Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 29, 2010

Our first big institutional round of VC was $16.5 We went “nuclear&# and slimmed down to 33 people (yes, I know, still large by today’s standards but this was 2001), raised $10 million and we built a real company. I learned everything I know about startups in these lean years: 2001-2004.

culture 333

culture construction startup advice 333

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

DECEMBER 29, 2021

It reminds me of the early days of web2 in 2001/2002/2003, when we started USV. As such Web3 can, if properly developed and with the right kind of regulation, provide a meaningful shift in power back to individuals and communities. The good news is there are literally tens of thousands of teams building new things on a web3 stack now.

finance 274

finance financing development communities 274

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 29, 2010

People assume that I’m biased because I’m a VC and think you should always get the highest valuation possible. The A round was done in February 2000 (end of the bull market) and my B round was done in April 2001 (bear market). But if you do this early (pre VC) then the price points are pretty low. This is wrong.

venture capital 282

venture capital capital ventures angel investing 282

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 18, 2009

You’ve got to be able to come out of unsuccessful VC meetings, pull your socks up, and go into the next pitch. As a VC if I can tell that you’ve survived tough times and you don’t appear beaten down that’s a huge plus. This was soon after the bursting of the dot com bubble – in early 2001.

entrepreneurs 298

entrepreneurs advice VC SaaS 298

Dream It

APRIL 12, 2020

During our recent Dreamit Kickoff week, Bullpen Capital Founder and General Partner Paul Martino ( @ahpah ) spoke with our Spring 2020 cohort about the state of the VC ecosystem in the current economic crisis. Liquidation preferences may change in later financing rounds, but probably too significantly.

ventures 334

ventures startup capital board 334

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 7, 2011

I asked him if he’d be willing to allow me to interview him for This Week in VC and we filmed it in the offices of Stack Overflow – his new company. There’s a big business in Finance working with Excel, but that’s an outlier. Lesson: Joel had been building a community of readers since 2001.

peer-to-peer 285

peer-to-peer communities development innovation 285

TechCrunch

APRIL 11, 2022

Whether we will see as dramatic a correction in the next few years as we did in 2001 to 2003, however, is anyone’s guess.”. “If We look for founders where other VC firms said they aren’t the best founders, but really, they outperform and are high-performing founders and are resourceful when VCs didn’t give them money,” she added.

venture capital 97

venture capital investment investing ventures 97

TechCrunch

MAY 17, 2022

The judges for this pitch-off will be Yoon Choi (Muirwoods Ventures), Mar Hershenson (Pear VC) and Gabriel Scheer (Elemental Excelerator) on day one; and Sven Strohband (Khosla Ventures), Victoria Beasley (Prelude Ventures) and John Du (GM Ventures) on day two. ” Mar Hershenson — Pear VC. Victoria holds an MBA and M.S.

pitching 76

pitching energy startup consulting 76

Angel Capital Association

JUNE 27, 2024

During this past upcycle, many micro VCs raised significant funds and pursued earlier stage deals in earnest. Their DNA was wrapped up in a VC mindset that starting valuations were less important given the lofty later stage valuations and frothiness at that end of the market (hence over 1000 “unicorns” today vs only 8 in 2008 and 1 in 2001).

funders 52

funders peer-to-peer mix-use angel capital 52

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2010

It also takes options off the table if you eventually find out that this isn’t a VC backable business. I’ve spoken about this in a post entitled, “ Do you even need VC ?&# Let’s assume that the $2 million buys 25% of your company, which is the norm in an equity financing. Should you take it?

startup 319

startup advice venture capital VC 319

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

And the loosening of federal monetary policies, particularly in the US, has pushed more dollars into the venture ecosystems at every stage of financing. What Has Changed in Financing? However, to be a great VC you have to hold two conflicting ideas in your head at the same time. Of course we can’t. By definition?—?I’m

ventures 471

ventures VC venture capital funders 471

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 19, 2009

I had previously raised VC in 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2005. In case VC’s haven’t figured this out yet, shit rolls downhill. My blog linked to Brad Feld’s blog because I was so grateful for his series on term sheets and he was one of the biggest reasons that as a VC I felt compelled to blog.

VC 274

VC venture capital pitching capital 274

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 8, 2010

You’re tied at the hip to your VC. Get to know VCs over a long period of time so that when you’re ready to get engaged you feel you know their character. How do you then reference check your VC to be sure that you’ve chosen a good firm and partner? Ask the CEO’s about the VC when the chips were down.

VC 288

VC advice entrepreneurs venture capital 288

Gust

SEPTEMBER 17, 2014

Me: Raising convertible notes as a seed round is one of the biggest disservices our industry has done to entrepreneurs since 2001-2003 when there were “full ratchets” and “multiple liquidation preferences” – the most hostile terms anybody found in term sheets 10 years ago. It’s like we need a finance 101 course for entrepreneurs.

VC 153

VC financing finance entrepreneurs 153

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

2001–2007: THE BUILDING YEARS The dot com bubble had burst. Between 2006–2008 I sold both companies that I had started and became a VC. SEEING THINGS FROM THE VC SIDE OF THE TABLE While I was a VC in 2007 & 2008 those were dead years because the market again evaporated due the the Global Financial Crisis (GFC).

VC 466

VC culture sustainability capital 466

TechCrunch

JANUARY 29, 2021

Some readers say they use our surveys to study up on an individual VC before pitching them, so let us know which format you prefer. 10 VCs say interactivity, regulation and independent creators will reshape digital media in 2021. On January 15, 2001, then-college student Dries Buytaert released Drupal 1.0.0,

VC 107

VC founder media education 107

TechCrunch

DECEMBER 6, 2021

Since BCV’s first fund in 2001, the firm has invested over $4.5 The move to VC felt like a natural transition,” Melas-Kyriazi said. billion to fund young startups, and young VC firms, too. The firm currently has $9.2 billion in assets under management. In May, it closed two funds valued at a combined $1.3

capital 79

capital ventures angel investing VC 79

Tomasz Tunguz

AUGUST 14, 2014

And as DeCambre points out, so far through 2014, the ten largest startup financings have yielded about twice as much capital as the ten largest IPOs. The chart above compares the total number of MegaRounds, those VC investments of $50M or more, from 2001 through 2013. Last year, there was 1 MegaRound for every 2 IPOs.

financing 40

financing finance VC capital 40

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 16, 2012

I raised money as an entrepreneur, like you, in 1999, 2000, 2001, 2003 and 2005 for two different companies. And of course I’ve sat on the other side of the table: As a VC. This is not just the perspective of a VC although I can’t say I have zero VC bias. Neither can any VC. Executive Summary.

strategy 366

strategy development VC advice 366