The Startup Magazine

MARCH 1, 2021

As part of The Startup Magazine Founder Interview Series , we interviewed Maha and David Harper, wife and husband co-founders of Atlas Group London, a construction-tech startup that has digitized the building of healthcare facilities. Co-Founder & CEO. Co-Founder & COO. David Harper.

Technical Review 110

Technical Review Founder Saudi Arabia Cofounder 110

Feld Thoughts

JUNE 9, 2021

Matt was the co-founder/CEO of Return Path. Fred Wilson was his lead investor. I was the lead investor for Veripost. The founders of each company talked and, in between efforts to decimate the other, agreed it might be worth merging to survive. I’ve been working with Matt since 2000.

Fractional CTO 70

Fractional CTO Cofounder Startup Lead Investor 70

Lightspeed Venture Partners

APRIL 12, 2016

Since then, as a team, we’ve been fortunate enough to invest behind the vision of the founders of some tremendous consumer companies across messaging, social media, e-commerce, Internet of Things, marketplaces and gaming. His full time job is CEO of Cheddar , the OTT video company he founded, and where Lightspeed is the lead investor.

Technical Cofounder 60

Technical Cofounder Cofounder SCRUM Committed Capital 60

Hippoland

AUGUST 9, 2016

One question that seed investors love to ask is if you have a lead investor in your seed round. But once you figure out why an investor is asking, tactically speaking, what do you do? Let’s say that you find out that an investor is asking because he/she does not invest without a lead investor in place.

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Lead Investor Term Sheet Due Diligence Convertible Security 48

Rob Go

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

Most of these rhyme with what we’ve said in the past, but some have also evolved to fit the changing landscape and our own convictions about what really matters for founders and their investors at the seed stage. Lead investors are few. Leads that are true force-multipliers are exceedingly rare.

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North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 36

David Teten

JANUARY 10, 2012

Howard Lindzon is Co-Founder and CEO of StockTwits, a social network for traders and investors to share real-time ideas and information. Michael was the lead research analyst for the IPOs of Internet companies like UUNET, Yahoo! He joined Goldman Sachs & Co. and Tweetdeck (purchased by Twitter in June 2011).

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Technical Review Technology North Carolina Switzerland 128

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 23, 2021

For early stage VC ‘s, Syndication is the process of sharing investments with other potential co-investors. The classic scenario is when a VC has a signed term sheet to lead a round, but has left room open for another meaningful investor. When I started in venture, syndicating deals was fairly common.

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Syndicate Syndication Term Sheet Cofounder 207

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 7, 2015

I actually think a strong lead with some well-placed and experienced angels is the right mix. I save room in literally every deal to invite angels (or seed funds) to co-invest with me. Another founder … “When I pitched the idea to Adam, he was super on board,” Mr. Sloyan said. million from more than 30 investors.

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Cap Table Cofounder Silicon Valley Startup 150

View from Seed

MAY 29, 2019

These funds would regularly share deal flow with one another and could share the work in supporting founders and helping to push the company forward. This post will try to describe why this is happening and what repercussions are for founders and investors. Is This is Good or Bad for Founders?

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Syndicate Syndication Cofounder Cap Table 267

View from Seed

JANUARY 11, 2021

The sudden arrival of the global pandemic has shifted the playbook for founders and venture capitalists. Investors previously prone to onsite visits and amassed airline miles, now grapple with how to form relationships and build confidence without having met teams in person. Zoom calls have taken the place of in-person meetings.

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Venture Capital Cofounder Early Stage Seed Stage 350

View from Seed

NOVEMBER 20, 2019

You don’t often hear a founder speak so candidly about this (especially before the final chapter is written) so it’s worth a listen. . We were co-lead investors in Grove’s seed round and actually doubled down in an intermediate round prior to this challenging series A process. The first is super-human resilience.

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Founder Cofounder Seed Stage Portfolio 153

Hunter Walker

SEPTEMBER 27, 2021

And What This Means For Founders. In some ways it’s ALWAYS to an investor’s benefit to suggest a potential new investment wouldn’t be competitive to an existing portfolio company, and it’s ALWAYS to the current portfolio company’s benefit to suggest it might be. Why do I care about how investors at other firms get paid?

