Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 30, 2014
'When I first met Meredith Perry she was 24. That was three months ago this week. Today I’m handing her the largest A-round check I’ve ever written as a VC as we lead her $10 million A-Round at uBeam. As I’ve written about recently, at Upfront Ventures we started talking a couple of years ago about wanting to fund stuff with more meaning.
This is going to be BIG.
OCTOBER 10, 2014
'What should you price your seed round at? Well, it depends. I could probably write a book on venture round pricing dynamics. It would have lots of philosophy, religion, theory, fiction, and pontification. However, since I only have time for a blog post, I''ll settle for actual data. Since January of 2010, when I led my first seed investment in Backupify , I have led or committed to 27 investments.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Gust
OCTOBER 26, 2014
'Image via Flickr from Food For Thought album. When someone asks me for the best way to fund a startup, I always say bootstrap it, meaning fund it yourself and grow organically. Bootstrapping avoids all the cost, pain, and distractions of finding angels or VCs, and allows you to keep control and all your hard-earned equity for yourself. Despite all the focus you hear on external investors, over 90% of startups today are self-funded.
Berkonomics
OCTOBER 30, 2014
'One of my books, Extending the Runway , uses parallels to piloting a plane to equate to the process of creating and building a small company, making maximum use of resources to get to and beyond breakeven. It is worth revisiting the most important point of that book, which was written to prompt discussion between entrepreneurs, professional managers and their boards of directors about issues that could unite them or strain the relationships between them.
Advertiser: ZoomInfo
AI adoption is reshaping sales and marketing. But is it delivering real results? We surveyed 1,000+ GTM professionals to find out. The data is clear: AI users report 47% higher productivity and an average of 12 hours saved per week. But leaders say mainstream AI tools still fall short on accuracy and business impact. Download the full report today to see how AI is being used — and where go-to-market professionals think there are gaps and opportunities.
Tomasz Tunguz
OCTOBER 21, 2014
Bill Macaitis, the former CMO of Zendesk, articulates how a SaaS marketing team should operate better than anybody else I’ve met. At a recent Point9 conference, Bill outlined the 9 marketing disciplines of great SaaS companies and how they fit together to create a marketing powerhouse. I’ve copied my notes from Bill’s talk below. Ops & Analytics Team.
Startup Catalyst Brief brings together the best content for the entrepreneurial ecosystem from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 8, 2014
'An abbreviated version of this post appeared yesterday on TechCrunch. If you want the full SlideShare deck with many slides not in either post it’s in this link –> The LA Tech Market. “There’s something going on in LA.” It’s the most common refrain I hear from investors and even entrepreneurs these days. I hear it right after people have decided to come by for a few days to “check out what all the fuss is about.” I hear it when I visit LPs (th
This is going to be BIG.
OCTOBER 3, 2014
'Random story that I recounted recently to someone the other day. It''s super interesting to go back and trace connections and relationships that led to new opportunities. If nothing else, it serves as a good reminder that every thing you do now is an investment in the future. In 2009, I was introduced to Havi Hoffman. She was working as a developer evangelist at Yahoo!
Gust
OCTOBER 19, 2014
'Image via Flickr by Joshua Gajownik for opensource.com. I always advise software startups to file patents to protect their “secret sauce” from competitors, and to increase their valuation. The good news is that a patent can scare off or at least delay competitors, and as a “rule of thumb” patents can add up to $1M to your startup valuation for investors or M&A exits (merger and acquisition).
Berkonomics
OCTOBER 16, 2014
'Especially for social media-based businesses, we all need to recalibrate our thinking about who is the teacher and who is the student. There is nothing wrong with a manager slowing a conversation to ask for more background when speaking to an often-younger and more involved associate. You know what I mean… The conversation goes something like this: “We found it on x site and using y app with z as our data object.”.
Advertisement
Large enterprises face unique challenges in optimizing their Business Intelligence (BI) output due to the sheer scale and complexity of their operations. Unlike smaller organizations, where basic BI features and simple dashboards might suffice, enterprises must manage vast amounts of data from diverse sources. What are the top modern BI use cases for enterprise businesses to help you get a leg up on the competition?
Tomasz Tunguz
OCTOBER 22, 2014
Startups struggle to set the right price for their products because pricing dynamics in the field don’t obey the laws taught in the classroom. The standard supply and demand curves, drawn above, imply that as price increases demand decreases; that buyers act rationally and that this law is immutable. But this simply isn’t the case. Buyers in the market place violate the traditional supply and demand model all the time.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 19, 2014
'We are often asked how companies get funded, why VCs make the decisions we make and what we’re looking for in entrepreneurs. I think this is a Seriously great example of how this process works for at least one VC – Upfront Ventures. But I’m guessing the narrative is similar elsewhere. I first met Andrew Stalbow , the founder & CEO of Seriously in August of 2013.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 5, 2014
'Note: this is a non-religious post. This weekend was Yom Kippur, holiest of the Jewish holidays and the day of atonement. It’s also the day when most Jewish minds are least focused since one needs to fast for 24 hours. I sat in schul listening to the rabbi’s sermon and given my mind is prone to ADD anyways I must admit that my consciousness often floats around the room but even more so on Yom Kippur.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 26, 2014
'Yesterday I wrote a post about The Silent Benefits of PR in which I pointed out that most young companies I encounter don’t fully grasp the benefits of PR because they are less measurable than product milestones or customer acquisition analyses (like CAC/LTV). In that article I talked about how PR drives: recruiting, employee retention, biz dev deals, funding and even M&A and that often “attribution” to your PR activities is unknown.
