Hey VCs, it’s not your company!
(Editor’s note: Brad Feld is an early stage investor and co-founder of Foundry Group. This post originally appeared on his blog.)
VCs say a lot of stupid things. I’m guilty of it plenty and whenever someone calls me on it I try to acknowledge and… Continue Reading
4 ways to get automatically rejected by an angel investor
I’ve started three companies, and now I’m an angel investor. So I’ve been on both sides of the table.
There are lots of good articles out there about pitching, and surely everyone who pitches me has read some of them. Still though, a few problems… Continue Reading
What rehab taught me about making bad investments
(Editor’s note: Jeff Bussgang is a General Partner at Flybridge Capital Partners. This column originally appeared on his blog Seeing Both Sides.)
For as long as I can remember, I have been an enthusiastic participant in sports. To be clear, I’m not a great athlete (in fact, I’m… Continue Reading
10 lessons in bootstrapping a business
(Editor’s note: Clate Mask is co-founder and CEO of Infusionsoft. He submitted this story to VentureBeat.)
There are two ways to build a business: Raise a bunch of money or bootstrap. When I was in business school, there wasn’t much attention given to the bootstrapping notion. The… Continue Reading
The VC gender gap – Are VCs sexist?
(Editor’s note: Jeff Bussgang is a General Partner at Flybridge Capital Partners. This column originally appeared on his blog Seeing Both Sides.)
I find the preponderance of males in VC an annoying and stubborn phenomenon. When I first entered the start-up game as an entrepreneur in… Continue Reading
Negotiating VC funding? Look beyond ‘the pre’
(Editor’s note: Jeff Bussgang is a General Partner at Flybridge Capital Partners. This column originally appeared on his blog Seeing Both Sides.)
VCs have an unfair advantage when it comes to financings. They simply have more experience doing deals.
A typical start-up company will do 2-4 venture… Continue Reading
High investment return expectations may limit VC spending
(Editor’s note: Dr. John K. Paglia is Associate Professor of Finance, Pepperdine University’s Graziadio School of Business and Management. He contributed this story to VentureBeat.)
Private capital lenders and investors may not engage in a meaningful volume of lending for another 2-3 years, according to new research… Continue Reading
Can you trust any VCs under 40?
(Editor’s note: Serial entrepreneur Steve Blank is the author of Four Steps to the Epiphany. This column originally appeared on his blog.)
Over the last 30 years Wall Street’s appetite for technology stocks have changed radically – swinging between unbridled enthusiasm to believing they’re all toxic…. Continue Reading
7 ways I’ve almost killed FreshBooks
I’ve often said, “were it not for my co-founder and VP of operations, I would have run this company into the ground long ago”. Sadly, that’s not hyperbole. Good partners can help reel you in when your thinking begins to wander off the path of… Continue Reading
Too much funding can be toxic for start-ups
The dream is a common one for entrepreneurs – find start-up capital and find as much of it as you can. But being cash rich isn’t always the best move for your company. Mike Maples of Maples Investments, in this talk at the Stanford Technology… Continue Reading
5 milestones to reach before raising venture capital
I meet lots of web entrepreneurs who tell me they want to raise venture capital. Most of these people are first time entrepreneurs and they just assume that once they’ve got an idea, the next thing to do is raise venture capital. That’s naive.
I always… Continue Reading
Solicit feedback, not funding
There’s an old saying: Ask for advice, you get money. Ask for money, you get advice. The team at Cooliris actually found this to be true. Rather than relying on a single pitch meeting, the founding team met regularly with a variety of companies to… Continue Reading
Touching the hot stove
I’m a slow learner. It took me 8 startups and 21 years to get it right, (and one can argue success was due to the Internet bubble rather then any brilliance.)
In 1978 when I joined my first company, information about how to start companies simply didn’t… Continue Reading
VC investing rebounds in Q2, still at mid-1990s levels
Venture capital investment activity rebounded to $3.7 billion in the second quarter, but the gains are only enough to put the sector on track to match annual levels from more than 12 years ago.
While the change in direction is reassuring, it may be a dead-cat… Continue Reading
Dig in to the Q12009 MoneyTree Report
It may come as no surprise, but attracting the eye of a venture capital firm is a lot tougher during a recession. VC investments hit a 12-year low during the first quarter of 2009 with only 549 deals struck, according to the PricewaterhouseCoopers/National Venture Capital… Continue Reading
China venture capital investments rise to highest level in five years
Venture investments into mainland China boomed during the second quarter — hitting their highest level in five years.
The trend is likely to continue because of better tax treatment lately for foreign investors there.
Investors into private companies pumped nearly $1.37 billion into 71 deals, more than… Continue Reading
Life-science briefing: Thursday, March 20, 2008
TODAY’S HEADLINES:
Vantia Thera spins out of Ferring, raises £19M (PDF release)
Third Eye gets $150K for intracranial-pressure monitor (release)
Diabetes tester Oculir closes doors, returns capital (VentureWire)
Catalyst Health Ventures raising $60M fund (VentureWire)
Vantia Thera spins out of Ferring, raises £19M – Vantia Therapeutics, a U.K. spinout of Ferring… Continue Reading
Life sciences briefing: Wednesday, March 5, 2008
TODAY’S HEADLINES:
Precision Thera merger with “blank check” Oracle Healthcare collapses (release)
Sleep Solutions takes in $21M for sleep-apnea diagnostics (release)
Trevena takes in $24M for drugs targeting G-proteins (release)
“Specialty biotech” PanGenetics gets €23M for antibody drugs (release)
Cancer-drug maker Unibioscreen pulls in €5M (release)
Danish contract manufacturer CMC Biologics… Continue Reading
Life sciences briefing: Monday, March 3 ,2008
TODAY’S HEADLINES:
InfraReDx takes $17M for arterial-plaque detection (VentureWire)
Cancer-drug developer Serenex sells out to Pfizer for undisclosed sum (release)
Life-sciences fund Longitude Capital raises $95M (VentureWire)
Hospital consultant Intercede Health names Gray Miller as CEO (release)
InfraReDx takes $17M for arterial-plaque detection – InfraReDx, a Burlington, Mass., developer of diagnostic… Continue Reading
Life sciences briefing: Monday, Feb. 25, 2008
TODAY’S HEADLINES:
Microsoft launches $3M fund to support online health-improvement tools (release)
Clarus Ventures raises $660M life-sciences fund (release)
Iverson Genetics raises $1.1M for blood-clotting tests, seeks $9.3M more (VentureWire)
Upstart Ventures aims for $30M fund to seed Utah life-science ventures (release)
CalHealth takes in $750K for blood-pressure monitoring (VW)
Regenerative… Continue Reading