This is going to be BIG.

OCTOBER 22, 2018

In almost every single investment I’ve ever made, I can think of a singular moment in my relationship with a founder that, no matter what came before or what might come after, defined our relationship. Often times, it came in a very vulnerable and down moment for the founder—perhaps they just lost out on a big opportunity, had someone from the team leave, or they’re running low on capital before sales have come around.

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founder ventures investing investment 1006

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 9, 2018

You had an amazing meeting with an investor. Your product demo crushed. The dialog was great. They told you how much they loved your space. The meeting was only supposed to last 45 minutes but you ran 90. The assistant tried to end the meeting twice but was shoooshed away. You race back to the office to tell everybody how well it went and you wait for the follow-up call to have a partners’ meeting or talk about term sheets or at least dip into due diligence.

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A Smart Bear

SEPTEMBER 5, 2018

We all know that startups should make decisions quickly. Fast decisions leads to rapid action, which accelerates the loop of production and feedback, which is how you outpace and out-learn a competitor, even one that already has a lead. But some decisions should not be made in haste, like a key executive hire , or how to price , or whether to raise money, or whether to invest millions of dollars in a new product line.

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Startup Grind

SEPTEMBER 25, 2018

Aneme Dlamini of Startup Grind chats to Simone Musgrave of Musgrave Gin about perseverance, building an actual business, and bringing your femininity as a force to be reckoned with in the business world. Aneme = A, Simone = S A : Welcome! S : Thanks. A : So, I am not going to go with the traditional ‘background story’ (laughs), I am sure you’ve been asked that many times.

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Advertiser: ZoomInfo

Marketing technology is essential for B2B marketers to stay competitive in a rapidly changing digital landscape — and with 53% of marketers experiencing legacy technology issues and limitations, they’re researching innovations to expand and refine their technology stacks. To help practitioners keep up with the rapidly evolving martech landscape, this special report will discuss: How practitioners are integrating technologies and systems to encourage information-sharing between departments and pr

B2B marketing

Berkonomics

SEPTEMBER 13, 2018

This is one of my favorite insights, since I lived this one in a positive exit from my computer business. Types of business buyers expanded. Most people will tell you that there are two kinds of eventual buyers for your business: financial and strategic. A financial buyer will analyze your numbers, past and forecast, to the n’th degree, and calculate the price based upon the result, after carefully comparing your numbers with those of others in the same and similar industries.

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board investing investment technology 240

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. A comprehensive post on this topic could be 5,000+ words, but we do not do such things here. We kept detailed notes month by month and today, I tried to organize them by key sections, what you’ll see below. There’s a good chance I’ve missed something — if you feel that way, by all means, please share your point of view on Twitter (or email) an

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For Entrepreneurs

DECEMBER 5, 2018

Matrix Growth Academy – Zero to 100 was an educational event held in San Francisco, aimed at providing B2B Founders with a road-map for how to get from Zero to a repeatable, scalable and profitable growth process that would take them to $100m in revenue. Please find below the primary videos for They have been.

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David Teten VC

APRIL 30, 2018

Why are more US VCs investing in international startups? Take a look at The Fortune Unicorn List : of the top 100 most valuable unicorns in 2016, 39 are currently based outside of the United States. While fundraising of US VCs has dropped slowly as a percentage of global limited partner allocations over the last decade, non-US startups are receiving a more rapidly increasing percentage of that money.

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ventures startup investing investment 74

Deskmag

MARCH 21, 2018

Blockchain is the technology which underpins crypto-currencies including Bitcoin, but its potential reaches far beyond digital currencies. The technology is set to radically transform the property industry through its ability to deliver a vast array of tools, systems and functional benefits for commercial property and thus, the coworking market. However, progress is required before blockchain can truly impact coworking operators.

