This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 16, 2014

How long does it take from first meeting a VC to getting cash in the bank? If all my deals came as intros from trusted connections that I know for years versus at founder pitch events that''s interesting data. If you meet someone at a pitch event, they''ve already got a company and they''re looking to close as quickly as possible.

VC 418

VC pitching networking venture capital 418

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 5, 2023

It will also be my last venture capital deal. Venture capital is a pretty opaque industry and if I can shed some light on what it’s like to do this, or to decide to stop doing it, I’m happy to help. I’ve decided that this is long enough for me—especially given the fact that when you’re in venture capital, you don’t just stop.

ventures 545

ventures investment investing VC 545

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 27, 2013

And I am often approached by entrepreneurs in cities which don’t have a vibrant VC community. Just ask the people of Portland, Seattle, Boulder, Iowa, Princeton, Dallas or countless other cities that don’t have enough venture capital. It’s a goal to help you understand the life of a VC. Ask SuperCell.

VC 365

VC board communities pitching 365

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 21, 2021

She was pitching for a pre-seed round of $400k. Founders hit the street with their pitch deck, some make it, and some don’t, but nearly all of them ascribe a lot more human influence over the process than there probably is. Or that venture capital is a meritocracy? I’m a female founder. I don’t have a technical co-founder.

advice 476

advice pitching venture capital VC 476

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 18, 2019

Brooklyn Bridge Ventures , the pre-seed and seed stage VC fund I run in NYC, has invested in 64 companies in the last six and a half years. The diversity is the direct result of our mission—to build the most accessible venture capital fund in NY. Twenty-five of them have at least one female co-founder. Fifteen had co-founders over 40.

venture capital 413

venture capital capital ventures peer-to-peer 413

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 28, 2018

There’s a quick litmus-test conversation any early-stage VC will have with the founder and it’s one that you should be as prepared for as your elevator pitch. It goes something like this … VC: “How much money are you raising?” Founder: “$8–10 million” VC: “What’s your current burn rate?” This is a red flag for VCs.

VC 247

VC capital financing finance 247

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 24, 2014

Not every potentially good VC previously worked for Fred Wilson and Josh Kopelman. Not every VC used to get pitched by VC funds for a living and has seen hundreds and hundreds of VC pitch decks. So what about a Techstars-like program for new VCs? Venture Capital & Technology'

accelerator 388

accelerator mentorship VC incubation 388

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 11, 2015

That's one thing you have to realize about venture capital. I realized that I judge a lot of hackathons, pitch competitions and other various things on the weekends, and felt like I was losing at least 2 out of my 8 weekend days--so I gave myself back those days. Out of those, I take about 150 new pitches a year--about 3 a week.

VC 419

VC pitching board construction 419

This is going to be BIG.

APRIL 14, 2014

Most companies don''t ever raise venture capital and they do just fine. That''s a much better picture of female entrepreneurship than the 2-4% of venture capital dollars going to women. The main driver of the skew towards men getting venture capital, statistically, is that far more men are pitching.

founder 400

founder pitching mix-use venture capital 400

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 21, 2012

For some reason, everyone wants to be a VC. Since the best entrepreneurs are busy running their business and get pinged by VCs all the time, you're not going to wind up getting a deal if all you do is e-mail once, give up, and walk away. It doesn't have to count as an official pitch of any kind. Plenty of room. RSVP here. ).

creativity 365

creativity VC pitching communities 365

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

OCTOBER 14, 2020

The NVCA and Pitch Book are out with their Q3 report on the VC industry and what they report is that the VC industry continues to be very active throughout the pandemic. The massive expansion of later-stage private capital continues unabated. The massive expansion of later-stage private capital continues unabated.

ventures 362

ventures VC pitching innovation 362

This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 23, 2014

It doesn''t help them improve their pitch or adjust their model. It just feels like the VC wasn''t that interested in the first place and so they''re not sure what the interest was in the first place. If an entrepreneur is going to invest their time pitching me or having a meeting--I''ll do my best to invest my time to have an opinion.

pitching 385

pitching VC venture capital opportunity 385

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 4, 2013

When I was new at Venture Capital I was trying to figure out the business. As a VC you want to feel like you have “proprietary sources” of deal flow. It makes it extraordinarily hard to raise the next round of capital. They know how to build pitch decks. They know the VCs so they know what interests them.

