VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 5, 2024

According to Pitchbook, “The median return of emerging fund portfolios narrowly exceeded that of their established counterparts, while the top-quartile figure delivered by emerging managers significantly outperformed.” The focus on entertainment tech meant that we always cared about content creation, distribution and monetisation.

Management 103

Management Technical Review Venture Capital Generative AI 103

Version One Ventures

DECEMBER 3, 2019

Bessemer started the idea of the “anti-portfolio” – the companies that you passed on, but ended up doing very, very well. . After Honey was acquired by PayPal for $4B a few weeks ago, we thought it was a good time to share the Version One anti-portfolio: Honey. We had a chance to invest in a $500K round at a $12M valuation in 2015.

Portfolio 201

Portfolio Cap Table Early Stage Valuation 201

VC Cafe

OCTOBER 22, 2024

This capability could revolutionise content production and distribution for media and entertainment companies. For example, our portfolio company HourOne can generate high quality videos of people speaking in a talk show, completely generated with AI. billion in earn out based on performance.

Generative AI 78

Generative AI Technical Review Vertical Government 78

Steve Blank

JULY 2, 2009

If you were a “with it” VC you needed to have a “Content&# or “Multimedia&# company in your portfolio to impress your limited partners – educational software companies, game companies, or anything that could be described as content and/or Multimedia. We understood none of this. More detail in future posts.

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley Technical Review RSS Software Review 120

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

However, in private markets, there is more room to optimize across all 11 steps of the investing process: firm management , marketing, fundraising , origination , manage relationships, due diligence, negotiation, monitoring, portfolio acceleration , reporting, and. If you have one, please contact me. 7) Negotiate .

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2011

Yes an online video startup in ‘99 that helped large media companies encode and distribute their videos through portals. He is starting to see this occur in sites that are verticalizing content. An example is Metacafe, a Highland Capital portfolio company. He does think there are opportunities in vertical search.

Vertical 265

Vertical Curation Boston Burn Rate 265

Mucker Lab

OCTOBER 12, 2016

Normal distributions do not exist; standard deviations are meaningless. Vertical integration of different funding risks. I also believe that the ebb and flow of the venture investment cycle has been exacerbated by the recent vertical integration of early, growth, and even late stage venture funds. Betting on the wrong horse.

Harvest 60

Harvest Vertical IPO Early Stage 60

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 4, 2021

Anthony Ulwick and Ted Thayer of Strategyn have a set of unique and valuable insights: Rather than defining markets as existing, adjacent or new markets – or by verticals, technology, demographics, et al. Others define markets around verticals, e.g. the financial services market or the healthcare market.

Customer 427

Customer Marketing Lean Vertical 427

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 14, 2021

That’s a bit of a cautionary tale to VC investors today who might think it’s inevitable that the private value they are enjoying in their portfolios will certainly translate to distributions in the near future. This is particularly relevant for VC funds because they do not follow a normal distribution, they follow the power-law curve.

Valuation 319

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Distribution Early Stage 319

Genuine VC

AUGUST 3, 2012

For us, the investment is certainly fresh and newest in our portfolio, but it also feels familiar. And Board Member James Reinhart is already part of the NextView family, as CEO of portfolio company, thredUP. Today the company announced that it has raised $2M from a number of investors including us at NextView Ventures.

Cofounder 199

Cofounder Seed Stage Portfolio Curation 199

Occam's Razor

JULY 24, 2018

Analyzing these metrics not only fundamentally changes marketing strategy (think tens of millions of dollars for large companies); their insights can change your company’s product portfolio, your customer engagement strategies and much more. Slice the matrix vertically along the time-to-useful dimension…. Is the distribution optimal?

Analytics 95

Analytics Framework Metrics Green 95

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 14, 2021

That’s a bit of a cautionary tale to VC investors today who might think it’s inevitable that the private value they are enjoying in their portfolios will certainly translate to distributions in the near future. This is particularly relevant for VC funds because they do not follow a normal distribution, they follow the power-law curve.

Valuation 295

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Distribution Early Stage 295

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 18, 2010

Reportedly, Softbank and Zynga have discussed jointly distributing games through Softbank’s mobile-phone service in Japan and other countries. Network of vertical focused sites: BeachMint, BeachMint, WineMint, etc.; first vertical to launch by 2010 Holiday Season. DST invested $180mm last fall. No Financial details disclosed.

Venture Capital 225

Venture Capital Non-Compete Vertical Europe 225

Rob Go

JULY 11, 2013

We tend to favor companies that have a “distribution advantage”. This isn’t true for every single one of our portfolio companies, but in at least half, we had a thesis about why this company had some sort of unfair advantage or head-start when it comes to getting their product out into the market.

Distribution 66

Distribution Vertical Viral B2B 66

View from Seed

AUGUST 30, 2017

We think it’s inevitable that this vertical will undergo the same digital transformation as every other major commerce category and we’ve made two investments behind this thesis ( Paintzen and Renoviso ) and will be expecting to do more around the construction and renovation space in the years to come. Source: Google Finance).

Denmark 244

Denmark Vertical eCommerce Internet 244

VC Cafe

MARCH 6, 2024

With the rapid advancement of generative AI, we’re seeing content creation, distribution and monetisation being disrupted faster than ever before. Calling Israeli startup founders in Interactive Entertainment, AI & Gaming! Drop us a line or slide into our DMs – we’re all ears!

Artificial Inteligence 141

Artificial Inteligence Generative AI Startup Vertical 141

Version One Ventures

JANUARY 27, 2014

Distribution strategies are different. ” And many distribution strategies that worked on the web (like long-tail SEO), simply don’t work in an app ecosystem. ” And many distribution strategies that worked on the web (like long-tail SEO), simply don’t work in an app ecosystem.

