Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2022

At our mid-year offsite our partnership at Upfront Ventures was discussing what the future of venture capital and the startup ecosystem looked like. To that end I’m really excited to share that Nick Kim has joined Upfront as a Partner based out of our LA offices. Please follow him & welcome him to Upfront!!

Technical Review 416

Technical Review Pre-Money Valuation San Francisco Valuation 416

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 24, 2014

As a result I didn’t write my first venture capital check until March 2009 – exactly 5 years ago. I divided success into the phases of venture capital and 18 months into writing my first check here was my view (details on each in the link above). 5 years ago. Sourcing high-quality leads : 9/10.

Los Angeles 387

Los Angeles Intellectual Property LP Venture Capital 387

Growthink Blog

DECEMBER 27, 2017

Are you looking to raise venture capital ? Business planning and raising venture capital go hand-in-hand. A business plan is required for attracting venture capital. These tips draw on Growthink’s decades of experience consulting to start-ups in the business planning and capital raising process.

Venture Capital 129

Venture Capital Business Plan Technical Review Private Placement 129

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 13, 2011

Yeah, that was when I changed for me…” “…there was so much positive feedback on demystifying this one element of venture capital. And especially if you are dealing with early stage firms where partners might have different areas of specialization but they might have a lot of connective tissue across things. was starting.

Technical Review 288

Technical Review Venture Capital Silicon Valley Software Review 288

David Teten

MAY 9, 2012

We are in the midst of two great disruptions to American business: the internet’s ongoing disruption of most traditional industries: finance, healthcare, retail, finance, fashion, etc. VCAP© Addresses the Gap between Venture Capital and Funding for Women and Diverse Entrepreneurs.

Venture Capital 154

Venture Capital Programming Accredited Investor New York 154

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

Over the past month a colleague ( Chang Xu ) and I sifted through data on the venture capital industry (as we do every year) and made a bunch of calls to VCs and LPs to confirm our hypotheses. why the hell has seed financing declined so much in the past 3 years?? This begs the question … Why Has Seed Investing Stagnated?

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage IPO 328

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 16, 2010

The VC industry grew dramatically as a result of the Internet bubble - Before the Internet bubble the people who invested in VC funds (called LPs or Limited Partners) put about $50 billion into the industry and by 2001 this had grown precipitously to around $250 billion. Partners leave the industry. Here’s my take: 1.

LP 311

LP Technical Review Early Stage Silicon Valley 311

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 15, 2010

Next Wednesday we’ll have Dana Settle of Greycroft Partners, a New York / LA early-stage venture capital fund. Often times when companies raise “bridge” financing (this is money from internal investors. and who had biz reasons for wanting to remain stealth.”. - We spoke briefly about why. Short answer: no.

Stealth 285

Stealth SEC Advertising Accredited Investor 285

View from Seed

APRIL 14, 2020

This led to a number of repercussions that most VC’s have lamented during this time, including higher prices, larger rounds, shoddy due diligence, and many companies raising large sums of venture capital that probably aren’t suited to VC funding. Business Models and Sectors.

Early Stage 374

Early Stage Software Review Technical Review Due Diligence 374

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 14, 2009

Over the same 30 years, Venture Capital firms have honed their skills and strategies to match Wall Streets needs to achieve liquidity for their portfolio companies. One of the biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make is misunderstanding the role of venture capital investors. What Do VC’s Do?

Silicon Valley 237

Silicon Valley IPO Technical Review Venture Capital 237

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

Something happened in the past 7 years in the startup and venture capital world that I hadn’t experienced since the late 90’s — we all began praying to the God of Valuation. How might our next phase of the journey seem brighter, even with more uncertain days for startups and capital markets? What happened?

Valuation 466

Valuation San Francisco Ratchet Liquidation Preference 466

Steve Blank

APRIL 11, 2013

Examples are Hollywood for movies, Milan for fashion, New York for finance and today, Silicon Valley for technology entrepreneurship. The ultimate goal of Innofund is to get the startups far enough along in technology and market validation so other sources of financial capital (banks, VC’s, corporate partners) will invest.