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Early Stage Cofounder Vertical Portfolio 117

Hunter Walker

JANUARY 10, 2022

I love working with great people and as a venture capitalist, am fortunate the number of founders I’m impressed by far exceeds our investment capacity. Here’s an example of a founder that I’ve known for a while who recently raised a seed round with different firms than ours. The needs of the lead investor for ownership?

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Cofounder Founder Acquisition Startup 93

Hunter Walker

SEPTEMBER 12, 2022

An Investor and a Founder Postmortem a Mistake. And while I passed on leading their seed, I did contribute a smaller amount into the financing, along with three subsequent pro rata/super pro rata investments. The ability for an investor to earn the trust of a founder and maintain that over time. The Four (!!!)

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Cofounder Lead Investor Founder Restful 99

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 8, 2010

He blogs to 10,000 web entrepreneurs at Software by Rob and co-hosts the podcast Startups for the Rest of Us. Before I get into the details for founders, let me talk about options-hungry employees. While I agree that many VCs are crummy seed investors, I think there are some that are excellent seed investors. Dying at 70?

Startup 191

Startup CTO Hire Cofounder Venture Capital 191

Hippoland

APRIL 9, 2017

3) You act cagey about information Early stage investors understand that there is a lot of work to do in an early stage startup. What looks really bad is when founders try to be evasive about their answers. But a lot of founders will act cagey and evade questions or beat around the bush when faced with difficult questions.

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Cofounder Early Stage Software Review Naming 48

Pascal's View

JULY 9, 2017

Andrew Krowne and I recently co-wrote an article in Tech Crunch , Why SAFE Notes Are Not Safe for Entrepreneurs. At its core, this issue points to the lack of understanding about the importance of post-money valuation by both entrepreneurs and investors.

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Post-Money Valuation Valuation Cap Table Covenant 49

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 4, 2022

For most founders, fundraising is a struggle. The rest have to work super hard to create access for themselves, build trust and win investors over. What’s that investor going to be like in a board meeting when you as a female founder need their support or worse, actually their vote?

Cap Table 167

Cap Table Cofounder Private Equity Finance 167

mashable.com

NOVEMBER 2, 2011

Facebook Co-Founder’s Startup Asana Launches Publicly. Joshua Baer is the co-founder and CEO of Otherinbox , a prolific angel investor and the director of Capital Factory , Austin’s seed-stage incubator. Make It Easy for Investors To Write Checks. Look for Your Lead Investor.

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Social Media Startup Angel Investor RSS 80

techcrunch.com

APRIL 26, 2013

Co-founder Naval Ravikant explains that 18 pilot companies in the program, including Transcriptic, Double Robotics and Tred, received $6.7 million in commitments from 620 investors in the past four months, with about $2 million raised per month on average. Investors included Founders Fund, 500 Startups and Marc Cuban.

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SEC Accredited Investor San Diego New York City 61

Hunter Walker

DECEMBER 30, 2022

The same can be said of startups and their founders, in the sense that so many things can go wrong in the building of a company to an exit, that success almost seems to be a statistical anomaly [more on how bees fly ]. See, it happens to investors too, not just founders. So this is the other side of the coin from above.

Cap Table 70

Cap Table Venture Capital Cofounder Portfolio 70

Hunter Walker

NOVEMBER 21, 2018

One was the result of a cofounder breakup. When they’re at seed stage, we’re deferring to the founders’ decisions but also trying to help them understand the challenges associated with a hard pivot if their cap table isn’t supportive of the direction. As Jason wrote : .

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Founder Cap Table Seed Stage Cofounder 98

OnlyOnce

APRIL 27, 2021

The conversation with your co-founder about only one founder/executive on the board. You already have 100% of the mindshare and ambassadorship your co-founder has to offer. The conversation with an existing VC about leaving the board to make room for new investors or an independent.

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Vesting Cofounder Startup Term Sheet 48

A Crowded Space

OCTOBER 3, 2018

Very shortly after I joined, Greg Gretsch (now my partner at Jackson Square Ventures) co-led oDesk’s Series A along with Venky Ganesan (partner at Menlo Ventures and lead investor in Rev.com). Since I was young and foolish, that didn’t deter me from joining full time. Congrats again to the Upwork team.

