The Equity Kicker

JUNE 20, 2014

When companies attract high valuations their investors are predicting the future too – either that the business will trade in M&A at a ‘strategic multiple’ or that they will generate big cash flows. For larger valuations it is the latter. That’s true, but in the startup industry we have to do it every day.

Valuation 123

Valuation Metrics Software Review Technical Review 123

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

When I met my now-wife, I realized that any technology that can find me a spouse is a killer app. I’d argue that the same type of technologies that have revolutionized dating can revolutionize our industry. . I walk through below how progressive investors are using technology and analytics throughout all of their operations.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

The Startup Magazine

OCTOBER 29, 2023

Metrics play a significant role in customer journey analysis, providing quantifiable data that can be analyzed to glean valuable insights. In this blog post, we will delve into the rationale behind monitoring the customer journey, essential metrics for comprehensive analysis, and how segmenting data can provide deeper insights.

Metrics 130

Metrics Customer Harvest Acquisition 130

Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 24, 2020

As a frequent advisor to new entrepreneurs and startups, I often hear your frustration with being treated differently from other startups by investors, on expectations for valuation , traction, and market size. Valuations here are always low, and funding generally depends on friends and family, or a few forward-thinking angels.

Artificial Inteligence 436

Artificial Inteligence Marketing Valuation Startup 436

VC Cafe

SEPTEMBER 5, 2024

It’s about going beyond traditional metrics and processes, adopting unconventional approaches, and doing things that might seem unscalable to most. The focus on entertainment tech meant that we always cared about content creation, distribution and monetisation. Riches in Niches.

Management 104

Management Technical Review Venture Capital Generative AI 104

Gust

OCTOBER 18, 2011

This is the first of a six part series on different methods used by angel investors to arrive at pre-money startup valuations. It is one of the most useful methods for establishing the pre-money valuation of pre-revenue startup ventures. Return on Investment (ROI) = Terminal (or Harvest) Value ÷ Post-money Valuation. (in

Valuation 174

Valuation Pre-Money Valuation Southern California Post-Money Valuation 174

YoungUpstarts

OCTOBER 24, 2017

A CPA provides input on tax structure and metrics, and assists with due diligence related to your industry. Is it prudent to have a set formula for valuation before you know how the company will perform or will you require the company to pay for an expert to value the company if one side wants to sell?

Partner 208

Partner Technical Review Intellectual Property Due Diligence 208

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 26, 2016

There has been a lot of public debate over the past several weeks about whether it’s a good thing to be “gross margin positive” or not and commentary always reminds me that some people at startups don’t quite understand financial metrics or even how to think about which ones are healthy. I’m guessing much of this was 101 to many readers.

Metrics 150

Metrics Cost Acquisition Startup 150

VC Cafe

JANUARY 14, 2022

In this posts I review the potential risks for the Israeli tech ecosystem and the mitigating factors that counter some of them. According to the 2021 Tech Review report by IVC , Israeli tech startups attracted a record of $25.6 Israeli tech investments 2015-2021 (source: IVC ). What comes next? China: $104.4

Israel 159

Israel Technical Review Lock-up Period South Korea 159

Haystack

DECEMBER 29, 2018

It’s that time of year, time to look back and reflect on the most significant storylines in the tech, startup, and VC world. Technology is, like water, flowing and seeping into nearly every sector and eventually into most of the global economy. companies, more sensitivity around technology IP and security.

Technical Review 165

Technical Review Venture Capital Russia China 165

Steve Blank

OCTOBER 24, 2017

A version of this article is in the Harvard Business Review. Technology cycles have become a treadmill, and for startups to survive they need to be on a continuous innovation cycle. 20th Century Tech Liquidity = Initial Public Offering. Technology Cycles Measured in Years. This seems to be occurring more and more.

Founder 281

Founder Technical Review CTO Hire IPO 281

NZ Entrepreneur

MAY 31, 2021

Movac also offered some key metrics that can be monitored to evaluate whether your portfolio is sufficiently diversified: Number: an important metric but it doesn’t tell the whole story by itself. Negotiating reasonable terms and valuations that look to the long-term.

Portfolio 86

Portfolio New Zealand Management Technical Review 86

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 4, 2015

In a new book, “ The Leadership Capital Index ,” Dave Ulrich, a best-selling author, business consultant, and business school professor, provides some real insights and metrics on what makes up the elements of goodwill in the minds of top valuation experts. I have paraphrased his key points here as follows: Leader personal impact.

