Dream It

MARCH 6, 2020

Jeff Berman is General Partner at Camber Creek , one of the first venture funds dedicated to real estate technology and the built world. The team owns, operates and manages over 150 million square feet of real estate, making Camber Creek one of the biggest value-add venture partners for real estate tech startups.

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Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 20, 2015

VC funding. We love capital efficiency until we love land grabs until we abhor over funding until we get huge payouts and ring the bell for more funding until we attract every non-VC on the planet to invest in startups until it crashes and we start the cycle all over again none the wiser. What do I know about venture?

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2021

 —  @jasonlk How the Long Game Has Benefitted Upfront I was thinking about it this morning in particular and thinking about my own personal investment history. sold to Disney for $670 million and since our first investment was at < $10 million valuation we did quite well. Entrada Ventures? —?that

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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.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

Seed investments are down by any measure (funds, deals, dollars) over the past 3 years in deals < $1 million AND in deals between $1–5 million. Over the past month a colleague ( Chang Xu ) and I sifted through data on the venture capital industry (as we do every year) and made a bunch of calls to VCs and LPs to confirm our hypotheses.

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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. Even then private market investors can paper over valuation changes by investing at the same price but with more structure so it’s hard to understand the “headline valuation.”

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Dream It

FEBRUARY 1, 2022

During Q&A, both sides start engaging in a sort of conversational dance - with one side leading (VC/customer) and the other side following (founder). By Elliot Levy , Healthtech Associate at Dreamit Ventures Book Office Hours with me. Most of that time goes to the meat of the conversion: the question-and-answer portion.

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This is going to be BIG.

JULY 16, 2014

There''s been some writing about how VCs and founders interact with each other and it inspired me to take a step back and reflect on what my role is supposed to be with regards to the investments I make and the founders I deal with. Venture Capital & Technology' Here''s what I came up with. I am not an expert.

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Dream It

JANUARY 13, 2021

The venture capital screening call is an important step to get right in due diligence. Learn how to pass a VC associate screen in under 10 minutes! Alana suggests that before speaking to an associate, you gain a basic understanding of the fund’s focus and stages they invest in. What does good prep look like?

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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? I went back across the 21 investments I''ve made both at First Round and at Brooklyn Bridge Ventures --a period that dates back to January 28, 2010, when I closed on Backupify. Venture Capital & Technology' That''s an interesting question.

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Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 11, 2016

Gregg Johnson, CEO of Invoca For the first 5 years or so after I became a VC I didn’t talk much about what I thought a VC should be excellent at since frankly I wasn’t sure. It’s easy to think the role of a VC is to have strong opinions about markets, trends, tech dynamics and so forth. The role of VC is sparring partner.

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This is going to be BIG.

MAY 12, 2014

How does one make money raising a venture fund of this size? That means I have a total budget of a little over $200,000 to run the entire operations of Brooklyn Bridge Ventures. If I was optimizing for cash, I would have been an investment banker a long time ago. Thankfully, that''s what I raised--$8.3 So how does it work?

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This is going to be BIG.

JULY 30, 2015

One of the first things I did when I joined the venture asset class as a lowly institutional LP analyst in 2001 was to build the VC fund cashflow model. Just about every analyst who looks at fund investing has built one. And no, the numbers don't exactly add up--but they're more than close enough for venture capital.

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venture capital capital ventures VC 419

This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 31, 2014

In my career, I''ve done 19 investments in NYC and 1 in Boston, and I''ll admit that I felt like I couldn''t help the Boston company nearly as much. VC is a service industry and the best investors are always looking for ways to help. Venture Capital & Technology' 2) The earlier you are, the closer you want your investors.

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Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 6, 2015

Firms like Baseline, Felicis, ff Ventures, Founder Collective, Freestyle, HomeBrew, IA Ventures, K9, Lowercase, NextView, Resolute, Rincon, Crosscut and the countless other great firms we all now know didn’t exist. Some quick highlights include: The Role of a Seed Stage VC. Each VC raises money – say $90 million.

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Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 26, 2020

Today we’re announcing that my partner Kara Nortman is becoming Co-Managing Partner at Upfront Ventures and I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to welcome her to her new role. She worked for 5 years as a VC at Battery Ventures and co-headed M&A at IAC working with Barry Diller. She had all of the skills and traits we sought?

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This is going to be BIG.

NOVEMBER 16, 2015

It's a story that just hit a milestone--a $4mm round of venture funding that I'm ecstatic to say Brooklyn Bridge Ventures just led. But just because you could see them everywhere doesn't make them an obvious venture bet--nor does it tell the story of how the round even came to be. Still, I followed the space closely.

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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.

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venture capital capital ventures peer-to-peer 413

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 3, 2016

That was a question posed to me by a new analyst at a venture capital fund. While there are lots and lots of really kind, generous people working in venture capital--the recently retired Howard Morgan, Hunter Walk, Brad Feld, and Karin Klein for example--it's really tough to argue that there isn't widespread jerkery. So what gives?