San Francisco 60

San Francisco Bangladesh Ukraine Philippines 60

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 30, 2018

I know that some founders feel uncomfortable with this as though they might somehow be sharing something so confidential that it ultimately hurts you. So a VC doesn’t want to price a deal in which the founder feels aggrieved from day one but takes your money anyway because he or she doesn’t have a choice. After all?—?we

Valuation 324

Valuation Post-Money Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Cofounder 324

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 6, 2015

Previously she was Co-Founder and CEO of SNAZZ, a cloud-based event management platform. What are some of the unique benefits and constraints from the point of view of a founder? . Some corporate funds lead rounds and take board seats, others don’t. Some corporate funds now lead rounds.

Venture Capital 60

Venture Capital Balance Sheet Technical Review Portfolio 60

BeyondVC

SEPTEMBER 13, 2006

In other words, the acquirer does not want to have an ex-employee or founder come after them once the transaction is completed. So in order to satisfy the acquirer’s needs, all your company has to do is find the signed documents for the key technical founders. Well, this is easy to take care of, right? Good luck with that.

Technical Review 60

Technical Review Intellectual Property Cofounder Due Diligence 60

View from Seed

AUGUST 12, 2015

I loved the founder but was struggling because this just didn’t seem “big enough” to me. I remember talking to one of their angel investors (and also one of my old mentors) about what the company could become and what it would look like if it ever became a really big business. But these were the early days of the company.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Marketing Angel Investor Term Sheet 120

View from Seed

AUGUST 12, 2015

I loved the founder but was struggling because this just didn’t seem “big enough” to me. I remember talking to one of their angel investors (and also one of my old mentors) about what the company could become and what it would look like if it ever became a really big business. But these were the early days of the company.

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Marketing Angel Investor Term Sheet 120

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2015

If you’re a solo founder and haven’t built out your team or engineers I’m likely to want 15+%. Of course investors care about controls (board, protective provisions, IP assignments, non-solicitation) but these are all pretty standard. .” million and the founder starts thinking, “yeah, $3.5

Pre-Money Valuation 150

Pre-Money Valuation Option Pool Post-Money Valuation Dilution 150

www.readwriteweb.com

MARCH 7, 2011

Chris McCann is the co-founder of StartupDigest , the members-only guide to the tech startup world. Theres now a heated discussion in the investor class about AngelList. The startups and investors can do the round however they like. spray-and-pray? approach vs. the concentrated approach. AngelList is a community.

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Technical Review Due Diligence Startup Angel Investor 50

View from Seed

JANUARY 26, 2016

Just yesterday, for instance, we saw a company raising a seed round that has no product and two founders … and we also saw a company raising a seed with hundreds of thousands of dollars of monthly revenue. technical co-founder). These tend to be cases where founders are proven. FWIW, that is not how we operate.).

Seed Stage 120

Seed Stage Early Stage Cofounder Finance 120

Up and Running

JANUARY 25, 2017

We had previously launched a demo of our product to show traction to potential investors, and better define the pain-points for potential clients. My soon to be former co-founder replied, “We’ve seen 400 percent growth, month over month, and after the first 30 days we’re getting very positive feedback.

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Venture Capital Cofounder Security Partner 60

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

I was hanging out the other day with my buddy Jody Sherman, founder & CEO of EcoMom. I was an angel investor in his company, made a bunch of calls on his behalf and then I personally sent it out on AngelList. Co-founded a company in the private jet business – sold to Virgin America. Through this process he raised $2 million.

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Valuation Deal Flow Lead Investor Cofounder 292

Feld Thoughts

AUGUST 2, 2010

This prompted me to write a post titled AngelList Boulder and Some Thoughts on Seed Investing where I promised to write up some of my thoughts on how and why VCs could be good seed investors. They are: Fred Wilson: Lead Investors, Dipshit Companies, and Funding Every Entrepreneur. each are equally happy situations.)

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Angel Investor Cofounder Syndicate Syndication 152

Feld Thoughts

MAY 3, 2010

When I’m on a VC panel, I’m always amused by the answers from my co-panelists as they are usually the same set of “VC cliches” which makes it even more fun when I blurt out my answer. “ The great companies that I’ve been an investor in share a common trait – the founder/CEO is obsessed with the product.

Product 148

Product Cofounder Lead Investor Software 148

Hunter Walker

APRIL 4, 2015

That is, raising $5m+ at a $20m+ post-money, lead by a large multistage VC. With Homebrew we’re focused on being ‘partners of conviction’ to founders during the first few years of their companies. So what’s a seed fund to do when a “seed” round is $20m?

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Cofounder Lead Investor Valuation Framework 48