Leadership 120

Leadership Technical Review Due Diligence Valuation 120

Austin Startup

APRIL 25, 2017

In order to achieve 20x growth, Snap needs grow both of those metrics 4–5x. In summary: Snap’s current business doesn’t justify a $20B valuation. How can one justify a $20B valuation for Snap? The product that could most likely justify Snap’s $20B valuation is Spectacles. Let’s look at each figure. That’s it.

Valuation 48

Valuation Technical Review Social Network Forecast 48

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 17, 2018

You get to have interesting conversations with founders and review business plans and then see how these businesses evolve over the years. " Revenue doesn't pay your bills, GM does  —  @msuster 2/ Founders obsess with revenue as a vanity metric. Some even grow "bad" revenue just to show growth.

Founder 242

Founder Dilution Software Review Later Stage 242

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

A version of this article first appeared in the Harvard Business Review. Tech IPO prices exploded and subsequent trading prices rose to dizzying heights as the stock prices became disconnected from the traditional metrics of revenue and profits. Then the cycle repeats with a new set of technologies.

Lean 335

Lean Burn Rate Startup IPO 335

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 20, 2019

Competition from other startups and established incumbents, constraints on time and capital, and limited access to talent and technology resources are just a few of the hurdles nearly every first-time founder faces while trying to build a business. Have a reasonable attitude about your early-stage valuation, and don’t get too hung up on it.

Technical Review 140

Technical Review Due Diligence Early Stage Differentiation 140

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

Nearly every successful tech startup I’ve observed over the past 20 years has gone through a similar growth pattern: Innovate, systematize then scale operations. So it makes me laugh to this day when I talk with a journalist or potential investor in the company and they ask flippantly, “How is MakeSpace a technology company?”

Operations 286

Operations New York City Technical Review Startup 286

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

MARCH 21, 2017

Revenue multiples, profit multiples, premium over the previous financing — these are metrics used by sellers to help determine a minimum acceptable price. Even if this costs more than 2 years of in-house assembly, it’s still worth it, due to accelerating revenue growth due to up-sales and market-differentiation.

Balance Sheet 242

Balance Sheet Vertical Acquisition Revenue 242

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 27, 2019

How Most Board Meeting Prep Works I’ve been sitting on tech boards for two decades so I have some experience with what goes wrong. The law firm has done its job of preparing the stock option requests, board meeting minutes, 409a valuations. Often board members themselves don’t do the work to say “what metrics would we like to see.”

Stock Options 226

Stock Options Metrics Stock Valuation 226

YoungUpstarts

JANUARY 10, 2018

How do you find the balance between not too small to prove itself but not too big to have an off-putting valuation? You’ll find exceptions to this rule, like Snapchat, which was operating at a loss at its IPO, when it experienced high initial trading prices due to its huge popularity and untapped monetization capabilities.

Valuation 145

Valuation Technical Review Exit Strategy Metrics 145

View from Seed

DECEMBER 4, 2019

At the time, I spent most of my time describing the metrics themselves and how VCs and their LPs evaluate performance based on these measurements. If you aren’t familiar with these metrics, I recommend reading the original post to get a sense of the numbers that I’ll be reviewing here. So, is this good or bad?

LP 256

LP IRR Distribution Portfolio 256

The Startup Magazine

JANUARY 14, 2020

With advances in technology, green buildings can also be built at fairly competitive prices. Higher asset valuation – growing awareness about the environment; the social impact of buildings and the need to meet sustainability credentials is increasingly making real estate investors and occupiers turn to green buildings.

Green 135

Green California Government Valuation 135

David Teten

SEPTEMBER 23, 2017

VCs tout themselves as frontier technology investors, but most are using the same infrastructure tools they have used for the past 20+ years: Excel and recent college grads searching Google. According to Knowledge.VC , under 5% of US VCs have a full-time team member focused on technology. . But we’re doing it slowly.

Private Equity 60

Private Equity Venture Capital Equity Technical Review 60

David Teten

JANUARY 19, 2021

Our categorization is not a technical one. Additionally, Flexible VC can accommodate all types of companies, not just asset-lite, tech-enabled companies.”. This structure allows for alignment on the front end, and real-time flexibility for performance metrics,” says Samira Salman , a family office investor and advisor. .

Cofounder 78

Cofounder Technical Review Equity Dividend 78

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2011

2 preamble issues having read the comments on TC today: 1: I know that the prices of startup companies is much great in Silicon Valley than in smaller towns / less tech focused areas in the US and the US prices higher than many foreign markets. As the risks below get eliminated the higher the valuation investors are prepared to pay.

