Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 14, 2014

It was 2009 and it was terribly difficult to get any financing (if you can remember a time like that!) 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). So we went for it.

accelerator 290

accelerator mentorship peer-to-peer VC 290

This is going to be BIG.

SEPTEMBER 19, 2012

In the early spring of 2009, the fundraising nuclear winter of the previous year hadn't yet thawed. Back when I was pitching my previous startup to investors, it had never really dawned on me that they had experienced what I was going through--and that a VC firm was essentially a startup. VCs pitch for money, too.

ventures 280

ventures pitching VC startup ecosystem 280

TechCrunch

APRIL 13, 2022

An online day will follow on May 20 to give our audience, including those who were unable to attend, a chance to tune in online and catch highlights from the live event, network and watch the full sessions. with Yoon Choi (Muirwoods Ventures), Mar Hershenson (Pear VC) and Gabriel Scheer (Elemental Excelerator). Founders – apply here.

micromobility 82

micromobility transportation pitching collaboration 82

TechCrunch

APRIL 12, 2022

An online day will follow on May 20 to give our audience, including those who were unable to attend, a chance to tune in online and catch highlights from the live event, network and watch the full sessions. with Yoon Choi (Muirwoods Ventures), Mar Hershenson (Pear VC) and Gabriel Scheer (Elemental Excelerator). Founders – apply here.

micromobility 78

micromobility transportation pitching collaboration 78

TechCrunch

APRIL 15, 2022

An online day will follow on May 20 to give our audience, including those who were unable to attend, a chance to tune in online and catch highlights from the live event, network and watch the full sessions. with Yoon Choi (Muirwoods Ventures), Mar Hershenson (Pear VC) and Gabriel Scheer (Elemental Excelerator). Founders – apply here.

micromobility 71

micromobility transportation pitching collaboration 71

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 24, 2011

I invested in LA-based Gogii , one of the fastest growing, most exciting mobile social networking companies you’ve never heard of and maker of a product called textPlus. Gogii came in my office in 2009 with three of the most talented founders I had seen. By the next Monday we had lost the deal to a NorCal VC.

investing 310

investing investment VC board 310

This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 12, 2011

Ironically enough, the second nudge she gave my career also had to do with AOL--ten years later when in 2009, she introduced me to Jon Brod who was forming AOL Ventures. When someone comes in to pitch me, I always ask them to tell me the "origin story". My first article for the monthly edition was on AOL. Are there examples of that?

data analysis 281

data analysis venture capital communities strategy 281

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 14, 2009

This is part of my ongoing series Pitching a VC. Quick caveats: having fewer investors (3-5) is better than many investors (10-15) and PLEASE make sure you hire a great lawyer who has experience in doing start-ups to avoid pitfalls that will make VC harder down the line. They might be as hard as raising VC.

advice 291

advice VC pitching angel investing 291

Founders Coop

FEBRUARY 21, 2024

Just two years later, in 2009, we worked out a deal to create the Techstars Seattle program, with our first program running in 2010. As Techstars’ track record fell further and further behind YC, their investor sales pitch of “buying an index of the global startup ecosystem” fell flat.

startup ecosystem 195

startup ecosystem accelerator communities support 195

TechCrunch

APRIL 17, 2023

Your Deck Sucks — The Pitch That Raised $18 Million in the Current Climate: Jacqueline Samira, founder and CEO, Howdy.com, raised $21 million without ever sending a deck to a single investor. TechCrunch hosts Darrell Etherington and Becca Szkutak will interview serial-founder-turned-VC Russ Wilcox.

real estate 80

real estate incubation VC construction 80

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 13, 2013

And my specialty was computer networks. So I joined this group called Network Solutions, we did computer networking, the predecessor to the internet. A lot of the VCs I talked to – I was living in NorCal, a lot of the VCs were saying, “Yeah, come on in, EIR.” You remember what 2009 was like, right?

startup 337

startup entrepreneurs consulting board 337

TechCrunch

APRIL 15, 2022

If you want to pitch, it’s your last chance to get your applications in. Startups and VC. The company has been around since 2009 and just launched a new set of tools. Baseball has come a long way since 1897, when a Princeton math professor designed a pitching machine that ran on gunpowder.

board 98

board strategy pitching media 98

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 11, 2016

As the human ear ages it loses its ability to hear high-pitched sound frequencies (above 15-16 kHz) through a condition known as presbycusis that starts at 18 years old. That’s like you saying you don’t want to go to cocktail parties and network anymore while every 25-35 year-old VC steals your customers.

peer-to-peer 279

peer-to-peer media VC networking 279