Sep
27
So the big news in VC circles yesterday was Tumblr’s mammoth $ 85M financing round. That’s on top of the $30M they raised less than a year ago. In total the 4 year old company has raised $ 125M. Matthew Ingram has an interesting post on Tumblr on Gigaom and cites some pretty impressive traction [...]
Sep
20
Fundraising is an art not a science. And as I have really come to appreciate now that I am on the investor side, there are many subjective elements that go into the investment decision. The timing, fit, stage, interpersonal chemistry all have to work. One thing that has killed interest in deals for me is [...]
Raising money is always hard. Especially so if it’s your first time and if your company is brand new. As seed investors, we routinely work with 1st time founders and by default are working with young companies. For the most part, the cap tables and prior financings we see are clean, but more often than [...]
I rarely watch the news. Too depressing. But last night we tuned in for a bit. Among the top headlines: growing concern over the financial health of many European Union countries. Markets are concerned about debt levels, raising the cost of debt and starting a downward spiral. People are protesting, governments are in a bind. [...]
Sep
02
I was traveling with one of my partners (John) yesterday. When you get out of the office with team members you often end up having great conversations that would never happen during the usual office hustle. Yesterday we found ourselves with 45 minutes between meetings and just sat down to shoot the shit about the [...]
Aug
11
So, it’s been almost a year since I moved to the dark side. People still often ask me how I like it. The short answer: I love it! Can’t believe I get paid to do this. But it struck me yesterday that I need to be bipolar in this role. And I am sure most [...]
Jul
26
I got this e-mail earlier today as a contact submission on my blog. I’m sharing it with names and details removed, not to be mean but because this happens all too often and it shouldn’t. My name is Joe Blow, I have been working on “Acme” project with a friend of mine, built two prototypes [...]
Jul
22
I had a great question from an entrepreneur this week who is deciding whether or not to take VC into his business. He heard that VCs want 10x returns and if you accept VC$ then you need to deliver that. He was worried that VCs block sales that don’t deliver the required returns. This question [...]
Jul
20
A lot of startup entrepreneurs ask me about when / if they should raise VC$? There is no one answer of course. It depends on many variables such as: opportunity size, your ambitions and track record. But my natural reflex is to tell most folks that if they are pursuing something that is fundable (a big [...]
Jun
07
We launched Founderfuel, our accelerator program, last week. As I scanned through the launch coverage I noticed many references to the program being an “incubator”. There is a big difference between incubators and accelerators both in terms of experience and results (returns). Here is how we see it at Real Ventures:
May
12
I’m a big mobster movie fan. Just love’em. There’s a lot we can learn from the ways and rules of the Mafia. One of their many lessons comes in making effective intros. If you’re introducing someone new to “the family”, you need to do two things: i.) Vouch for that person; and ii.) Show that [...]
For the second time in its history, Skype has made it’s venture investors a bundle of cash! The 1st time around, funds like Index and Bessemer scored big when eBay bought it. Now a group investors including the Valley’s new superstar VC fund Andreessen Horowitz has made another killing with Microsoft buying the company for [...]
I spent last week in the Valley and met a number of entrepreneurs that either recently raised $ or were in the process of raising. I won’t comment on the crazy valuations going on out west (that’s been covered already). Instead, I want to talk about an interesting phenomenon regarding high profile angels and the [...]
Apr
21
As we know all too well, most VCs you pitch will say ‘no’. So, when it comes to raising your round, you shouldn’t be jumping in a plane for every 1st meeting you get. 1st meetings mean nothing. There is no assurance that they will move ahead. Investors could be learning about the space, just [...]
Apr
18
We are fortunate at Real Ventures to meet a lot of entrepreneurs and regularly lament in our partners’ meetings that we wish we could do more deals. The truth is, we won’t do the majority of deals that we see. This is true of all venture investors.