VC 347

VC advice pitching entrepreneurs 347

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 1, 2014

We all have our inherent biases and what I am not arguing here is that the venture capital world is a fair playing field for anyone. I repeat: I AM NOT ARGUING THAT VENTURE CAPITAL IS FAIR TO ANYONE. We really don''t know, because we''re missing some critical information: HOW MANY WOMEN ARE SEEKING VENTURE CAPITAL?

venture capital 328

venture capital capital ventures founder 328

This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 17, 2016

Now that they have to go back into the market next year to pitch their own fund, they're going to have to answer some tough questions about valuations. If you're a founder fundraising this year, that means spending more time getting VCs comfortable with the risks of your company. Thing of it as a VC hangover.

VC 253

VC pitching board capital 253

This is going to be BIG.

NOVEMBER 16, 2015

That story actually begins about eleven or twelve years ago, with a little bit of VC mentoring. I was working for the GM pension fund, an institutional LP, as an analyst, doing a research project on consumer private equity and venture capital investing. Leading an investment into an ice cream chain, however, that's another beast.

venture capital 378

venture capital ventures capital consumer retail 378

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 5, 2016

There was an explosion in number of startups both because it was cheap and there was tons of available capital. Non VC Growth Rounds. The fact that I still see it referred to in pitch decks is farcical. Late-Stage VCs Pay Up. VC Infighting. Boom in Number of Startups. Explosion in Seed Funds.

venture capital 271

venture capital capital ventures VC 271

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2018

controlling your psychology ) you no doubt have heard me say that raising capital is a sales & marketing process. In order to understand how to “get to yes” with a VC you first need to understand how VC partnerships make decisions and then you can understand how to increase your odds of closing a deal. This is Sales 101.

VC 314

VC board investment investing 314

This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 15, 2020

There have been a lot of calls for VC firms to make more hires from the Black and Brown community, as well as to hire more women. Lots of the data is skewed toward later stage rounds and I’ve never ever seen stats on who is pitching. Not all hires, however, are made equally. Morever, LPs should be influencing these policies.

venture capital 327

venture capital ventures capital mentorship 327

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 16, 2014

We’ve been dying to tell you all for a while that we had raised a new venture capital fund and of course given SEC filing requirements the story was somewhat already scooped by the always-in-the-know Dan Primack a few weeks ago. If you want to understand how the VC industry is changing there is a great primer in the link.

ventures 396

ventures VC venture capital real estate 396

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 17, 2014

With the author staying close as an advisor, they build a real, cashflow positive business and start to think about where they could go with some outside capital. The first pitch I got was from someone who didn''t intend on staying with the business as an employee. You could think of it as a spin on Thrillist.

pitching 375

pitching consulting VC venture capital 375

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 19, 2014

Go pitch a VC with an idea, and they''ll tell you to build it. Venture Capital & Technology' Go to them with a prototype and they''ll tell you to launch it. Launch it, and they''ll tell you to get more users. Get users and they''ll tell you to get paying customers. Let''s remember that, people.

venture capital 400

venture capital pitching health VC 400

Dream It

MAY 19, 2021

In this Dreamit Dose, Managing Director Adam Dakin presents his view on the right way to answer it after hearing hundreds, if not thousands, of founder pitches. Make the specific amount you are raising and corresponding milestones clear at the beginning of the pitch, and do not give a range. The amount you're raising is your ask.

pitching 393

pitching board health VC 393

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 27, 2022

Besides, there were a limited number of places where I could do my job in venture capital anyway—and while I might be a go to for a pitch from super early stage pre-seed and seed founders looking for quick answers and decisive term sheets in New York City, the reality is that I would be pretty far down the list in the Valley.

culture 390

culture VC communities education 390

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 16, 2024

There are more active VCs alive today than have ever existed in the history of modern human existence—and that dates back 300,000 years! Then, they need to figure out a way to project that brand up above the venture community, like a Bat signal calling for the best founders to come and pitch them. The question is what to focus on.