Mobile 161

Mobile Web SEO Distribution 161

Version One Ventures

JANUARY 2, 2019

Each week we like share our thoughts on a range of topics from vertical markets to general startup advice and our reflections on investing. Changing the narrative on distributed teams in Silicon Valley”. Among our Silicon Valley-based portfolio companies, every company past “A” has a distributed team. Happy new year!

Silicon Valley 144

Silicon Valley Venture Capital Distribution Artificial Inteligence 144

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 14, 2021

That’s a bit of a cautionary tale to VC investors today who might think it’s inevitable that the private value they are enjoying in their portfolios will certainly translate to distributions in the near future. This is particularly relevant for VC funds because they do not follow a normal distribution, they follow the power-law curve.

Valuation 156

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Distribution Early Stage 156

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 5, 2023

You can stop making new investments, but it will take years to actually work through your active portfolio companies. I’ve decided that this is long enough for me—especially given the fact that when you’re in venture capital, you don’t just stop. Consider this.

Later Stage 218

Later Stage Venture Capital Term Sheet Limited Partner 218

Rob Go

AUGUST 21, 2013

Product / Distribution Fit. My friend Brian Balfour wrote a blog post yesterday about emerging distribution channels and how they impact innovation. One point he makes is that in even established vertical, new companies tend to rise on the back of new distribution channels. Seed stage founder heuristics.

Distribution 48

Distribution Founder Product Seed Stage 48

A Crowded Space

AUGUST 11, 2014

Offer portfolios  Many different people like to showcase their work online. Now there are free portfolio tools for almost every type of individual. Once a site is successful in gaining users for their free portfolio tool, you end up having solved your initial supply challenge. Provide value to one side. See: Ebay.

Aggregator 101

Aggregator Curation Demand Portfolio 101

ReadWriteStart

DECEMBER 8, 2011

Some vertical ad networks have gone after this opportunity, Glam Media being one of the most successful of the lot. The market is crowded, but Stathis has a critical mass of traffic and transactions, as well as a large portfolio of car rental companies providing data to make the service viable. It's just not worth it.

Greece 116

Greece Entrepreneur India Silicon Valley 116

Hippoland

APRIL 17, 2015

The truth is, we have 50+ folks on staff at 500 from all over the world (except Antarctica) with expertise in different verticals. We pull from knowledge of our diverse staff, which includes a team of in-house marketers, as well as our 1000 portfolio companies and hundreds of mentors. And, we don’t just invest.

Entrepreneur 48

Entrepreneur Vertical Holding Company Distribution 48

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

customers aren’t buying it, the cost of distribution is too high, etc.) Venture portfolio companies don’t succeed because they used the Product Development model they succeeded in spite of using it. Because it isn’t until after first customer ship that a startup discovers that their initial hypotheses were simply wrong (i.e.

Customer Development 245

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 245

Version One Ventures

OCTOBER 1, 2020

As we do at the end of every quarter, we’ve summarized some of the key highlights and activities across our portfolio. . In addition, UNI arrived and was probably one of the largest token distribution events ever with 15% of all tokens going to nearly 300K liquidity providers and users. Announcements.

Portfolio 94

Portfolio Software Review Cofounder Canada 94

VC Cafe

JUNE 30, 2022

shout out to our portfolio company Echo3D who’s working on this) Improved collaboration tools By default, both the Unity and Unreal level editors only support a single designer editing a level at a time. I love landscapes as they help organise the categories needed to define the vertical.

Cloud 200

Cloud Venture Capital Cofounder Non-Compete 200

Cracking the Code

OCTOBER 13, 2020

As doctors are embracing new technologies, we think this is only the beginning of the digital transformation of medical practices and hospitals, and we expect a lot more innovation in this vertical in the coming years.

Europe 71

Europe Cloud Silicon Valley Israel 71

Rob Go

JANUARY 21, 2016

Convenience tends to be an area where incumbents struggle, especially when convenience is tied to new forms of distribution. Incumbents are where they are because they have scale through the existing large modes of distribution (eg: physical retail). Our consumer portfolio has largely been focused around convenience.

Disintermediation 28

Disintermediation Distribution Demand Flash 28

VC Cafe

APRIL 15, 2024

Initially, many publishers were slow to recognize the internet’s impact on their business model as distribution and the classifieds and ad worlds split – or what Ben Thompson calls the “ Great Unbundling ”. Media companies can create their own smaller, specialised LLMs to boost vertical content creation. What do you think?

Generative AI 142

Generative AI Media Artificial Inteligence Vertical 142

VC Cafe

DECEMBER 19, 2024

What to Expect: AI agents managing financial portfolios, purchasing goods, and negotiating contracts in real-time. Vertical-specific agents (e.g., It’s no secret that short form vertical video is the fastest growing form of content on the web, but until now it’s also been more cumbersome to produce quality content.

Media 88

Media Generative AI ChatGPT Vertical 88

VC Cafe

MARCH 6, 2025

Vertical AI Even with the commoditisation of foundational models, vertical AI is a huge opportunity because it addresses complex, industry-specific demands with tailored functionalities, deep integrations, and specialised workflows. Below are three examples of potential winners. Madrona’s Jon Turow has a great primer on this.

Technical Review 88

Technical Review Vertical Open Source Generative AI 88

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2017

https://medium.com/media/cc969482e7abf6b75d3c0958c8ee409d/href I moved to Los Angeles in 2007 and as a VC who had built his career as a programmer, database designer, program manager, CEO then VP Products at Salesforce, I wanted to build a portfolio of software investments. An obvious vector for me would be software for the media industry.

Media 210

Media Los Angeles Russia Viral 210