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.

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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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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. Five have LGBTQ+ founders.

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Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 23, 2014

The critical skill is not just your immediate network but the network beyond that you can tap into if you’ve earned the right through nurturing your 1-degree relationships. After my first Tweet with the Notorious mothafucka quote , I thought about my role as a VC and I Tweeted the following. Building Your Network.

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MARCH 31, 2014

Phone calls were no substitute for in person and when it came to hiring, my network simply wasn''t as big up there as it was here. VC is a service industry and the best investors are always looking for ways to help. Venture Capital & Technology' 3) Talk to entrepreneurs they''ve backed before to see who really adds value.

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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). As a result we need somebody well networked into these communities already.

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MAY 11, 2015

That's one thing you have to realize about venture capital. Softball is also networking, though, because we have some entrepreneurs, another investor, and a left-handed female infielder who works at a venture bank and turns a double play as well as anyone in the league. E-mail is networking, deal work, due diligence.

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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.

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 12, 2013

I am thrilled to announce that we have added Hamet Watt as a Partner at Upfront Ventures. This is a big news day at Upfront Ventures. He reached out to younger founders and offered to help via his network at AT&T, Google, media agencies … you name it. He will be a venture partner. And he followed through.

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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. Venture capitalists play an important role in burgeoning ecosystems. So what about a Techstars-like program for new VCs?

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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. So what makes Ample Hills so special?

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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. They are venture bankers not investment bankers. ” I love businesses that don’t lend themselves well to VC Panels at conferences or Demo Days.

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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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This is going to be BIG.

DECEMBER 28, 2013

However, in this moment, I think one''s career in venture capital depends on changing your perspective. The biggest question I think VC''s face right now is whether or not, in the future, the best founders will look and act like the best founders of the past. It was exactly how you''d imagine a venture firm to throw a party.

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DECEMBER 3, 2020

The partner at the fund, the VC, gets to do the fun part—the meeting with founders, vetting deals, negotiating, helping, etc. Having a better overall portfolio of venture capital by adding funds into the mix. In fact, that number is probably even more than the average VC fund has the bandwidth to make. So what’s the point?

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This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 18, 2019

I believe that the next generation of top companies are far more likely to be founded by people not on VC radars today. Opening up our circle to create and scale genuine engagement for people outside of typical venture networks is how we do business—and we’re getting exceptional deal flow because of that.

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

Viewing the article through the lens of a venture capitalist there’s much to agree with under the mantra of “growth!” He also nails the reason why venture capital is still necessary to grow large businesses quickly in a world where the costs of running startups have fallen dramatically. So I like that bit, too.

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Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 17, 2019

I became a VC 12 years ago in 2007 when the pace of deals was much slower. As I was trying to figure out the role I wanted to play in the VC world I decided I wanted to focus on businesses that were building deeply technical products to solve problems for business users. Over the past 2.5

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Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 10, 2016

My partner Greg Bettinelli (worth following on Twitter) was recently named by The LA Business Journal as the “ Top deal maker in Los Angeles in Venture Capital.” And Greg has had the most influence on Upfront Ventures’ strategy since he joined. I created an accelerator & mentor network (Launchpad LA).

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Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 8, 2014

And there’s none that makes me happier than to announce that Jordan Hudson has been promoted to a Principal at Upfront Ventures. What is a principal at a VC firm and how does it work at Upfront Ventures? ” Associates have different functions at different VCs. VC firm admin. Portfolio community building.

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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! Until then, venture investors—GPs, Principals and junior professionals alike—have a lot of lanes to carve out to try to differentiate from each other. The question is what to focus on.

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Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 12, 2019

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. As a result of the IPO window shifting we saw a massive inflow of public-market capital into the latest stages of venture.

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This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 5, 2015

Ten years ago, in 2005, I started working for Union Square Ventures as their first analyst. I reiterated the notion of risk taking when giving career advice the other day and how when I joined Union Square Ventures, it wasn''t the USV it was now. Who''s the VC that everyone *isn''t* trying to network with.

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FEBRUARY 21, 2021

Any VC will tell you that the ones they said yes to, they mostly got there right away—and that there are very few “maybe” deals that get tipped over the fence. Or that venture capital is a meritocracy? What we do not know is how many people are deciding to seek out venture capital from each group. That adds risk.

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This is going to be BIG.

AUGUST 16, 2020

One of the core beliefs that I had when I started Brooklyn Bridge Ventures was that most of the next 50-100 important companies to be built in New York City were going to be started by people not on most VC’s radars today. The Circulate series acknowledges that access to ideas, resources and networks is structurally unequal.

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Haystack

DECEMBER 29, 2018

It’s that time of year, time to look back and reflect on the most significant storylines in the tech, startup, and VC world. 6/ Venture Capital In Expansion Phase. Telegram announced their ICO and raised over $1B from some of the best VC firms. VC funds invested directly in MakerDao’s Dai stable coin.

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 29, 2013

If you track the venture capital industry it would be hard to miss the conversation going on this week over AngelList “Syndicates.” My favorite new VC blogger, Hunter Walk, weighed in with some thoughtful comments about how Syndicates might actually pit, “ angel vs. angel.” Angels have additional networks.

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Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 18, 2014

It got me thinking about the advice that I often give to new VCs. For years I saw myself as the new guy in VC but then you wake up one day and realize that 50% of your peers have been doing it for less time than you and time has moved on. You want to build your network with other VCs so you go to demo days, SxSW and so forth.

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David Teten VC

MARCH 1, 2022

The easiest way to work with and for VC funds is to become a part-time scout, getting paid for sourcing investments. How to win consulting, board, operating, and investment roles with private equity and venture capital funds (video). How to find a job as a VC scout. How to get a job in venture capital.

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TechCrunch

SEPTEMBER 12, 2021

But most venture-backed startups are “still overwhelmingly white, male, Ivy-League-educated and based in Silicon Valley,” according to a study conducted by RateMyInvestor and Diversity VC. Or will we have to repeat the same conversations about representation failings within VC funds? Funding for Black entrepreneurs in the U.S.

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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: . Generally solicit under the 506(c) designation.

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Jason Malki

MARCH 9, 2023

I had the pleasure of interviewing Karen Sheffield, the Founder & Managing Partner of Pachamama Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in US early-stage climate tech companies. Then, I stumbled upon PE/VC after chatting with a good college buddy of mine. How can our readers follow you on social media?

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This is going to be BIG.

MARCH 14, 2019

The Fantasy Cash Flow Model When I was an analyst at the General Motors pension fund, investing in VC funds, I had to build a model of how I thought they would perform. Because I had previously met Jack Dorsey through the Union Square Ventures network, in 2009 I was able to grab coffee with him before he launched Square.

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Hunter Walk

FEBRUARY 22, 2025

Ok, back to the VC content marketing. A few years back I helped start Screendoor , a fund that backs new venture firms by hopefully being one of their earliest and largest supporters. As a result I’ve seen hundreds of VC decks, all certain they will be among the top performers. This post is about ‘seeing.’

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David Teten VC

JUNE 9, 2021

Would you like to work with private equity and venture capital funds? There are relatively few jobs directly inside private equity and venture capital funds, and those jobs are highly competitive. See How to negotiate a partner role at a VC or private equity firm.) At Versatile VC , we’ve used all these models.

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David Teten VC

SEPTEMBER 13, 2022

It’s hard enough to raise capital from VC, private equity fund, and family offices. The vastly larger universe of B2B companies, many of which have teams focused on pushing VC and private equity funds to evangelize their product to their portfolio. See my list of due diligence questions for VC and private equity funds. .

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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. “Our Our solution on the tenant side was a no-brainer.

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