Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2018

You race back to the office to tell everybody how well it went and you wait for the follow-up call to have a partners’ meeting or talk about term sheets or at least dip into due diligence. After my board meeting I had to do an interview with a CFO candidate that one of my portfolio companies asked me to speak with. What do I do now?

Software Review 381

Software Review Churn Rate Due Diligence New York 381

View from Seed

JULY 31, 2014

Two weeks ago, my partners and I here at NextView Ventures announced our second fund. And since we will continue to look proactively at new seed-stage tech startups over the next few years, the question becomes: What, then, will these companies look like? Recent Investment Themes. BUSINESS-FOCUSED (B2B). Network Effect B2B.

Seed Stage 272

Seed Stage B2C Technical Review Disintermediation 272

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 27, 2013

I am super excited to announce that today is a day of lots of new things for my partners & me: A new fund, a new office and a new brand. Santa Monica is the place where the highest concentration of early-stage startups are created if you consider also the contiguous geography of Venice Beach. Let’s start with the fund.

Los Angeles 343

Los Angeles Las Vegas San Francisco Baltimore 343

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

Reading the NY Times article “ Jeffrey Katzenberg Raises $1 Billion for Short-Form Video Venture, ” I realized it was time for a new startup heuristic: the amount of customer discovery and product-market fit you need to find is inversely proportional to the amount and availability of risk capital. It’s the antithesis of the Lean Startup.

Lean 335

Lean Burn Rate Startup IPO 335

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 16, 2014

Our last fund was $200 million but as you may already know since we raised that fund we added new partners Greg Bettinelli and Kara Nortman and Venture Partner Hamet Watt – all of whom are busy looking at new deals for the firm in addition to Yves Sisteron (the founder), Steven Dietz (also part of founding team) and myself.

Las Vegas 396

Las Vegas St. Louis Southern California San Diego 396

TechEmpower

DECEMBER 11, 2023

This vast pool of talent showcases a wide range of experience and portfolios, quality of work, and inquisitiveness. Given this diversity, it's important to be selective in the development services company with whom you choose to partner. Here's what to consider Experience and Portfolio: What type of projects has the company completed?

Software Developers 297

Software Developers Software Development Software Review Software 297

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. Pitchbook estimates that there is about $290 billion of VC “overhang” (money waiting to be deployed into tech startups) in the US alone and that’s up more than 4x in just the past decade.

Technical Review 416

Technical Review Pre-Money Valuation San Francisco Valuation 416

Version One Ventures

JANUARY 4, 2021

We’ve seen our startup companies find new ways to keep moving forward. Pienza , a Seattle based B2B startup studio led by Bizible founder Aaron Bird, raised $5.1M. . Lolli continues to add great partners like eBay ; you can now earn BTC while you shop on eBay’s marketplace. . Jam raised a $3.5M

Portfolio 148

Portfolio Technical Review Securities and Exchange Commission North America 148

Steve Blank

JUNE 27, 2017

As more and more companies face disruption from globalization, new technology, and startups that have more capital than the incumbents, the continuing cry from Wall Street investors is, “Why can’t companies be as innovative as startups?”. Here’s one reason why: Startups can do anything. Startups can do anything.

Startup 306

Startup New York City Valuation Distribution 306

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2014

I spend a lot of time with startups and thus hear many companies talk about their approach to sales and their interactions with customers. The entrepreneurs in whom you invest don’t see the bird’s eye view of your portfolio or the industry more broadly. Startup Lessons' The press don’t get your financials.

Software Review 341

Software Review Customer Technical Review LP 341

VC Cafe

FEBRUARY 9, 2022

As you may already know, I’ve always been a fan of startup landscapes. This edition includes maps of Israeli startups building the Metaverse, Insurtech, Martitime tech, Proptech and Contech, Digital Health, Smart Logistics and Supply Chain, Sports Tech and ecommerce. Israeli founded proptech startups (credit: Proptech Zone ).

Israel 210

Israel Technical Review eCommerce Startup 210

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 27, 2013

Understanding where your VC partner sits in their respective fund and where their fund is in the cycle of its investment lifecycle will help you understand your VCs behavior. VCs crave the ability to help portfolio companies. That role as sparring partner can be useful if for nothing else than to test your resolve.

