View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

Lead investors are few. Leads that are true force-multipliers are exceedingly rare. Although seed funding has exploded since we started Nextview, we continue to hear the refrain from founders that there are tons of investors that will pile-in on a round that is coming together, but that lead investors are few and far between.

North America 120

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 120

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 26, 2013

When my co-founders and I got the company scalable and repeatable, we hired an operating executive as the CEO and returned a billion dollars to each of our two lead investors. Now when I listen to entrepreneurs who’ve cratered a company, I listen for their stories of failure and redemption. Lessons Learned.

Redemption 225

Redemption Cofounder Silicon Valley Burn Rate 225

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. How I Think About Seed Investing As A VC - Feld Thoughts , August 2, 2010 Last week saw an explosion of discussion around seed investing, including plenty of negative comments around VCs as seed investors.

Startup 191

Startup CTO Hire Cofounder Venture Capital 191

Gust

SEPTEMBER 27, 2014

To begin with, it is important to understand some basic facts about the world of entrepreneurial finance: There are many more entrepreneurs than there are investors, with the result that only one company out of every 400 that seeks venture funding actually receives it.

Angel Groups 159

Angel Groups Elevator Pitch Software Review Deal Flow 159

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 17, 2012

That means investors are going to buy that much of your company at a time. It means lead investors can get to 10, 15 or 20% ownership depending on whatever math they have that makes their own success model work. More often, its probably closer to 25%, but since this is a blog post, I'll try to look more entrepreneur friendly.

Venture Capital 121

Venture Capital Framework Dilution Equity 121

The Startup Magazine

MARCH 1, 2021

As entrepreneurs with a passion for helping others, they’ve built a company that is vastly accelerating the ability to deliver healthcare to the most needy global communities. We are always interested in engaging with both investors and partners that share our vision – to help us really take this forward and scale.

Technical Review 125

Technical Review Founder Saudi Arabia Cofounder 125

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 15, 2016

This has led VC & entrepreneur bloggers alike to similar conclusions: start raising capital early and be careful about having too high of a burn rate because that lessens the amount of runway you have until you need more cash. I’m surprised how few entrepreneurs have this open conversation with their investors.

Burn Rate 150

Burn Rate Cap Table Valuation Software Review 150

crowdSPRING Blog

AUGUST 4, 2010

Why An MBA Could Kill Your Chance To Become A Great Tech Entrepreneur – [link]. Idiocy and brilliance of American policy toward entrepreneurs – [link]. Lead Investors, Dipshit Companies, and Funding Every Entrepreneur – [link]. Why software startups decide to patent … or not – [link].

Social Media 92

Social Media Small Business Design Media 92

The Next Web

OCTOBER 7, 2013

You might assume the lead investor wants a 20 percent stake and 15 percent option pool each time there’s a Series ‘Blah’ every 12 to 18 months, but this is admittedly too simple. Entrepreneur Insider Analysis and Opinion How-To''s' Get rightly compensated, in whatever form it may come.

Engineer 129

Engineer Dilution Option Pool Vesting 129

ReadWriteStart

FEBRUARY 19, 2020

The government creates programs to help entrepreneurs. In 2012, the national government created the programs iNNpulsa and apps.co, both promote innovation , business, and technological developments in Colombia by providing funds and coaching programs to promising entrepreneurs. Ayenda Rooms.

Colombia 146

Colombia America Technical Review Startup 146

David Teten

MARCH 31, 2012

I’m exceptionally excited to announce that I’m now Chairman and lead investor with some other angels in a new company, Spright Governance Inc. I spoke with a range of Singaporean entrepreneurs, many who felt that the U.S. (An aerial view of Parliament House in Singapore. Photo credit: Wikipedia).

Government 154

Government Singapore New York City Non-Compete 154

NZ Entrepreneur

AUGUST 4, 2021

Lead investors and term sheets. Now that you’ve got investors undergoing due diligence, you must secure a lead investor. Typically, lead investors take up a significant portion of an investment round, and act as a signal to other investors that the round is getting traction.

