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I’m so tired of seeing young entrepreneurs get screwed by their angel investors on convertible notes and I know I can’t convince you not to do it so I’d like to offer one simple bit of advice to help you avoid getting screwed (at least on one part of your note). When you do a convertible note with a cap that converts into the next round of funding one of the unintended consequences is that if you’re successful and raise at a larger price than your cap the early angels oft
By Jeffrey Papen, CEO and Founder, Peak Hosting. At Peak Hosting , we're big fans of TechEmpower's Framework Benchmarks, an open source project the company has been coordinating since early 2013. Covering a wide variety of web application frameworks, this project gives developers useful data that can help them find the framework that will provide the performance and features they need for their application.
A version of this article previously appeared in Forbes. When joining a startup, there are seven important questions you should ask in order to answer the question: “What the heck are my stock options worth?”. You just received a job offer from a startup which includes 50,000 stock options. That is wonderful…or is it? I reviewed and approved hundreds of employment offer letters at my various startups, all of which included stock option grants.
Venture capitalists sometimes make an error in directing their portfolio company CEOs to push resources to the limit and scale the business to immense size quickly, all to seize market share. The logic in this is simple: once a company has market share, other issues can be sorted out to monetize the market, make the company profitable, scoop up wavering competitors, or even sell the company to a larger firm looking for a large customer base.
Office leases are one of companies’ largest expenses, and if your whole team is working from home with no clear end in sight, you may be wondering what to do about your lease.
Santa Monica-based Famebit , the Youtube influencer marketplace led by David Kierzzkowski, has acquired short form, video marketing company Refame , the two announced this morning. Financial details of the buy were not disclosed. Famebit said the deal will help it automate short form, video content creation on Vine, Snapchat, and Instagram. Refame has a reach of over 40 million people, according to the companies.
In my Chapter 8.1 post I shared with you a story of my electric car (Chevy Volt, not the Tesla!) purchase. I was a week past my chapter 7 bankruptcy and my goal was to get back on the horse and start building credit immediately. Additionally, the car I traded was financed by my ex and it was in her name. I needed that to change, so did she. I knew big interest rates and a lot of work were in store for me, but I went for it.
Amazon. It is a household name. It has become so synonymous with Internet companies that the French have invented a disdainful term including Amazon: “les GAFA,” which they refer to as Google-Apple-Facebook-Amazon to talk about American dominance of the Internet. Try to imagine if you *didn’t* already know Amazon and the company walking into VC meetings telling people they were going to disrupt the selling of all goods starting with books but then extending into electronics, ap
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Amazon. It is a household name. It has become so synonymous with Internet companies that the French have invented a disdainful term including Amazon: “les GAFA,” which they refer to as Google-Apple-Facebook-Amazon to talk about American dominance of the Internet. Try to imagine if you *didn’t* already know Amazon and the company walking into VC meetings telling people they were going to disrupt the selling of all goods starting with books but then extending into electronics, ap
Most business managers preach that the key to success is holding employees accountable for actions, but I have found that successful entrepreneurs are all about holding themselves accountable. They skip the blame and complain game, and make things happen despite major obstacles. As a startup investor, I view any evidence of a victim mentality as the kiss of death.
A version of this article previously appeared in Forbes. Young Al Kooper did not miss his Bob Dylan moment. When Al was invited by Producer Tom Wilson to sit in on Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited, Mr. Wilson made it clear to Al that he was a backup guitarist. He told him to sit quietly in the control booth and be ready to play if Dylan wanted to explore an arrangement that required two guitars.
This is like a Hans Christian Anderson parable, but aimed at you and your business… There are big fish and small fish, potential customers, all swimming in the sea that is your potential marketplace. You, the lonely fisherman, have to weave a net to catch your fish. Should your net be large and bulky, requiring more effort and expense to weave? Or should it be small and delicate, to catch those fish that would otherwise fall through the net?