Advisory Board 365

Advisory Board CTO Hire Fractional CTO Los Angeles 365

View from Seed

JULY 6, 2020

You have an authentic passion for startups and a deep respect for entrepreneurship. You will spend the rest of your time working alongside the partners throughout the investment process – analyzing investment opportunities, assisting in market research and diligence, and post-investment portfolio support. . You are hungry.

Technical Review 257

Technical Review Software Review Hiring Seed Stage 257

VC Cafe

JANUARY 22, 2021

A few months ago, VC Cafe launched a series on startup engagement and outreach programs of large tech companies. After covering Google startup outreach and support (from first hand experience), today I’m happy to add Amazon and AWS, by looking into the variety of ways startups can engage with the commerce and cloud giant.

Technical Review 174

Technical Review Startup Venture Capital Incubator 174

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 18, 2019

All were backed based on the sole criteria that they had the potential to make my limited partners a lot of money. Creating this community doesn’t only mean backing diverse founders, but also surrounding yourself with a community of other diverse professionals to help your portfolio. Three teams have African-American founders.

Venture Capital 165

Venture Capital Portfolio Cofounder Seed Stage 165

View from Seed

JANUARY 13, 2021

What has happened is that over the last 10 years, the vast majority of successful startups have raised some sort of a seed round prior to a series A. First, the winners in most portfolios don’t often have a true recap round. This requires some increase in fund size even with a fairly modest sized portfolio.

Dilution 399

Dilution Later Stage Portfolio Technical Review 399

VC Cafe

MARCH 7, 2025

Israeli tech funding remained stable in February, with 25 startups raising a total of $588 million and two new unicorns minted: Dream and Augury. NEW APPOINTMENTS Big congrats Iren Reznikov on joining Vintage Investment Partners as a Partner! Startup funding -20% YoY to $19.3B We must #BRINGTHEMHOME NOW ?? in Feb, U.S.

Israel 103

Israel Stealth Taiwan ChatGPT 103

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2014

On August 26th I had an equally effusive intro from Ynon Kreiz, also a friend, trusted source and also the CEO of portfolio company Maker Studios. 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

YoungUpstarts

AUGUST 25, 2017

Almost synonymous with this startup-focused era, the once indomitable VC investor sector is changing and adapting to deal with the changing nature of entrepreneurship. Startups, naturally, need to be aware of how these changes affect the current investment environment and how they can be leveraged to their advantage.

Venture Capital 193

Venture Capital Technical Review Kenya Startup 193

Steve Blank

FEBRUARY 23, 2013

Ron is a managing partner of Schaffer Consulting , and is currently serving as an Executive-in-Residence at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley. For what I had thought were a few simple ideas about taking what we’ve learned about startups and applying it to corporate innovation, the post has gotten an amazing reaction.

Business Model 334

Business Model Technical Review Business Plan Search 334

View from Seed

JANUARY 27, 2021

We are looking to bring on board a versatile new team member to support the varied internal operations of the firm as well as collaborate with the partners on our external programs and communications with the broader entrepreneurial community. You have an authentic passion for technology, startups, and a deep respect for entrepreneurship.

Operations 227

Operations Hiring Seed Stage Boston 227

VC Cafe

JULY 21, 2020

If you’re a startup founder, you’re probably looking at Google in some way, maybe in terms of partnership or acquisition, but maybe some level of suspicion and fear. In this post, I’ll try to organise the various startup engagement and outreach programs at Google. How can startups engage Google (credit: VC Cafe).

Technical Review 131

Technical Review Startup Early Stage Cloud 131

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 22, 2012

Usually it’s on behalf of a portfolio company. After all, if your VCs won’t help you get access to potential buyers or business development partners – what will they do? I frequently tell startups that the best way to get a meeting with money is to get a highly-qualified introduction. I do this often.

Email 359

Email Portfolio Technical Review Aggregator 359

Steve Blank

APRIL 11, 2013

I just spent a few weeks in Japan and China on a book tour for the Japanese and Chinese versions of the Startup Owners Manual. Of all the Chinese government programs, the Torch Program is the one program that kick-started Chinese high-tech innovation and startups. In these series of 5 posts, I thought I’d share what I learned in China.

