Evolving Venture Models: Preemptive Buyouts
Last February I suggested a possible hybrid-model for venture capital firms: locating pre-VC backed technology plays, buying them on the cheap, then augmenting the companies with a pre-assembled all-star team of managers. Looks like Austin Ventures was listening: Today, Austin Ventures announced its second $50 million investment to back a seasoned entrepreneur to head this […]
How to Validate a Startup for Investment
The early life-cycle of a startup is all about validation. Especially for first-time founders, the struggle is often to figure out what’s missing or what can be done to convince an investor to take a chance and invest. Validation is also significantly more difficult for non-technical founders (see Paul Graham’s point #6). Whether looking for […]
Funding For Social Apps Heats Up
PaidContent has released its second installment of the Social Media Deals Report. The team analyzed deal flows over a 15-month period: Venture Investment Into Social First Companies: Total number of investments: 400 Total number of disclosed investments: 341 valued at $2,763,715,000 Average investment size: $8,104,736 Best estimated value of overall investment in the space (disclosed […]
Fundraising: Personal Relationships Drive Investment
The old adage for raising money is that investors invest in the team first and the product or service second. Therefore, if investors primarily invest in people, then what they are really investing in are relationships built on trust. This is why entrepreneurs tend to raise money from friends and family first –  they know […]
Don’t Be Fooled By Venture Capital Brokers
On Friday night I published an inappropriate post. A reader pointed out my mistake in the comments and I subsequently pulled the post. I owe an apology for making accusations without proper due diligence. For that I apologize. While my methods were unfair, the point I was making is 100% valid. If you are raising […]