The Tech Coast Angels , one of the most active angel investment groups nationwide in addition to here in Southern California, said Friday that it invested in eight new and follow on deals in the first quarter of 2015, in addition to seeing two exits out of its portfolio. The TCA did not say how much it invested in the quarter, but sale the investments in the first quarter went to Groundmetrics, ImmunoGum, iPourIt, Pediatric Biosciences, Playlist Media, Schlep & Fetch, Spine Innovation and Tw
Years ago I began doing a presentation called Think Big for area high schools and colleges which included The Ten Commandments for Entrepreneurs. It became quite popular and I was asked to keynote my Think Big presentation for Women’s Economic Ventures. I was honored and knew my material mattered when I got hugs from several of the women after my talk.
*. Unicorns. The most overused word in the technology industry today. And they aren’t even f **g real. That is how absurd thing have gotten. No, I take that back. THIS is how absurd things have gotten: “I have to raise at a billion-dollar valuation” “Why? You don’t have the revenue or profit to support that valuation.” “But if I don’t I won’t be able to recruit the best people in the market.
Every entrepreneur I know is dismayed by the number of friends who approach them with a line such as “I have an even better idea that will change the world, and one of these days I’m going to get around to starting my own business.” I always wonder what is more important to them on an ongoing basis than changing the world, since their startups usually never materialize.
A version of this article previously appeared in Forbes. Self-aware startups often learn more from their failures than from their success. Timehop , the photo album for the digital age, is no exception. Created by Jonathan Wegener and his Co-Founder Benny Wong, the company has over 16M+ users. To put this in proper perspective, more than twice as many people access Timehop each day than read the New York Times.
It is all about execution. Waiting over a year to see results is too long, since your chance of mid-course correction is greatly reduced. To make the point, Harvard’s Robert Kaplan believes that less than 10% of corporate strategies are effectively executed. Ouch! If that is true, we are tolerant bunch. We carefully plan in long, dedicated sessions each year or so, then draw up a series of goals, strategies, tactics, objectives, targets, or whatever we want to name them.
Santa Monica-based secure messaging app developer TigerText , which provides secured text messaging for the enterprise and healthcare markets, has signed up a customer in Chicago. TigerText said that Chicago Cardiology Institute (CCI), which treats cardiovascular disease in Illinois, has deployed the company's secure messaging products as part of a HIPAA compliance effort.
Do you remember movies about the future where everything is controlled by machines? Look back at the Skynet computer from The Terminator, V.I.K.I from I, Robot or Alice from Resident Evil. Seems terrifying, right? In each movie, the computer evolves and takes control of everything. But don’t you find this story rather similar to what we are witnessing now?
*. Lawsuits. I’m so tired of the nature of the legal system in the United States where bullying, intimidation and mobster-like shake-downs are becoming prevalent. As I write these words I already imagine my next deposition in which I’m asked to read this out loud. Lawsuits are becoming so prevalent these days. Even when I’m not the one being sued I find myself being dragged into deposition after deposition and my blog (along with all my emails) are being served as evidence.
The pervasive ability and need to communicate constantly and globally through the Internet and smartphones is incenting everyone to get more out of their own assets and time, and capitalize on the idle resources of others. This new sharing economy is rapidly becoming the new business of sharing, with major winners already including Airbnb (rooms), Uber (rides), and Chegg (books).
A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. The US Postal Service pulled off another debacle with the Maya Angelou stamp. Their task was simple. Combine a photo of Ms. Angelou with one of her more memorable verses. Instead, the coupled her image with text written by Joan Walsh Anglund. <break here> Twice Isn’t Charming. Hey, everyone makes a mistake.
Make some noise Los Angeles because it’s time to compete in Tech.Co’s Startup of the Year Competition! Tech.Co has been traveling the globe, both virtually and physically, searching for the world’s best startup, and the Tech.Co’s Startup of the Year Competition & Tour’s next stop is in Los Angeles! Winners will get the chance to compete in Tech.Co’s Startup of the Year Competition at Celebrate 2015.
Local angel investors--including the Tech Coast Angels and Pasadena Angels --might just have another big hit on their hands, with the news today that San Luis Obispo-based Mindbody has filed for an IPO. Local angels--whose biggest exit so far in recent years was the IPO of Green Dot back in 2010--were the first backers of MindBody, having first received funding from Frontera Capital, the Pasadena Angels, and the Tech Coast Angels back in 2009.