Technical Review 65

Technical Review Software Review Founder Due Diligence 65

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 7, 2015

One of my favorite entrepreneur-Twitterer weighed in, “You want to keep tapping into their collective intelligence so you keep saying ‘Thank you for the feedback’ and they keep sending it,” Ms. million from more than 30 investors. We tell them very explicitly, they should prefer a small number of investors,”. Morrill said.

Cap Table 150

Cap Table Cofounder Silicon Valley Startup 150

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 12, 2017

No entrepreneur wants to think that their business won’t last, but as they burn cash in the developing years they need to consider future implications — particularly funding. During the audit process, the company needs to address the risk that it may not be able to continue as a “going concern.”

San Francisco 133

San Francisco Forecast Early Stage Term Sheet 133

View from Seed

AUGUST 26, 2015

Just yesterday, Adam Medros , SVP of Global Product at TripAdvisor and an entrepreneur advisor for NextView, just asked about when the next event will be. And although this is written for angel investors, I think entrepreneurs can only benefit by increasing their knowledge around these investors and hope you’ll continue reading if that’s you.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Angel Investor Software Review Silicon Valley 120

View from Seed

AUGUST 26, 2015

Just yesterday, Adam Medros , SVP of Global Product at TripAdvisor and an entrepreneur advisor for NextView, just asked about when the next event will be. And although this is written for angel investors, I think entrepreneurs can only benefit by increasing their knowledge around these investors and hope you’ll continue reading if that’s you.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Angel Investor Software Review Silicon Valley 120

View from Seed

OCTOBER 11, 2022

Through all of this, what has been obvious is her hunger to serve founders and desire to work with entrepreneurs to bring about the kind of world changing impact we seek to be a part of at NextView. Specifically: – We are high-conviction, hands-on lead investors.

Cofounder 156

Cofounder San Francisco Portfolio Limited Partner 156

Genuine VC

JANUARY 15, 2015

Often for a myriad of often idiosyncratic reasons, an entrepreneur is introduced to an attractive new potential VC partner late in the game. However, in my personal experience, the come-from-behind lead investor is worth incorporating into the process, as it turns out more often than you’d expect that they end up leading the round.

Lead Investor 100

Lead Investor Term Sheet Venture Capital Portfolio 100

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 27, 2011

This is where your business starts to incur real costs—but it’s also where entrepreneurs don’t like to be short term “sellers” of their equity. They’re hesitant to raise money—selling equity to investors—when things look great.

Dilution 104

Dilution Equity Hiring Partner 104

mashable.com

NOVEMBER 2, 2011

AngelList is brilliantly designed to make it easy for investors to write checks to entrepreneurs. Naval and Nivi , the founders of AngelList, took the very best social mechanics from Facebook , Twitter and LinkedIn to create a “social proof” that ultimately makes investors comfortable writing checks.

Social Media 80

Social Media Startup Angel Investor RSS 80

View from Seed

JANUARY 27, 2021

We believe that this fund is the perfect size for us to be the best possible partners to early-stage entrepreneurs today. Investors take chances when they invest in seed stage companies, but founders take a profoundly larger chance when selecting a lead investor or board member for their company.

LP 411

LP Early Stage Seed Stage Venture Capital 411

BeyondVC

SEPTEMBER 13, 2006

As an entrepreneur, you are most likely spending most of your time building your product and getting it to market. When you closed your first round of funding years ago, the lead investor did his diligence and found out that the technical co-founder’s existing employer may have a right or may even own the startup’s technology.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Intellectual Property Cofounder Due Diligence 78

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 3, 2011

One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make is not understanding the relationship they have with their investors. Steve, we thought we’d tell you this before the board meeting, but both our firms are going to pass on leading your next round.” At times they confuse VC’s with their friends. Lets Go to Lunch. I was speechless.

San Francisco 333

San Francisco Silicon Valley Limited Partner Venture Capital 333

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 26, 2020

In previous blog posts I’ve written about the two main approaches to building a seed round syndicate – the subscription method (where an entrepreneur presets a structure with a convertible note or SAFE and recruits investors who subscribe to the round, all without a term-driving lead investor) and a term-driving lead investor approach.