VC 243

VC angel investing networking pitching 243

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 25, 2013

But VC is like congress. “I don’t know the exact math, but I hear it again and again: the top 2% of firms generate 98% of the returns in venture capital.” As you can see from the chart their data suggests there are about $25 billion of VC distributions per year in the US. Their data looks at tech VCs.

VC 374

VC peer-to-peer entrepreneurs investment 374

TechCrunch

JULY 2, 2021

Founder of Unicorn Capital and Minimal Capital, Evan Fisher 's pitching and investor strategy has helped startups raise more than $2.5 Not even a senior VC. The biggest lie in venture capital is: “Yes, I read through your deck.” None of that is effectively transmitted in a cold pitch deck. Evan Fisher.

pitching 122

pitching VC venture capital capital 122

This is going to be BIG.

APRIL 23, 2012

When people tell you how and why they raised capital or what drove their app to success, they often attribute success to planning or neat little explainable reasons when they might simply have no clue what happened. Venture capital is kind of like a knuckleball. So why bother showing up? Why ever read another tech blog?

advice 417

advice startup VC strategy 417

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2017

It’s why raising a round of capital often feels like a hollow victory because it almost feels like a temporary reprieve from the Grim Reaper and in a way every new round just sets the bar higher to clear for the next round of financing or the hope of reaching profitability. It’s why so few can really start a business from scratch.

pitching 238

pitching VC mix-use entrepreneurs 238

Revolution

FEBRUARY 13, 2023

Since the beginning of modern venture capital investing — a relatively nascent asset class — the industry has been biased toward funding what it knows best: founders with familiar demographics (white, male) in familiar geographies (Silicon Valley).

innovation 264

innovation investment investing pitching 264

David Teten VC

MAY 26, 2021

How do you raise money for your venture capital or private equity fund from family offices and high net worths? . I see five innovative new methods for raising capital which emerging managers such as Versatile VC are using, which I’ve ranked in roughly descending order of popularity: .

venture capital 136

venture capital capital ventures innovation 136

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2014

I had witnessed a number of early-stage tech startups in LA raise seed capital from the Bay Area and relocate. Throughout all of these years I was a full-time VC so Launchpad really came out of evenings and weekends for me. Adam had a full time startup and then was doing consulting (he later raised a VC fund). And Jamie hers.

accelerator 290

accelerator mentorship peer-to-peer VC 290

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2012

I have sat through countless pitches with Ivy League grads spewing off intellectual descriptions of the details of their product or service and why it will win in the market. In a VC pitch this type of messaging will do just fine. These messages need to pass the cocktail party pitch. And I think this is a mistake.

entrepreneurs 370

entrepreneurs pitching startup education 370

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 4, 2021

Below is a link to the pitch video. There wasn’t any context around it—not exactly something I’d call a “pitch”. I explained that this wasn’t really a pitch because it lacked all sorts of context. Having been called out, I set up a meeting—but I didn’t do it to take a charity pitch. Who was the team?

pitching 243

pitching transportation consulting creativity 243

This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 23, 2013

If you were to have to pitch a VC right now on a concept, the part about why you is already known--you''ve been living it. Venture Capital & Technology' What has life put you in a position to have unique insight into? So what startup have you already started working on before you have an idea?

startup 349

startup venture capital pitching VC 349

TechCrunch

OCTOBER 4, 2022

This relationship also supplied Spleet with the critical network of landlords required to list multiple units when it went live; the pitch to landlords was that Spleet would bring proper KYC into the rental process and allow them to verify tenants and automate rent collection. Closing on $103M, MaC VC is changing the face of venture capital.

VC 131

VC real estate venture capital financing 131

This is going to be BIG.

DECEMBER 21, 2017

Nothing seems to apply--you're not a tech company, you bootstrapped your way to millions in revenues before taking on capital, and you sell mostly through brick and mortar. Would we pitch Series A players? Adam Struck brought on significant additional capital from his network. Did that seed make this round our Series A?

pitching 255

pitching VC strategy investment 255