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 find a job as a VC scout. VC recruiters list and compensation data. How to negotiate a partner role at a VC or private equity firm. Syllabus for how to launch, manage, and invest a VC fund.

VC 131

VC venture capital accelerator ventures 131

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

I gave him the same advice I give nearly all over-worked, control-freak, do-everything-yourself startup founders: “Your number one priority isn’t any of these things. I need to take some VC meetings. There is no question NY startups get disproportionate press. Him: “I know, I know. Me: “Bullshit.

communities 319

communities VC innovation entrepreneurs 319

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2014

So the startup work moves to where the startup founders live and not vice versa. I’ve blogged about this before and provide a lot more details in these posts: 1. The Foundations of the Seattle startup community. The Components of any Great startup community.

startup 392

startup communities venture capital angel capital 392

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?

startup ecosystem 129

startup ecosystem ventures founder startup 129

Startup Catalyst

MARCH 27, 2018

Doing startups, Angel and VC investing is mainstream. Corporates are actively involved with startups – intentionally interacting by either running incubators and accelerators themselves or through Techstars, 500 Startups, Plug And Play for example; investing; or intentionally being first customer.

communities 140

communities startup incubation accelerator 140

TechCrunch

MARCH 2, 2021

This is because most of the capital in Africa for promising startups is typically distributed among many investors. During the onset of the pandemic, Aboyeji, via his blog post , said Future Africa Fund was looking to raise institutional investment. “There’s a massive early-stage funding gap for African startups.

founder 144

founder finance financing investing 144

Hunter Walk

DECEMBER 11, 2023

I *think* Daniel and I met at a VC happy hour many years ago. He’s founder and CEO of Greenhouse , a ‘hiring operating system’ for companies which spans recruiting and onboarding tools for enterprises and SMEs. A few other things to think about: PE approaches debt very differently than VC firms.

ventures 75

ventures leadership VC venture capital 75

TechCrunch

NOVEMBER 23, 2021

.” That might work inside mature companies, but early-stage founders who are presenting themselves to investors must be more specific. In an interview with Natasha Mascarenhas, B2B stealth startup founder Akshaya Dinesh recounted the time her team was rejected by an accelerator because they hadn’t yet picked a CEO.

data collection 89

data collection SaaS board frameworks 89

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 20, 2012

Tracy DiNunzio isn’t your typical Silicon Valley startup founder. She did her first tech startup after the age of 30. It represents the great majority of entrepreneurship and eschews the fairytale rags-to-VC-riches stories we so often read about in the press. So Tracy began keeping a blog about … (what else?)

peer-to-peer 364

peer-to-peer entrepreneurs startup entrepreneurship 364

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 13, 2013

If you want to be the marketing person or you want to be perceived as a businessperson or a VC or technical person or whatever you want to be perceived, people will always define you. And what I mean is, I told this story in a blog post I wrote called, “ Is It Time to Earn or Is It Time to Learn ?”

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startup entrepreneurs consulting board 337

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2014

Everybody has a blog these days and there is much advice to be had. Many startups now go through accelerators and have mentors passing through each day with advice – usually it’s conflicting. There are bootcamps, startup classes, video interviews – the sources are now endless. What is a founder to do?

advice 408

advice frameworks startup mix-use 408

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

You’re writing a freaking blog post! I try to take time out of my week to occasionally meet with startup founders – even those that haven’t been introduced. Plus, he’s a loyal reader of this blog. He has a startup. Can you please intro me to XYZ VC? “But WAIT !!! Marketing.

advice 314

advice culture board VC 314

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2013

Jonathan Strauss took this issue head on in a blog post that I believe every startup founder should read on “ Replacing Oneself as CEO.” I know because I marked the occasion with a blog post on how to have a great VC meeting. The financial pressures of running a startup started to hit Jonathan.

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peer-to-peer energy founder advice 303

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2011

One of the great joys of doing the web series This Week in VC every week is that I get to spend time with great people debating the issues of our day including how our industry is evolving as well as insights into how companies got started, got their initial traction and dealt with adversities. Oh, yeah. And there you have it. Not a chance.

board 286

board culture VC education 286

TechCrunch

MARCH 15, 2021

The increase might not turn heads in a world of $90+ billion valuations, but Lavingia thinks the new rules could revitalize a path to raising capital for venture capitalists and founders alike. If this works, startup founders will start to be able to go direct more frequently,” Lavingia said. So far, Gumroad has raised $3.4

venture capital 112

venture capital VC capital ventures 112

Hunter Walk

MARCH 11, 2023

Riffing Off VC Charles Hudson’s Blog Post, Here’s What I’m Trying to Answer a group of different robots running a race, digital art [DALL-E] If startup founders sometimes ‘Build in Public,’ is the analogou sventure capitalist motto to ‘Think in Public?’

VC 73

VC support investing investment 73

Y Combinator

MARCH 30, 2021

Secondly, I think so much about being a startup founder is really about being optimistic about the future, and believing in your vision when no one else does — and most people don’t in the early days. The third trait founders need is resourcefulness. This is really important; everyone always asks for coffee.

founder 57

founder advice pitching startup founder 57

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 28, 2014

I was reading Danielle Morrill’s blog post today on whether one’s “ Startup Burn Rate is Normal. I love how transparently Danielle lives her startup (& encourages other to join in) because it provides much needed transparency to other startups. ” I highly recommend reading it. Profitability.