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coworking spaces coworking development innovation 82

Speaker: Wayne Spivak - President and Chief Financial Officer of SBA * Consulting LTD, Industry Writer, and Public Speaker

The old adages that "cash is king" and "you can’t spend profits" still hold true today. But however well-known these sayings might be, it requires a change in mindset to properly implement a cash flow management system that predicts your business's runaway as accurately as possible. Key to this new mindset is understanding the difference between the Statement of Cash Flows, a historical look at the source and uses of cash, and the Cash Flow Statement, which uses transaction history and forward-l

financing

Tomasz Tunguz

MAY 28, 2018

Imagine you came across this ad. Scientists have discovered a revolutionary new treatment that makes you live longer. It enhances your memory and makes you more creative. It makes you look more attractive. It keeps you slim and lowers food cravings. It protects you from cancer and dementia. It wards off colds and the flu. It lowers your risk of heart attacks and stroke, not to mention diabetes.

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ventures startup investing investment 79

This is going to be BIG.

JANUARY 1, 2018

Year after year, educators and those invested in education love to speculate about what will take off in the near future. And as far as riveting news goes, nothing quite peaks the interest like new trends that have the potential to fundamentally change learning. In almost all of the commentary from both educators and industry, the mention of AR and VR for 2018’s big trends were ubiquitous.

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education investing investment media 400

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 28, 2018

There has always been tension between CPG (consumer packaged goods) companies and the retailers who sell their products to consumers. If a consumer will pay a fixed price for a product or service then the battle over who gets the margin in any sale is between the person who merchandises a product and the person who manufactures it. This is an age-old marketplace tension where leverage often determines the value captured.

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sustainability communities founder media 296

A Smart Bear

JANUARY 4, 2018

People said there’s no money in hosting. WordPress is just a toy. After the success of Smart Bear, I should be setting my sights on something big, not this. I’m sure people said similar things to Heather when she joined as our CEO. The Silicon Valley-oriented technology press outlets don’t cover us because we’re not in San Francisco, even though we’re more successful than most of the startups they cover.

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Speaker: P. Andrew Sjogren, Sr. Product Marketing Manager at Very Good Security, Matt Doka, Co-Founder and CTO of Fivestars, and Steve Andrews, President & CEO of the Western Bankers Association 

PCI compliance can feel challenging and sometimes the result feels like you are optimizing more for security and compliance than you are for business outcomes. The key is to take the right strategy to PCI compliance that gets you both. In this webinar, we have a great set of panelists who will take you through how Zero Data strategies can be used as part of a well-rounded compliance and security approach, and get you to market much sooner by also allowing for payment optimization.

strategy

Startup Grind

SEPTEMBER 24, 2018

Are you thinking about building the next big thing in EdTech? Well, I have to say that the journey is really amusing but extremely challenging at the same time! Many have tried to revolutionize education and failed. That’s why you need to make sure you are up to the challenge and ready for a very long journey and not in it for a quick exit! I want to share with you some of the lessons I learnt (and still learning) while building Knowledge Officer , a career-oriented learning platform for profess

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startup founder education sustainability 196

Berkonomics

MARCH 8, 2018

Give one percent equity to each outside board member vesting over four years of service. Many early stage CEOs and board members have asked for some guidance regarding pay and time commitments for board members. Here is my best advice, based upon many boards and many years. Pay early stage board members of companies that are not lifestyle businesses one percent of the fully diluted equity in the form of an option that vests over four years of service.

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Entrepreneurs' Organization

OCTOBER 30, 2018

Co-founder of Owned Outcomes Krupa Srinivas explores the value of fear in an entrepreneur’s journey as she describes partnering with a US healthcare intermediary to solve the problem of cataloguing hospital supplies. The US hospital supply chain is one of the largest supply chains in need of an overhaul. Market participants struggle with the lack of standardization, interoperability and transparency on quantities and prices of devices and supplies they purchase.

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Haystack

NOVEMBER 25, 2018

It’s that time of year, where I — as a committee of one judge, me — select one startup in the tech ecosystem that “broke out” and has the makings of an even larger outcome should things continue to go right. As a little tradition on this blog, I’ve singled out companies starting in 2013 with Stripe ; there was Snap back in 2014; Slack in 2015; took a break in 2016, as I wasn’t inspired to select one then; and last year, 2017, was Coinbase.