Pre-Money Valuation 336

Pre-Money Valuation Valuation Silicon Valley Stock 336

The Startup Magazine

JULY 27, 2018

Hrank is a service which reviews shared hosting providers and allows you to compare the performances to see which one suits you better. They are also kind enough to give users a chance to check the response time history of a hosting provider, and not just the current metrics, which is good. Source: Pixabay.

Hosting 60

Hosting Technical Review Metrics Internet 60

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 23, 2012

I have been close to the tech & startup sectors for more than 20 years and I can’t think of a period in which I felt more optimistic about the innovation and value creation I see in front of us. From this we have seen a commensurate boom in the number of startup companies. They compete on features, price and execution.

Venture Capital 347

Venture Capital Technical Review LP Mobile 347

betashop.com

OCTOBER 8, 2012

90 Things I’ve Learned From Founding 4 Technology Companies. On October 27, 2010 I wrote a blog post about the “ 57 Things I Learned Founding 3 Tech Companies.”. 90 Things I’ve Learned Founding 4 Tech Companies: Find your company’s One Thing. ?? We do twice-yearly reviews of all Fab team members. So, here goes.

Technical Review 108

Technical Review Technology Software Review Valuation 108

crowdSPRING Blog

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

Why Innovators Love Constraints | Harvard Business Review – [link]. Valuations in the Series A and Series B Market are Booming – [link]. How Monoprice Is Eating The Tech World From The Inside Out – [link]. Avoiding Undue Diligence: My Strange Approach To Angel Investing – [link].

Social Media 106

Social Media Small Business Technical Review Design 106

YoungUpstarts

SEPTEMBER 16, 2015

What’s critical for entrepreneurs to understand is that valuations for startups do not increase at a linear rate; they increase geometrically based on achieving the right milestones. The best entrepreneurs raise enough money to achieve a set of interim milestones and then raise capital again at a significantly increased valuation.

Valuation 100

Valuation Dilution Chicago Technical Review 100

Up and Running

JULY 14, 2015

The primary issue is a technical one. Any investor will put their valuation on your business based on a number of factors, including looking at important metrics for your business, patents, or assets. But raising too much money will cause the valuation to increase. Should you ever raise more than you need?

Technical Review 60

Technical Review Valuation Due Diligence Finder 60

Genuine VC

JULY 19, 2010

Of course CapEx has been transformed into OpEx via changes in the tech infrastructure layer (open source, virtualization & cloud computing, offshoring, etc.). All of these above changes aren’t just due to market inefficiencies (like the supply side), but are truly marked changed that are intensifying. That’s no secret.

Seed Stage 175

Seed Stage Technical Review Dilution Offshore 175

Gust

JULY 23, 2014

So even if my own mother asked me to meet with you, and you were pitching me a biotech opportunity for a $10 million investment at a $90 million valuation, I might take the meeting, but it wouldn’t be particularly useful for either of us. Now comes the really tricky part: getting me to review all that stuff you just neatly uploaded.

Angel Investor 153

Angel Investor Elevator Pitch Pre-Money Valuation Technical Review 153

Cracking the Code

AUGUST 3, 2011

In search of Europes next tech stars. Detailed SaaS Spreadsheet (Valuation and CAC benchmark). SaaS 13 Index Valuation. In search of Europe's next tech stars. Churchill Club 2008 Top 10 Tech Trends. SaaS business metrics: why are they different? Best Venture and Technology Podcasts for 2007.

Software Review 67

Software Review Europe Technical Review Search 67

The Equity Kicker

FEBRUARY 8, 2012

With earlier stage companies investors generally don’t have the luxury of being able to rely on hard metrics and instead have to rely on gut feel – i.e. ‘direct’ evaluation. This is most common when the product is deeply technical and there isn’t much to be learnt from direct observation. Sometimes they use third party consultants.

Technical Review 123

Technical Review Product Venture Capital Valuation 123

Tim Keane

JANUARY 12, 2010

Term-sheets and Valuations: Thinking about Negotiations.   I’ve sat down with entrepreneurs and a copy of a term sheet guide I like [ “Term Sheets & Valuations - A Line by Line Look at the Intricacies of Venture Capital Term Sheets & Valuations ” by Alex Wilmerding, Aspatore Press.] The Valuation Question.

Term Sheet 68

Term Sheet Valuation Dividend Liquidation Preference 68