www.founderinstitute.com

MARCH 2, 2010

When members see connections, they often partner with one another, backstopping and expanding each other’s capabilities and skills or forming entirely new ventures. Chris Dixon posted about an ideal term sheet for first round funding, which started an blogosphere discussion about terms.

Term Sheet 40

Term Sheet Liquidation Preference Vesting San Diego 40

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 10, 2014

Struggling entrepreneurs are often so happy to get a funding offer that they neglect the recommended reverse due diligence on the investors. Taking on equity investors to fund your company is much like getting married – it is a long-term relationship that has to work at all levels. It’s no fun for either side.

Technical Review 257

Technical Review Due Diligence Term Sheet Offshore 257

www.quora.com

JANUARY 16, 2011

Find Questions, Topics and People Add Question Add Question Venture Capital Venture Capital Term Sheets Startups Term Sheets What are examples of good startup term sheets? Ycombinator open source term sheet is a good start for Seed deals. Brad Feld does the best blog term sheet series.

Term Sheet 41

Term Sheet Startup Angel Investor Wiki 41

Genuine VC

APRIL 29, 2013

all talk about the best way for entrepreneurs to optimize their fundraising process with the end-goal of receiving a term sheet. It’s often spoken as if the second that magical term sheet document is in hand, the process is over. Agreement of key terms between entrepreneur + VC firm.

Term Sheet 150

Term Sheet Valuation Partner Conversion 150

NZ Entrepreneur

AUGUST 4, 2021

Byron van Vugt from NZ Growth Capital Partners explains. Lead investors and term sheets. Those investors interested in becoming lead will issue what’s called a term sheet – this details the terms they’re willing to invest on. Byron van Vugt is a senior investment analyst at NZ Growth Capital Partners.

Technical Review 63

Technical Review Software Review Founder Due Diligence 63

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2009

This is part of my new series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I originally posted it on VentureHacks , one of my favorite websites for entrepreneurs. Ability to Pivot – I don’t like to invest in people that I’ve never met before who come through my office wanting to have a term sheet within 30 days.

Entrepreneur 291

Entrepreneur Term Sheet Early Stage Affiliate 291

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2017

Also, make sure you know several partners at the VC firms who have invested in you because in tough times it helps to have very broad support. You need to know how many partners they have and which partners do which kinds of deals. The best VCs follow up but then so, too, to the best entrepreneurs. That’s fantasy land.

Burn Rate 238

Burn Rate Term Sheet CTO Hire Fractional CTO 238

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2010

Back in November I agreed with Nivi over at VentureHacks to do a series on the ten most important attributes of a successful entrepreneur. Unfortunately, I don’t believe it is perfectly correlated with what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur. Tags: Entrepreneur Advice Start-up Advice Startup Advice.

Technical Review 284

Technical Review Due Diligence Entrepreneur Early Stage 284

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 27, 2016

Struggling entrepreneurs are often so happy to get a funding offer that they neglect the recommended reverse due diligence on the investors. Taking on equity investors to fund your company is much like getting married – it is a long-term relationship that has to work at all levels. It’s no fun for either side.

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Due Diligence Term Sheet Offshore 120

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 25, 2010

A reminder that it is important for all entrepreneurs is to remember to be careful about “deal drift.” We had many term sheets (it was 1999 and we had a pulse) and we were deciding which one to take. We were trying to optimize around a few criteria: price, size of round, number of syndicate partners and, of course, terms.

Technical Review 301

Technical Review Term Sheet Due Diligence Venture Capital 301

Genuine VC

OCTOBER 2, 2012

After completing a long process identifying the right venture firms to pitch, running an exhaustive fundraising process, finding a mutual fit, and successfully negotiating terms… at last, the term sheet is signed. The two- to six- week time between the signing of the term sheet and closing is “venture limbo.”

Term Sheet 162

Term Sheet Founder Vesting Due Diligence Syndication 162

David Teten

AUGUST 19, 2019

Though RBI will displace some traditional equity VC, its much bigger impact will be to expand the pool of capital available for early-stage entrepreneurs. . John Borchers, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Decathlon Capital, claims to be the largest revenue-based financing investor in the US. So what is Revenue Based Investing?

Revenue 60

Revenue Term Sheet Founder Technical Review 60

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 13, 2020

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited angel investors. Angels are more likely to fund new entrepreneurs, and early-stage or seed rounds, while VCs tend to focus on entrepreneurs with a successful track record, and later stage rounds.