Programming 179

Programming Technical Review SBIR China 179

Up and Running

SEPTEMBER 5, 2017

At the outset, it is worth noting that when it comes to the world of venture funding, I am a bit of an outsider. Until a handful of years ago, I didn’t even know what venture capital was, let alone anything about the complicated process of actually acquiring VC funding. percent of venture capital deals, and received.33

Venture Capital 82

Venture Capital Lean Cofounder Technical Review 82

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 22, 2011

Or worse yet they may never get financed. Raise at “ the top end of normal &# but not so high that future financings in a corrected market become impossible. An obvious example is Google who may have gotten less market attention if there would have been 8 well-financed competitors during the 2001-2005 timeframe.

Saudi Arabia 309

Saudi Arabia Valuation IPO Technical Review 309

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2019

just having a sparring partner with a vested interest in your success can be useful. Others may not have the experience you want and they fill up a seat that makes retaining founder control more difficult if you ultimately raise large rounds of venture capital in the future. What happens at the A-round of venture capital?

Venture Capital 236

Venture Capital Startup Angel Investor Silicon Valley 236

Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 23, 2013

The new hot topic for entrepreneurs the last couple of years is crowd funding, which is anticipated to at least supplement, if not replace, the slow and mysterious process of current Angel and venture capital investors. Of course, this might also lead to investors, partners, and licensing opportunities. Debt-based crowd funding.

Intellectual Property 247

Intellectual Property SEC Venture Capital Equity 247

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 25, 2012

The new hot topic for entrepreneurs these days is crowd funding, which is anticipated to at least supplement, if not replace, the slow and mysterious process of current Angel and venture capital investors. Of course, this might also lead to investors, partners, and licensing opportunities. Debt-based crowd funding.

Intellectual Property 242

Intellectual Property Venture Capital Angel Investor Equity 242

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 6, 2014

When you first start your company and raise initial venture capital your board probably consists of 1-3 founders and 1-2 VCs. The functions of an early-stage board are pretty obvious and well understood: Providing introductions to customers, biz dev partners, recruits, the press, other investors, etc. In the Early Days.

Technical Review 325

Technical Review Early Stage Software Review Los Angeles 325

David Teten

APRIL 1, 2021

Almost every private equity and venture capital investor now advertises that they have a platform to support their portfolio companies. As an agenda for each meeting, I suggest: – How can we most add value, in addition to helping with financing? All content is developed and delivered by the Real Ventures partners.

Private Equity 78

Private Equity Venture Capital Portfolio Equity 78

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 6, 2013

He wanted to work in venture capital and I was new to the industry and in no position to hire anybody. Their business model was to help young companies accelerate their launch by helping assemble a team, do initial marketing, provide seed capital and help them raise financing. I’ll leave the year out.

San Diego 344

San Diego Technical Review Seed Capital Sacramento 344

VC Cafe

AUGUST 11, 2022

A couple of weeks ago I was did a fireside chat with Alon Grinshpoon, founder and CEO of Echo3D , a CDN and CMS for 3D content in the cloud and a Remagine Ventures portfolio company, as part of an entrepreneurial finance MBA class in Tel Aviv University. Choose a partner, not just a fund. So choose your partner wisely.

Founder 187

Founder Term Sheet Cofounder Venture Capital 187

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 10, 2010

I guess it may be impractical for Twitter to acquire Seesmic given it has raised considerable amounts of venture capital (reportedly $12 million) but the broader point for me is that I always believed Twitter should control the client versions of its product. Think about the creative tension.

Acquisition 287

Acquisition Developer Management Advertising 287

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

If you track the venture capital industry it would be hard to miss the conversation going on this week over AngelList “Syndicates.” lack of traction, lack of downstream financing availability. founder fighting. existential threats (Apple announced they are competing directly with you). strategic direction.

Syndicate 356

Syndicate Syndication Cofounder Early Stage 356

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Unfortunately in early stage startups the drive for financing hijacks the corporate DNA and becomes the raison d’etre of the company. Did the partner have a good or bad day, etc. We were able to raise a Seed round from Bessemer Venture Partners on a powerpoint idea, and never found the repeatable customer model.

Customer Development 270

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 270

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 13, 2013

I got a job at a bank, and I worked in their corporate finance group. We had a finance group for all of the bank branches based in San Diego, and I wrote programs to download stuff from the mainframe so we could do analysis three days faster than they could send us the data. Comp sci in the 80s was terrible.