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Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 6, 2020

But I have been in close contact with the NVCA, many of the major law firms and many of the major VC firms. Am I ineligible since I’m VC-backed? There is nothing in the rules that state that VC-backed businesses are ineligible. The NVCA (National Venture Capital Association) Guidelines are below. shouldn’t I?

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This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 7, 2015

After checking out The Information's "open dataset" on diversity in venture capital , I felt pretty disappointed. I went back and calculated the number of companies in the first Brooklyn Bridge Ventures portfolio who have at least one founder who is female, from an underrepresented minority group, or LGBT.

venture capital 387

venture capital capital ventures VC 387

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 26, 2015

One of the least understood parts of the venture capital industry and venture capital firms is how investment decisions actually get made. For anything that would be considered a normal investment for the partnership most firms try to make sure every partner has seen the deal and has a chance to weigh in.

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Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 13, 2014

After years of trying to persuade Kara Nortman to become a partner at Upfront Ventures I can officially announce now that she’s joined us effective immediately. Investment experience (5 years a VC at Battery Ventures). Let me start with the news that I’m excited to share with you.

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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).

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Both Sides of the Table

JULY 26, 2022

Photo by Scott Clark for Upfront Ventures (no, Evan is not standing on a box) Last year marked the 25th anniversary for Upfront Ventures and what a year it was. 2021 saw phenomenal returns for our industry and it topped off more than a decade of unprecedented VC growth. What do you do with a $650 million platform?

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 24, 2018

If you’ve read any of my ongoing series on fund raising from venture capitalist (episode 1?— ?controlling 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. What do you want to know?

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This is going to be BIG.

MAY 11, 2015

That's one thing you have to realize about venture capital. As a single GP (a firm with one investment decision making professional), I get asked a lot of questions about how I manage my time considering the number of investments I make. I just know what I do--and what I saw partners at other firms I've worked at do.

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VC pitching board construction 419

This is going to be BIG.

DECEMBER 3, 2020

Fund investing, like adulting, is boring. That’s the first thing anyone trying to raise a fund needs to understand, as well as anyone thinking about investing in one. The partner at the fund, the VC, gets to do the fun part—the meeting with founders, vetting deals, negotiating, helping, etc. So what’s the point?

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 6, 2019

I’ve heard a lot of people question whether there is too much money in venture capital chasing too few great deals. Others believe that new business models are emerging that could replace venture capital all together. We’re in a new tech bubble!” some have pronounced. Valuations are out of control” is the mantra of others.

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A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

OCTOBER 15, 2020

I wrote yesterday , about the quarterly numbers for VC investing activity: If this was a student coming home with a report card, it would be straight As. Firms invested a total of $434 million in Q3—the lowest figure since the second quarter of 2017, according to PitchBook data. It feels like positive change is happening.

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Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

This is part of a series of advice for founders who need to raise money from venture capitalists. If you truly believe that you, your company and your products are exceptional and your company will be valuable then you’re actually doing them a FAVOR by helping them invest in your startup. an investment in your company.

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Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 24, 2015

But I do have some insight into how this will affect venture markets. So why invest in that period of uncertainty unless it’s early-stage and thus valuation matters less. If the next 30 days stays calm then investment will pick up. So, too, investments. I caution people from thinking this is necessarily a bottom.

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financing finance ventures real estate 344

This is going to be BIG.

NOVEMBER 4, 2018

When you get an investment from Brooklyn Bridge Ventures—you get me. My investment thesis is shaped by the sum of my personal experience and so are my values. My goal is to make Brooklyn Bridge Ventures the most accessible VC firm not just because I think it’s good business, but because I think it’s a based on good values.

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investing investment communities founder 294

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

AUGUST 17, 2020

I woke up to a dream this morning where I was playing a game that was very similar to Turntable.fm , a failed effort to create a social music experience that had a moment back in 2011 and that I had invested in via USV. Investments that don’t work haunt me. It comes with the territory in VC. Then I woke up.

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investing investment VC venture capital 205

The Seraf Compass

NOVEMBER 23, 2022

As a newly minted manager of a venture fund, your initial response to the question “what are we busy about?” might be, “finding great companies, investing in them and waiting for big financial returns.” And, while your response would be directionally correct, it would be woefully incomplete.

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strategy VC investing investment 360

The Seraf Compass

JANUARY 11, 2023

In Part I of this article we discussed several key concepts of fund investment strategy and how funds are categorized, whether it be by industry, geography, stage, specialty (e.g. Now let's take a closer look at capital allocation strategy and the life cycle of a venture fund. social impact, corporate, etc.) or some other criteria.

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strategy VC capital ventures 363

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. In venture, it’s all about getting an opportunity to make partner and being included in the carry—the economic upside of a fund. Not all hires, however, are made equally.

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