Programming 287

Programming Technical Review SBIR China 287

Steve Blank

JANUARY 22, 2014

Dino Vendetti a VC at Bay Partners, moved up to Bend, Oregon on a mission to engineer Bend into a regional technology cluster. Success depends on finding startups that have identified acute customer pains in large markets where conditions are ripe for a new entrant. I visited Bend last year and caught up with his progress.

Early Stage 295

Early Stage Silicon Valley Oregon Technical Review 295

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Of partner? I would call their portfolio companies and ask how helpful or not they’ve been. Politics are a part of human nature and thus a part of all startups. As I like to say “ Startups are all naked in the mirror ” (we see our own flaws but see everybody else in their Sunday best.). FourSquare.

Portfolio 364

Portfolio Chicago Sales Incubator 364

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 15, 2014

There were many moments in each space when pioneers were funding startups and the press hadn’t written much about them and if you were a typical investor you were still funding the last trend while some VCs were trailblazing into new categories. Startup Lessons' Almost nobody believed and now look at it. Online education.

Technical Review 362

Technical Review America United States Partner 362

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

You might like to think that a bunch of savvy venture capitalists saw a market niche for raising smaller funds or perhaps there was a generational shift where disgruntled junior partners spun out of bigger firms to start their own gigs. I launched my first startup in 1999 so I know the economics of launching from first-hand experience.

Venture Capital 328

Venture Capital Technical Review Seed Stage IPO 328

The Startup Magazine

FEBRUARY 11, 2022

Hauser Private Equity partnered with the Denver-based private equity firm Revelstoke Capital Partners to make a growth investment in DataLink Fund Solutions, a leading provider of integrated population health management applications. Organic and Inorganic Growth. Digital Transformation.

Private Equity 164

Private Equity Equity Technical Review Software Review 164

Hunter Walker

DECEMBER 13, 2020

You’re spending much of your time selling: the vision to employees, the opportunity to investors, the story to the press, the offering to the customers, the relationship to partners. Of course you’ll have lots of functional partners who basically sell as a job responsibility. Highlighted Homebrew Portfolio Jobs. Yes and No.

Technical Cofounder 161

Technical Cofounder Cofounder Startup Matching 161

Steve Blank

MARCH 31, 2014

Just look at the disruptive challenges that businesses face today– globalization, China as a manufacturer, China as a consumer, the Internet, and a steady stream of new startups. Perhaps that’s because where established companies might see risks or threats, startups see opportunity. Building Innovation Internally is Hard.

Private Equity 330

Private Equity Metrics China Intellectual Property 330

View from Seed

DECEMBER 4, 2019

One or two of the best companies may continue to appreciate, but most of a VC’s portfolio has probably been realized, written off, or has maxed out its value. The longer the portfolio maintains the same value without distributing back cash, the worse the fund’s ultimate IRR. LP Constraints. So, how good is an outlier fund?

LP 256

LP IRR Distribution Portfolio 256

VC Cafe

MARCH 21, 2022

Below is the first landscape of Israeli startups building the Metaverse, which we published last month in Calcalist , which helps explain our view a bit. We mapped over 50 startups that collectively raised more than $3.5 The Israeli startups building the Metaverse (Source: Calcalist / Remagine Ventures ). Gaming + web3/NFTs.

Startup 187

Startup Community Social Network Portfolio 187

View from Seed

JANUARY 24, 2018

When we create new platform initiatives, our team tries to think about how we can be the most impactful with our portfolio companies. Today, we’re thrilled to announce a new program that we hope will help our portfolio companies with two of these bullets. Building a great product.

Operations 176

Operations Cofounder Technical Review Angel Investor 176

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

JULY 23, 2014

Limited Partners or LPs (the people who invest into VC funds) have taken notice as 2014 is by all accounts the busiest year for LPs since the Great Recession began. The “big boom” in startup financing started around March 2009?—?more This is a structural shift in our industry few have talked about publicly. more than 5 years ago?—?and

Technical Review 398

Technical Review Venture Capital Valuation Pre-Money Valuation 398

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 12, 2014

It’s why I often advise angel investors to be careful about assuming that being an angel investor is a profitable exercise unless you have the ability to have a wide-enough portfolio to have a few companies doing extraordinarily well plus deep enough pockets to follow your winners. Why prorata rights are now sought out by LPs.

Technical Review 336

Technical Review Later Stage Early Stage LP 336