Wearing a specially designed Oculus VR helmet, driver Matt Powers races a real car in a menacing virtual world, while all the time driving blind to the real world. Castrol EDGE is stepping up their VR game by enlisting the creative technologist team of Glenn Synder and Adam Amaral who was brought in to develop the 360 experience. The post Driving Blind In The Real World With Oculus Rift appeared first on TechZulu.
Anybody who reads the blog regularly will know that I’m long video. I’ve made 5 investments in the sector and I hope to make 5 more. Between the US & Europe alone the video sector is worth around $500 billion. And TV / Film / Video Games / Virtual Reality / Augmented Reality and frankly the Internet will all merge. Western countries watch > 5 hours of TV per day.
Even in this age of globalization and virtualization, the geographic area where you choose to live and work can still make or break your startup business. I still have to tell some entrepreneurs that even with the best idea, they have to move to Silicon Valley to find the investors they need, or they need to move to the U.S. get the attention of the market they choose.
What I love about my job is getting to see teams of super-early-stage companies develop ideas that while raw have potential to make an impact on the market. I love the enthusiasm, the boundless energy and the sense of possibility that comes from having an idea that hasn’t yet been beat up in the marketplace of competing ideas, customer contracts, VC skepticism, jaded journalists or fickle consumers who are on the The New, New Thing.
I saw this Tweet recently by Scott Belsky, co-founder and CEO of Behance. conviction > consensus. — Scott Belsky (@scottbelsky) April 29, 2015. It spoke to me because it so resonates with my nearly daily advice to entrepreneurs and VCs alike. I went as far as to call it the best Tweet of 2015 so far because it encapsulated my advice so succinctly.
As an active investor in the Los Angeles technology market we’re always seeking to better understand the data and trends of why our market has grown so rapidly since 2009. We look for pockets of excellence where we may have skills that aren’t native in other markets or where our home town may have some unique skills or talents. Everybody now knows that LA produced SnapChat, Tinder and Maker Studios.
Planning a threaded Tweetstorm? Here’s the rules: 1/Tweet 2/Reply to 1st Tweet but remove your @name 3/Reply to 2nd Tweet not 1st 4/Repeat. — Mark Suster (@msuster) May 29, 2015. I learned the hard way by doing a Tweetstorm below but linked every subsequent Tweet back to the original Tweet to create the thread. I faced the wrath of the community.
In some unwelcome news, the University of Southern California looks to be the center of an alleged Chinese spying ring, formed by three former graduate students from the school's electrical engineering school. According to the U.S. Department of Justice , it has charged six defendants with economic espionage and theft of trade secrets, which benefited the People's Republic of China.
E-commerce giant Amazon.com is expanding free, same day delivery in Los Angeles, to members of its Prime service, as part of a broader expansion if its same day delivery services. According to Amazon, it is now offering up free, same day delivery to customers in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, San Francisco, and other cities, removing what had previously been an added fee service.
Hawthorne-based SpaceX , the commercial spaceship and rocket company founded by Elon Musk, is promoting travel to Mars with three, retro-style travel posters. SpaceX--which released the posters on Flickr over the weekend--released the posters under the caption "Adventure awaits! Explore Mars� ultimate vacation destinations". The posters are reminiscent of the vintage, National Park posters created by the WPA back in the 1930's in response to the Great Depression.
Irvine-based Kofax Limited and Lexmark International said late Friday that the two companies have received Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Antitrust clearance on the proposed acquisition of Kofax by Lexmark. The two had announced in March that Lexmark would pay $11.00 per share in cash--or approximately $1 billion--for Kofax. the two companies said that it also recently received approval from the German Federal Cartel Office on the proposed transaction.
Almost everyone of a technical bent in the technology industry is familiar with that old routine: your parents, your friends, and your neighbors inevitably calls you for free technical support. However, almost no one really wants to be that technical support person. Los Angeles-based HelloTech (www.hellotech.com) wants to be the service that you refer all of your friends and family to, instead--by offering up low cost, on-demand, in-home technical support.
Irvine-based Oculus VR and co-founder Palmer Luckey have been sued again, this time by a company in Hawaii called Total Recall Technologies. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court in California, claims breach of contract and theft of intellectual property by Luckey, who Total Recall claims they hired to help them develop immersive, head mounted displays.
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