've asked a few of them at a time to join a group call.

Cap Table 60

Cap Table Limited Partner LP Reputation 60

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 4, 2021

But basically from that moment, we struggled to keep up with the demand as opposed to trying to create more demand. But one of those pieces is how companies get formed, how they raise money, how they manage their cap table and how they eventually go public. And that was the moment where we found product market fit.

IPO 113

IPO Cofounder Technical Review Government 113