Cofounder 337

Cofounder Technical Cofounder San Diego Startup 337

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 27, 2024

While the answers are somewhat semantic, the pre-seed funding round is making a comeback in 2024 startup financing. Shameless plug, at Remagine Ventures we’re one of those specialists funds, investing in the future of interactive entertainment tech, gaming and next-gen consumer startups.

Valuation 186

Valuation Software Review Generative AI Technical Review 186

View from Seed

JANUARY 13, 2021

As seed has become the mainstream path to early-stage financing, the definition of seed has changed, and if one is to be a credible first institutional seed investor, he or she would need a fund big enough to be competitive and write $1-2M initial checks. This is because the market actually has changed. That year, they invested in Segment.

Dilution 399

Dilution Later Stage Portfolio Technical Review 399

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 22, 2014

You''ll get a venture capital analyst from a brand name firm who has just recently taken his job talking about what makes a company successful. You''ll get an entrepreneur who has raised one and only one round of financing in his or her entire life--all from relatively unsophisticated individuals, giving fundraising advice.

Venture Capital 158

Venture Capital Cap Table Startup Early Stage 158

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 27, 2014

Is it really surprising to anyone when we talk about "party rounds" as financing strategies we''ve created companies with unprofessional environments and founders behaving irresponsibly? Treat financings like an auction and you''re going to get a bubble and a lot of bad behavior. Venture Capital & Technology'

Term Sheet 160

Term Sheet Founder Cofounder Software Review 160

The Next Web

FEBRUARY 23, 2014

But now more and more tech companies cite a pool of talent and the Irish Venture Capital Association ’s investment tendencies as reasons for the city’s appeal. Lower taxes and living costs, in comparison to its English neighbour, are what urged this move originally.

North Carolina 168

North Carolina Technical Review Cyprus Raleigh 168

Steve Blank

JANUARY 21, 2015

This raises an interesting question: is the credibility of female entrepreneurs in the eyes of New York VC’s something about the venture firms, or is it about the industries they are funding? One can make the case that New York venture capital industry is rooted in the 21 st century not the 20 th.

Silicon Valley 120

Silicon Valley New York City New York Venture Capital 120

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Of partner? And so is venture capital. Picking a VC is hard. You don’t really have much to go on to decide who would make a good fit. Reputation of firm? Deals done in your industry? It’s a bit of all of these. I’ve seen other VCs who seem to never have time to get their hands dirty. Commitment.

Portfolio 364

Portfolio Chicago Sales Incubator 364

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 5, 2013

Written by David Shelters , managing director of Bangkok, Thailand-based investment banking and financial advisory firm Karon Business Consulting, the book should be an eye-opener for aspiring and new technology entrepreneurs and can help you navigate the dangerous waters known as venture capital.

Technical Review 164

Technical Review Private Equity Thailand Incubator 164

View from Seed

DECEMBER 4, 2019

Over the last 10 years, we’ve been in a bull market with considerable froth in late stage financing activity and valuations. The trends described above in VC performance have an upstream effect on Limited Partners which is somewhat counter-intuitive. This would suggest that TVPI would be performing well.

LP 256

LP IRR Distribution Portfolio 256

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 20, 2016

There is a common belief in the angel and venture capital community that you put your money on the best team, rather than the best idea. Even if your product is a technological marvel, I look for balanced strength on the team in finance, marketing and operations. Solo entrepreneurs rarely find an investor.

Sweat Equity 152

Sweat Equity Entrepreneur Elevator Pitch Startup 152

Steve Blank

APRIL 12, 2013

This post is about the rise of Chinese venture capital and how it helped build the countries entrepreneurial ecosystem. The Rise of Chinese Venture Capital. By 1991, 70% of the Torch funded startups were getting bank financing for expansion and later stages of the new ventures, with local governments acting as guarantors.

Venture Capital 279

Venture Capital China Offshore SBIR 279

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 13, 2014

After years of trying to persuade Kara Nortman to become a partner at Upfront Ventures I can officially announce now that she’s joined us effective immediately. It is rare to find somebody who matches exactly what I’m looking for in a partner so when you find it you act: Academic rigor (Princeton undergrad, Stanford MBA).

Partner 408

Partner Las Vegas Los Angeles Baltimore 408