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startup VC frameworks capital 383

TechCrunch

MARCH 5, 2022

As always, you can support me by sharing this newsletter, following me on Twitter or subscribing to my personal blog. D’Amelio family launches VC fund 444 Capital to invest up to $25M in high-growth startups. Waabi’s Raquel Urtasun on the importance of differentiating your startup. Deal of the week. What about $1.5

venture capital 82

venture capital communities ventures capital 82

Dream It

FEBRUARY 5, 2021

The Dreamit team has said it before, raising money from a VC is a lot like sales. Those are the 5 MORE things VCs wish startup founders knew before pitching. Stay tuned for our upcoming blog posts for more tips. They’re judging your ability to get your audience excited, bought in, and closed.

startup founder 397

startup founder founder startup pitching 397

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 13, 2018

Most founders prepare a deck, ask a few friends and investors whom to meet, get a few introductions and just wing it. As a result founders often meet the wrong investors, waste time on those who ask for more information. The typical VC process is as follows: They say there are three rules in property: Location, location, location.

VC 332

VC advice entrepreneurs energy 332

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 23, 2015

I wrote this conundrum and the need to take charge of how the market define your skills in my much-read blog post on “ personal branding.” For some aspiring to be tech entrepreneurs, I often suggest a two-step process, as I argued in this post that “ The First Startup Founder You Need to Invest in Is You.”

advice 335

advice peer-to-peer VC board 335

Gust

OCTOBER 2, 2014

As I’ve written about before, You’d Have to be a Big Baby to Complain about Being a VC. As a startup founder you rarely have much money in your bank accounts. I recently had coffee with a young friend who just finished his first startup. And I’m happy as a VC. And why I woke up at 4.50am. That’s stressful enough.

entrepreneurs 122

entrepreneurs VC founder venture capital 122

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 26, 2010

I wrote a blog post about being hands on where I argued that startup founders need to be hands-on or in my words, “you can’t run a burger chain if you’ve never flipped burgers.&#. I once had a startup team pitch me for an investment where the President of the company led the first call with me on his own.

entrepreneurs 286

entrepreneurs advice pitching VC 286

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 25, 2010

When I first read Paul Graham’s blog post on “High Resolution&# Financing I read it as a treatise arguing that convertible notes are better than equity. Most early-stage entrepreneurs who have worked with me (either as an angel or as a seed VC) know that I don’t rely at all on the social proof of other investors.

finance 287

finance financing advice VC 287

Entrepreneurs' Organization

DECEMBER 15, 2023

Founders are so anxious to avoid the pain of missing payroll or running out of cash in the near term that they make hasty decisions on investors that cost them later. Being aware of this bias can help founders take a balanced perspective. and more articles from the EO blog. The post Raising Funds? The post Raising Funds?

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pitching consulting advice communities 213

Entrepreneur's Handbook

FEBRUARY 4, 2021

An inside look at how successful VCs are courting the small world of big investors. Source: DocSend At DocSend , we spend a lot of time analyzing the data behind what it takes for startup founders to market their ideas, land meetings with VCs, and in turn source and close deals?—?from from pre-seed to Series A.

peer-to-peer 114

peer-to-peer pitching VC strategy 114

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

JANUARY 13, 2020

I used this title for possibly the most regrettable blog post I have written on AVC back in 2011. Alex starts off his post with this assertion: 2019 was the year when VCs and startup founders soured on paid acquisition. I am not sure if that is true, but if it is, it suggests a dramatic change in the startup playbook.

startup founder 156

startup founder startup founder entrepreneurship 156

Hunter Walk

SEPTEMBER 11, 2024

Here’s Part III: The term “VC” is a convenient, encompassing term, but it is an ambiguous categorization. For better or worse, “VC” is a disorganized, unruly, messy set of people and firms whose emergent behavior about important things does not converge. They have to fundraise just like startup founders.

venture capital 73

venture capital capital ventures VC 73

TechCrunch

OCTOBER 6, 2022

It also wrote a bit more about the fundraise on its own blog.). One of the most important things you have to show VC investors is whether the company is “venture scale.” Angel investors have very different expectations than VCs do). As a startup founder, you really need to understand how venture capital works.

pitching 94

pitching VC SaaS opportunity 94

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 18, 2012

As I’ve written about before, You’d Have to be a Big Baby to Complain about Being a VC. As a startup founder you rarely have much money in your bank accounts. I recently had coffee with a young friend who just finished his first startup. And I’m happy as a VC. And why I woke up at 4.50am.

entrepreneurs 420

entrepreneurs VC founder venture capital 420

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 7, 2011

A few weeks ago I was reading a blog post by MG Siegler that really struck a chord. VC Pitches. Having been an entrepreneur for near-on a decade and having pitched in 100 VC meetings I hated getting no feedback. I always believed that the job of a startup founder is to be Respected, Not Loved. That’s OK.

construction 337

construction VC pitching energy 337

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2011

So for anybody who reads my “This Week in VC&# transcripts but doesn’t watch the video – this one’s for you! I covered what I call “the co-founder mythology.&# If you do decide to go down the 50/50 route, please at least consider: Make sure you have founder vesting for both of you. I am one of them.

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founder strategy VC startup 393

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 30, 2016

If I blog on a stand-alone platform I have to work to get distribution. Of course I fund people outside of that age range but statistically startup founders of VC-backed tech companies are more likely in that range. As a VC if you don’t do this you’ll soon become irrelevant. Snapchat is similar.

media 218

media VC advice entrepreneurs 218

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2013

Anyway, as I winnowed my way through the comments section of my blog post on relationships I realized my own wife has posted a response! My husband is Mark Suster and before he was a VC and blogger he was a startup entrepreneur like you. Many startup founders spend all day making tons of hard decisions both big and minute.

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startup advice finance financing 418