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No-BS Venture Thoughts for No-BS Entrepreneurs.
A running perspective on Florida's growing tech and venture community, with an occasional detour to the Southeast/national scene, venture capital FAQs and maybe a gadget or two....
Recent Posts Tagged With 'vcfaq'
Riskmasters Know How to Prioritize
You have probably already heard that VCs love to back serial entrepreneurs, but why is that? What makes them special?Well, it's a mix of things, but one trait I've witnessed across a decent sample size is the ability to prioritize and reprioritize ...
Budgets: Past Performance and Future Results
Almost all investment literature warns you that past performance is no guarantee of future results. That disclaimer usually prompts, for me, a juxtaposition with Einstein's definition of insanity: "doing the same thing over and over again and exp...
Tough Times are Telling Times
By now you should have read plenty of entrepreneur/VC advice on surviving in the post-mortgage crisis world. I won't rehash it here, but 2009 will be tough and today's difficult decisions will separate the next batch of startup winners and losers. ...
How Does the Mortgage Meltdown Affect VCs?
I've heard today's frequently asked question multiple times this week as many colleagues, friends and family put all financial categories in the same mental bucket. Depending upon where you are in your fund cycle and the industries you back, the ans...
VC FAQ: Venture Capital Valuation
I received a couple more VC FAQ questions. This time from an entrepreneur and investment banker who saw Angie's List close a $35M round with Battery Ventures. That large funding, and others in the social media space, left her wondering how value is...
VC FAQ: From Developer to VC and Back?
As SocialSpark was in private alpha I wanted to try out their Spark feature. Even if you aren't looking to monetize your blog, Sparks allow you to highlight a hot topic, pose a question or share a good cause -- providing a true "marketplace of ideas...
Connect the Dots for Your VCs and Board
I've been lucky in my venture career to typically lead deals as the local VC. This has allowed me to be very close and active with the entrepreneurs I back -- some may even suggest 'too active'.There are many benefits from such a relationship, but o...
Nice Idea, but How Will You Get Visitors?
I had another conversation today with an entrepreneur who had an interesting online destination site idea, but few answers for attracting visitors. In general, I'm not nearly as excited about destination/media properties as I am about horizontal onl...
SBSS Week 2: 10 Reasons to Talk to Your Customers Early
We had another great week of the Success Breeds Success Series. This week covered Markets and Market Research -- with a focus on sizing your market and understanding what customers want.Randy Scott, CEO of NovaMin, was the guest speaker and did a fa...
SBSS Week 1: Entrepreneurs Need Passion
I'm helping facilitate the first FastTrac TechVenture program in North Florida, called Success Breeds Success Series (SBSS). It's an intensive 8-week bootcamp for entrepreneurs, including "secrets of success" from most of the top entrepreneurs in th...
Dry Powder = Venture Capital Reserves
Now that Inflexion Fund is well into it's life, I spent some time today reviewing how our reserve approach is working out across the portfolio (short answer: great). When I say reserves, I mean the amount of money or "dry powder" a fund mentally res...
Venture Capital Not Required
This post is for all those entrepreneurs who are building great businesses, but have no need or interest in venture capital. Given all the emphasis on venture capital from pundits, startup mags and regional entrepreneurship organizations, it’s eas...
Convertible Notes vs. Equity
Over at AsktheVC someone asked:"Should Entrepreneurs Be Worried About Convertible Notes as a First Financing Event?"Jason provided a pretty good answer to the entrepreneur's specific question and I commented about the broader question of VC vs. Angel...
Top Ten Limited Partner (LP) Lies
Paul Kedrosky has published another great Top Ten list, following on his previous Top Ten VC Lies. This time it's the Top Ten LP Lies. I'll give you the first five, but you'll have to visit Paul to see the rest...10: We don't invest in first or sec...