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Speaker: Nick Noreña, Innovation Coach and Advisor, Kromatic

Every startup and innovation project exists within an ecosystem that either helps or hurts that project. As innovation managers, we need to keep a pulse of that ecosystem and make sure we're helping those innovation projects we're managing every step of the way. In this webinar, Nick Noreña will walk through an Innovation Ecosystem Model that he and his team at Kromatic have developed to help investors, heads of product, teachers, and executives understand how they can best support innovation in

innovation

Forward Cities

DECEMBER 5, 2018

Our team is always looking for ways to highlight the great work happening around the country. Every day, our communities face new challenges that are met head-on by leaders and entrepreneurs aiming to make a difference. Their work inspires ours! Here is a selection of articles to stimulate the conversation: Museums, Neighborhoods, and Gentrification: Lessons from the Nation’s Capital.

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incubation entrepreneurs communities entrepreneurship 61

David Teten VC

JANUARY 9, 2018

A friend of mine interviewed for a job with massively successful hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen. My friend sat in the conference room, and Cohen walked in. He looked at his resume, and asked just one question: “ What’s your edge? ” My friend got the job because his answer was differentiated, credible, and backed up by a history of investing success.

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VC venture capital ventures capital 68

Deskmag

OCTOBER 9, 2018

Are coworking spaces actually only suited to extroverts who enjoy meeting new people? Do introverts avoid socializing in coworking spaces? In a nutshell: the answer to these questions is a clear no. Nevertheless, there are big differences between introverts, extroverts, and those in between, as the Global Coworking Survey shows. This article will discuss in more detail how they differ.

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coworking coworking spaces 101

Tomasz Tunguz

JANUARY 3, 2018

Below are 7 predictions about the startup software ecosystem. How many of them do you agree with? The tax holiday for repatriation creates one of the most active M&A environments of the past ten years. The repatriation holiday is part of the new tax plan. It permit companies to bring US dollars held abroad (from software sales in other countries) back to the US at a lower tax rate than before.

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This resource discusses the gap between early funding from friends/family and the more substantial rounds from angel groups and VCs. Why does this gap exist and what can be done about it?

startup

This is going to be BIG.

JUNE 11, 2018

Time and time again, I hear how hard of a time startups are having recruiting, especially for software developers. While candidate quality is sometimes an issue, or culture fit, or some other quality, most of the time the issue is that the company just isn't getting enough people into the top of the funnel. When I was a startup founder, I had this same issue.

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Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 12, 2018

Many people will write the history on why Ring became an enormously successful company and why it became a real-world unicorn in a world when many startups are anointed that merely on paper. Since I had a ringside seat to the company before it really existed all the way through the end I thought I’d offer my version and what I think it means for our future.

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entrepreneurs founder startup venture capital 247

A Smart Bear

SEPTEMBER 19, 2018

You roll down the windows and wear a helmet when you take your car to the track. This does not make me less terrified of a fiery death. The American Autocross champion was sitting in my passenger seat screaming at me to not let my foot off the pedal until I bounced off the RPM limiter. She was properly intense. I didn’t know what I was doing, but it’s fun to power through curves in a high-speed tenuously-controlled skid in my Mini Cooper S (plus Cooperworks).

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Startup Grind

AUGUST 13, 2018

Healthy living is not a cup of tea that you can warm up and reuse. You need to chart a full diet plan to stay well and strong. But, most of our readers tend to think that this is something very difficult to be done or implemented. However, if you look at the extensive workout schedule and your working timetable - you might find it impossible. Healthy living strategy comes with a smart plan too, you just need to focus on your pain points.

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strategy mix-use hospitality health 189

Advertiser: ZoomInfo

In times of economic uncertainty, account-based strategies are essential. According to several business analysts and practitioners, ABM is a necessity for creating more predictable revenue. Research shows that nearly three-quarters of marketers (74%) already have the resources needed to build successful ABM programs.

strategy