Angel Investor 314

Angel Investor Entrepreneur IRR Valuation 314

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2014

We are often asked how companies get funded, why VCs make the decisions we make and what we’re looking for in entrepreneurs. By September 18th we were ready to bring them to a full partner meeting and as a group we were bought into the vision and the experience of this exact team to pull things off.

Technical Review 373

Technical Review North America Los Angeles Cofounder 373

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

There was a lot of consumer internet activity again…resurgence of things, but it was still mysterious, venture capital was still kind of closed, 1st time entrepreneurs had a lot of questions that were unanswered, and there was still some sort of hand waiving around all the financing stuff and so we took it on….”. Is that when it became big?

Technical Review 288

Technical Review Venture Capital Silicon Valley Software Review 288

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

(co-written with Jamie Finney, Founding Partner at Greater Colorado Venture Fund. Similar to the explosion of seed funds in the past decade, we (and some limited partners too ) believe these Flexible VCs are on the forefront of what will become a major segment of the venture ecosystem. Of the Inc. 5000 companies, only 6.5% return cap.

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

View from Seed

FEBRUARY 23, 2021

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. At this point, the investor and the entrepreneur work together to develop their perfect list of potential partners, and then do targeted outreach to try to bring this investor into the round.

Syndication 207

Syndication Syndicate Term Sheet Cofounder 207

The Next Web

APRIL 6, 2013

My daily work consists of connecting innovative A round startups with potential investors or strategic partners. The five suggestions below are designed to help facilitate the investment process which may lead to a more expeditious term sheet and teach entrepreneurs to think more like an investor. Entrepreneur Insider'

Term Sheet 126

Term Sheet Due Diligence Strategic Investors Valuation 126

Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 17, 2015

For the elite startups and entrepreneurs who manage to attract the investor they dream of, and survive the term sheet negotiation, there is still one more hurdle before the money is in the bank. Visit reference customers, partners, and vendors. business due diligence entrepreneur investors startups'

Technical Review 120

Technical Review Due Diligence Startup Term Sheet 120

Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 12, 2023

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited angel investors. Angels are more likely to fund new entrepreneurs, and early-stage or seed rounds, while VCs tend to focus on entrepreneurs with a successful track record, and later stage rounds.

Angel Investor 246

Angel Investor IRR Venture Capital Valuation 246

The Next Web

SEPTEMBER 13, 2013

Many Asian entrepreneurs tell me that they want to raise funds from Silicon Valley firms because they perceive the valuations to be higher. In India, the leading firms are slightly more concentrated with Sequoia India , Accel Partners , and Nexus Venture Partners being a cut above the rest. Thus, VCs have the upper hand.

Asia 132

Asia Silicon Valley India Term Sheet 132

View from Seed

APRIL 30, 2015

From a company milestones perspective, entrepreneurs who take on venture debt are almost always thinking about raising that next round of capital from other institutions. Use good judgment, talk to your co-founders/investors/lawyers, and partner with a bank that values transparency and relationships such as SVB.].

Term Sheet 120

Term Sheet Equity Startup Seed Stage 120

Mucker Lab

AUGUST 27, 2014

As an entrepreneur himself, founding and operating printed circuit board factories in Taiwan, my father was debating between two places to immigrate to and build his next new venture: Los Angeles (“The Valley” aka San Fernando Valley) and Santa Clara (“Silicon Valley”). That number in the Valley might be closer to 10%.

Los Angeles 138

Los Angeles Southern California Silicon Valley Technical Review 138

ReadWriteStart

SEPTEMBER 2, 2011

Therefore, going down the fundraising path is something many technology entrepreneurs will need to do and a critical step in the development of their business. If you're earlier in the process, a small angel round or partnering with an accelerator may be the best approach. Tip 4: Really Understand Key Terms.

Cap Table 125

Cap Table Term Sheet Liquidation Preference Technical Review 125

reidhoffman.org

NOVEMBER 12, 2013

× At Greylock , my partners and I are driven by one guiding mission: always help entrepreneurs. It doesn’t matter whether an entrepreneur is in our portfolio, whether we’re considering an investment, or whether we’re casually meeting for the first time. Entrepreneurs often ask me for help with their pitch decks.