Syndicate 257

Syndicate Syndication Lead Investor Venture Capital 257

Lightspeed Venture Partners

APRIL 12, 2016

He studied physics and materials engineering at Harvard and MIT and received his MBA from Harvard Business School; so, Alex combines a deep technical background with terrific business and consumer sensibilities, as well as a passion for helping entrepreneurs build their dreams into reality. As a team, the next ten will be even better.

Technical Cofounder 60

Technical Cofounder Cofounder SCRUM Committed Capital 60

The Startup Magazine

AUGUST 18, 2017

The opening keynote session will define directions on Aligning the Role of Government Policymakers, Incumbent Banks, FinTech Innovators, Investors, Multilateral Agencies, MNOs and the Private Sector to Create a Dynamic Ecosystem for FinTech in Africa.

Africa 81

Africa Ethiopia Elevator Pitch Technical Review 81

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 5, 2014

Prabhdeep Singh: Ask any entrepreneur about their most valuable resource when they’re making tough decisions, and you’ll hear the name of someone, not something. Over the past 15 years we’ve built this amazing membership to serve our core clients – leading investors, corporations, consulting firms, and nonprofits.

New York 114

New York Technical Review Networking Advisory Board 114

Rob Go

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

Lead investors are few. Leads that are true force-multipliers are exceedingly rare. Although seed funding has exploded since we started Nextview, we continue to hear the refrain from founders that there are tons of investors that will pile-in on a round that is coming together, but that lead investors are few and far between.

North America 36

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 36

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2011

I was saying that I was happy it was all out in the open because I felt at least everybody could now understand the issues & opportunities from the perspectives of angels, entrepreneurs and VCs. Jody didn’t exactly have an easy time fund raising because he’s not one of the prototypical Silicon Valley funded entrepreneurs.

Valuation 292

Valuation Deal Flow Lead Investor Cofounder 292

Gust

AUGUST 6, 2014

What the terms end up being, and how a company and the investor(s) arrive at that term sheet, can differ widely. The simple fact of the market is that there are many, many more entrepreneurs seeking capital than there are investors seeking to fund them. Good personal chemistry with the entrepreneur.

Term Sheet 170

Term Sheet Lead Investor Preferred Stock Common Stock 170

BeyondVC

SEPTEMBER 13, 2006

As an entrepreneur, you are most likely spending most of your time building your product and getting it to market. When you closed your first round of funding years ago, the lead investor did his diligence and found out that the technical co-founder’s existing employer may have a right or may even own the startup’s technology.

Technical Review 60

Technical Review Intellectual Property Cofounder Due Diligence 60

View from Seed

OCTOBER 21, 2014

In short, more and more entrepreneurs are signaling their price expectations earlier in their seed fundraise process. In theory, there are three levels of pricing for an entrepreneur to potentially signal to a prospective investor: 1. Or, in the case of a convertible note, they’ll explicitly state a valuation cap.

Valuation 336

Valuation Founder Seed Stage Angel Investor 336

Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 29, 2010

This is a variation on the first mover argument, implying a paradigm shift that gives you a tremendous lead. Investors will suspect you have a technology looking for a solution. Whether you are looking for an investor or not, every good entrepreneur better plan for this journey before he finds his backside exposed.

Viral 223

Viral Advertising Lead Investor Revenue 223

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.

Post-Money Valuation 49

Post-Money Valuation Valuation Cap Table Covenant 49

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 14, 2010

This is the second article in a series on what it takes to be a great angel investor (and why this should matter to entrepreneurs). I like to invest where I have a personally strong connection with the entrepreneur and/or a strong intuition on the market from prior experience.

Angel Investor 288

Angel Investor Deal Flow Viral Algorithm 288

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 5, 2011

We’re almost always the lead investor and usually the most active, too. Become a resource for entrepreneurs to have access to the lawyers, accountants, real-estate professionals and other people with whom our entrepreneurs work. Demonstrate the deep relationships we have with the CEO’s with whom we work.

Early Stage 260

Early Stage Lead Investor Portfolio Partner 260

Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 10, 2012

This is a variation on the first mover argument, implying a paradigm shift that gives you a tremendous lead. Investors will suspect you have a technology looking for a solution. Investors like realists, but not wimps. This advantage is not sustainable. Our product is truly disruptive technology.” Marty Zwilling.

Viral 226

Viral Advertising Lead Investor Revenue 226