Advertisement
Gearing up for 2025 annual planning? Our latest eBook from the Operators Guild is your ultimate guide. Discover real-world solutions and best practices shared by top CFOs, drawn directly from discussions within OG’s vibrant online community. Learn from senior executives at high-growth tech startups as they outline financial planning strategies, align CEO and board goals, and coordinate budgets across departments.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 7, 2014
'Marc Andreessen kicked off another great debate on Twitter last night , one that I’ve been talking about incessantly in private circles for the past 2-3 years – what actually IS the definition of a seed vs. A-round. This is something I think entrepreneurs don’t totally understand and it’s worthwhile they do. My view: “Spending any time or energy trying to game the ‘definition’ of your round of fund raising is a total waste.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 12, 2014
'Prorata rights are one of the most important rights of a private market technology investors and yet are seldom fully understood. They often create the biggest tensions between investors who are investing at different stages in the business. These tensions seep out in some angels or seed funds publicly or semi-privately deriding later-stage VCs for their “bad” behavior.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 15, 2014
'Much has been written about when it is time to hire a “professional CEO” to run a startup company and of course that has long been a norm in Silicon Valley when founders find that their inexperience may be a limiting factor in company growth ( know as the Peter Principle ). Much less has been said about when the technical CEO is the best person to run the company.
This is going to be BIG.
OCTOBER 1, 2014
'Let''s get one thing straight. The world and every individual in it is a biased place. 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. HOWEVER. It weakens your argument, whatever it is, when you use faulty logic.
Advertisement
Mighty Financial specializes in supporting the financial aspirations of small businesses and entrepreneurs. With our comprehensive bookkeeping and precise accounting expertise with decades of experience across diverse financial roles, our team offers tailor-made services ranging from essential bookkeeping to strategic fractional CFO support, catered specifically to the unique challenges of technology companies, startups, and SMEs.
Both Sides of the Table
OCTOBER 29, 2014
'I’m pretty on record as saying I don’t think many private-to-private tech mergers make sense. They are often done from a position of weakness. Something in both companies isn’t working, which is why they come together. I often don’t believe in the therm M&A because in my experience mostly A works. But of course there are always exceptions.
Gust
OCTOBER 5, 2014
'Corporate boardroom image via Wikipedia. Mid-level or even top executives who “grew up” in large companies often look with envy at startups, and dream of how easy it must be running a small organization, where you can see the whole picture and it appears you have total control. In reality, very few executives or professional stars from large corporations survive in the early-stage startup environment.
Gust
OCTOBER 8, 2014
'A woman you don’t know tells you that she’s going to run a marathon of 7-minute miles. She’s never run a long distance race before. Would you bet on her completing it in record time? Probably not, right? “Watch me,” she tells you. And so you do. You’re impressed when she clocks her first mile at 7 minutes. A single mile does not a marathon make, but still, it’s a major milestone.
Gust
OCTOBER 29, 2014
'The first question you need to ask is “What country are you in?” and the second is “Are you an Accredited Investor by that country’s standards?” If we’re talking about the US and you are NOT at the Accredited level ($1 million in investable assets, or $200,000 annual income), then for the moment you are actually not allowed to invest in privately held startups (emerging public companies, of course, you can buy on the stock market like everyone else.).
Advertisement
Lack of digitalization decreases business competitiveness. To thrive, embracing modern solutions becomes essential. The approach to digitalization often aligns with a company's business model. This shift not only boosts productivity but also automates processes and improves security. The tech market offers a wealth of technologies tailored for management, planning, and forecasting, replacing outdated pen-and-paper methods.
Gust
OCTOBER 12, 2014
'Image via Flickr by Jeff Belmonte. I’m a strong believer that investors invest in people, before they invest in a business plan, or an idea. But I continue to learn that there are a host of other factors, maybe not even related to you or your business, that could keep you from getting the funding that you need. You may not have control over many of these, but it helps to know, for planning purposes, what is really happening.
Gust
OCTOBER 8, 2014
'Marc Andreessen kicked off another great debate on Twitter last night, one that I’ve been talking about incessantly in private circles for the past 2-3 years – what actually IS the definition of a seed vs. A-round. Cautionary note: No competent VC is actually fooled when you show up after raising $6M in seed financing and say you’re now raising an A!
Gust
OCTOBER 29, 2014
'On October 1st, 2014, after more than two years of partnership and development, Gust proudly joined the Mayor of the City of New York and IBM in announcing the launch of Digital.NYC , NYC’s new official hub for tech and startups. In the first 36 hours, mentions of the hub were viewed more than 42 million times on social media, and over 100,000 pages on the site were perused.
Gust
OCTOBER 25, 2014
'The Business of Venture Capital. Insights from Leading Practitioners on the Art of Raising a Fund, Deal Structuring, Value Creation, and Exit Strategies. Raising Venture Capital for the Serious Entrepreneur. Mastering the VC Game. A Venture Capital Insider Reveals How to Get from Start-up to IPO on Your Terms. Term Sheets & Valuations. A Line by Line Look at the Intricacies of Term Sheets & Valuations.
Advertisement
CAPTARGET presents a masterclass in M&A deal sourcing. Learn to cast a wide net, embracing seller self-identification. Consistency is the linchpin: keep the origination process steady for a reliable flow of opportunities. Diversify your tactics, employing various tools and vendors. Tech matters! Understand DNS settings, domain authority, and brand presence for optimal outreach.
Expert insights. Personalized for you.
418 
Let's personalize your content