Entrepreneur 111

Entrepreneur Viral Revenue Networking 111

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 26, 2015

Often if it’s a bigger firm (say 4 partners or more) and it’s a super small investment for their fund size (let’s say $250-500k when they normally invest $5-7 million) they will just require 1 or 2 partners to decide. What happens next feels like a black box to outsiders. ” Some firms are collegiate.

Venture Capital 150

Venture Capital Detroit Early Stage Partner 150

View from Seed

SEPTEMBER 4, 2018

That said, we tend to be very flexible on syndication to bring on great partners, and have collaborated with terrific partners like our most frequent co-investors Founder Collective, Accomplice, LHV, Softech, and others. Despite these shifts, the core principles of our approach and the ethos of our firm has remained the same.

North America 120

North America Seed Stage Early Stage Lead Investor 120

View from Seed

MAY 17, 2019

There are two distinct chapters to venture fundraising – the first is entrepreneurs pitching their startup to multiple firms to generate interest and ultimately secure a term sheet; then, the period after a term sheet has been signed progressing to close.

Term Sheet 149

Term Sheet Reputation Security Conversion 149

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 8, 2009

Traction can simply mean showing that you’re making progress with customers, product development, channel partners, initial revenue as a proof point, attracting well-known angel investors, winning industry awards / recognition. It’s not required but I have seen this technique be used effectively by entrepreneurs.

Technical Review 309

Technical Review Term Sheet Revenue Venture Capital 309

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 19, 2011

Called Tim Spicer (c-companies partner) and he told him matt, they only want one thing, more warrant coverage!!! Raised money from Splitrock Partners (of whom Matt thinks very highly) experience was so emotionally traumatic he came out of it vowing he’d never go thru that again – get cash flow positive RIGHT NOW!!! [if

Acquisition 304

Acquisition Warrant Customer Term Sheet 304

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 28, 2015

by John Vrionis, partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners. This past summer, the Lightspeed Summer Fellowships program invited selected guests to provide aspiring entrepreneurs a perspective into all aspects of starting a new company. Lightspeed is in the business of encouraging entrepreneurship.

Convertible Security 100

Convertible Security IP Technical Review Software Review 100

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

If an investor isn’t engaging then they’re not suddenly going to get a term sheet. If we feel a mutual connection then my goal is to make your life easier by offering you a term sheet before you’re even raising and I’ll spend the time and effort trying to prove that it isn’t worth running a process.

Term Sheet 332

Term Sheet Due Diligence Campaign Sales 332

Scott Edward Walker

AUGUST 25, 2011

Introduction I’ve been doing deals as a corporate lawyer for 17+ years, and there are certain fundamental mistakes that I’ve seen entrepreneurs make over and over again. Sadly, there are a lot of bad apples out there, and entrepreneurs need to be careful whom they are doing deals. Will he add significant value (e.g.,

Technical Review 63

Technical Review Term Sheet Los Angeles Entrepreneur 63

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 2, 2014

Too many entrepreneurs tell me they are looking for an investor, and can’t differentiate between venture capital (VC) investors versus accredited Angel investors. Angels are more likely to fund new entrepreneurs, and early-stage or seed rounds, while VCs tend to focus on entrepreneurs with a successful track record, and later stage rounds.

Angel Investor 266

Angel Investor Entrepreneur Venture Capital IRR 266

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 2, 2010

It’s the story of persistence in entrepreneurs. As a VC I’m acutely that a “yes&# decision to support an entrepreneur can do just that, yet I only write 2-4 of them per year and maybe another 3-4 as an angel. I try not to go out to entrepreneur events in LA every night – I have work to get done and a family.

Europe 352

Europe France San Francisco Chicago 352

Feld Thoughts

JANUARY 27, 2020

Legal Things Every Entrepreneur Should Know. How to Engage an Investment Banker (with help from Golding Partners). We also significantly updated Chapter 2: Preparing for Fundraising and Chapter 19: Legal Things Every Entrepreneur Should Know (with help from Cooley). The new chapters in this edition are 11.

Investment Bankers 108

Investment Bankers Term Sheet Capitalization Table Venture Capital 108

Tim Keane

MAY 16, 2010

A philosophy of valuations and term-sheets. Several months ago, I'd posted an article about term-sheets.    Based on a lot of feedback, I've added some new comments about put rights and made more explicit my philosophy about working together with entrepreneurs to achieve mutually satisfactory results. 

Term Sheet 60

Term Sheet Valuation Wisconsin Angel Investor 60