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Is Strategic Money an Oxymoron?

Both Sides of the Table

The topic of &# strategic&# investors came up. It felt like Groundhog Day because I have this conversation again and again – literally dozens of times each year. And I had 2 “strategic&# investors in my first company. Keep that in mind when you’re thinking about ’strategic’ money.

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Deal with Your Elephant in the Room

Both Sides of the Table

There’s an old saying that if I’m talking with you and I start the conversation by saying, “whatever you do, DO NOT think about Elephants &# then you can’t help but thinking about elephants while we’re speaking. Your A round investors are not stepping up. - You raised $1.5

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Should You Allow “Board Observers” on Your Startup Board?

Both Sides of the Table

every voice has the ability to sway a conversation and the tenor of the meeting. Strategic Investors ?—?This In some instances strategic investors prefer not to take board seats as it might be their corporate policy. There are many corporate investors who are more financial investors that typical strategic ones.

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How to Have a Smarter VC Strategy

Austin Startup

You benefit from the capital and investors benefit from a nice discount at conversion, usually in the range of 20 percent. Some came from angel investors, but we also sought out industry experts to be early contributors in this stage, which leads me to tip number three. We were able to raise $750k this way.

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Why I Don’t Like Board Observers

Both Sides of the Table

The third scenario I’ve seen is with “strategic&# investors. Strategic is often a euphemism for investors that are from the industry you serve rather than from a purely financial investor. I’ll cover strategic investors in a different post.

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Rethinking Board Observers – The Role of the “Silent Observer”

Both Sides of the Table

I don’t really need to the conversation skewed by extra participants. Some “strategic investors” have rules that they can’t sit on board seats. If the person is there to understand the context and help with follow up then they should be able to get full value from the meeting just by being there.

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Take Five: The Metaverse

VC Cafe

The latest appearance, a 3 hour conversation with Joe Rogan, comes in a troubling time for Meta/Facebook as I covered in my latest post on VC Cafe. Joe Rogan hosted Mark Zuckerberg on a 3-hour conversation on the metaverse and Facebook’s woes. The top 15 strategic investors in gaming. Final thoughts.

IP 187