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Booted out of Bootup Labs

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Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#41

Post by dedward »

Can I just say that the fact that either party here is duking this out in a public forum is just..... unprofessional? Especially from the VC firm itself?

I suppose I'm a newcomer to this "VC/incubator/startup" community - but in any other life situation, when I decide to pack up and move somewhere far away, I make sure I have stuff in writing, and cash in the bank, and all my i's dotted and t's crossed before I quit my old job and jump on a plane. I also make sure, as best I can, that expectations are the same on both sides. I don't see why this is any different whether it's VC capital for some wild idea or a serious business proposal or just a plain old job somewhere else... what ever happened to common sense?

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#42

Post by shadowsun7 »

apphacker wrote: post #36
dannyrobinson wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a manager of Bootup, I can assure you that we haven't been personally paid anything. The $50k is funnelled through the company to maximize canadian tax credits, which can amount to a meaningful amount of money. And it's used to pay for rent, legal, accounting, and other services that are for the benefit of the startup.

You shouldn't have accepted companies that you couldn't afford to pay. You shouldn't have asked them to move to a different country. Very reckless and irresponsible and to then attack the poster as "twisting the truth" about tiny details seems even worse to me. You should be sorry. You should show some humility.

I agree completely with apphacker. Being evil or unfair on the Internet is anathema to a (web) startup-related enterprise. 3 out of 7 startups funded is ridiculous. With this hitting the HN community, your best hope is that all three of those startups make it big, or you've just lost whatever credibility you have (with startups that count).

Good luck.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#43

Post by rdl »

http://blog.bootuplabs.com/2010/04/14/wertz-joins-board-firs...

I'm not really sure how I feel about this. It seems like they behaved pretty reasonably for a regular company, but as a fiduciary, they probably should have held off and not funded anyone without funds in the bank, vs. relying on a mid-term capital call. (I wonder who bailed on the capital call and why)

After this, I would probably be reluctant to move to Vancouver based on their line of credit promise unless I could see the funds in escrow; a LoC of $100k should mean $100k in an account I control, with equity going to them based on how much I withdraw. If they were Sequoia I'd be willing to accept a promise, but clearly how they have demonstrated they have pretty limited resources.

They at least seem fairly transparent about everything, so it's not dishonesty, merely bad judgment.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#44

Post by dedward »

dannyrobinson wrote: post #24
cperciva wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What sort of program offers $100k to that many groups and doesn't follow through? Not to be facetious, but: A program which doesn't have as much money as they're offering people. The founders of Bootup Labs put some of their own money in, but they're raising money (or trying, at least) from VCs for the rest. They're paying themselves [EDIT: or not -- see reply from dannyrobinson below] from the $50k/startup managemen…

As a manager of Bootup, I can assure you that we haven't been personally paid anything. The $50k is funnelled through the company to maximize canadian tax credits, which can amount to a meaningful amount of money. And it's used to pay for rent, legal, accounting, and other services that are for the benefit of the startup.

Doesn't your legal counsel suggest you , you know, don't engage in arguments in public internet forums that could lead to actionable court cases?

Should this turn out to not be the truth, even the slightest unintentional misappropriation of funds for a pizza could end up costing your company a great deal.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#45

Post by rdl »

rdl wrote: post #43

http://blog.bootuplabs.com/2010/04/14/wertz-joins-board-firs... I'm not really sure how I feel about this. It seems like they behaved pretty reasonably for a regular company, but as a fiduciary, they probably should have held off and not funded anyone without funds in the bank, vs. relying on a mid-term capital call. (I wonder who bailed on the capital call and why) After this, I would probably be reluctant to move t…

I'm also curious why 4/7 were cut -- was it that they were mediocre teams/products that Wertz didn't want to fund, or was it just that you ran out of money in the bridge period? It seems unlikely to me the latter, or you would have tried to structure some kind of bridge (or asked the teams to do this themselves by not drawing on the line of credit, which seems to be your only marginal cash expense per team). How else would you pick which companies to keep vs. eject?

I'm not trying to be a dick, but when you burn people (even unintentionally or with the best of intentions), it makes it harder for everyone else to do deals.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#46

Post by pg »

cperciva wrote: post #2

When I saw this title, my immediate thought was "hmm, I wonder if this is about Bootup Labs?" I've met the people behind Bootup Labs, and I like them. They're smart. They're enthusiastic about what they're doing. But I was never really convinced that they were able to make things work financially. I've seen enough startups that I can usually tell when a startup is running on fumes and spending all their energy on try…

In case this makes anyone think cperciva is not very bright, I replaced the original HN title with the title of the blog post itself.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#47

Post by jamesshamenski »

Boo the VC's in this one!

The investors of BootupLabs did not have confidence in 57% of their latest pool of startups. i wonder why they invested at all if they dont fully back their judgement?

Here's what probably happened, I bet the investors squeezed Boris and Danny with the alternative option being closing their doors early on all 7 companies. Sometimes VC's do evil things to extract more ownership in last minute negotiations (knowing very well that BuL was out of cash). I bet Boris and Danny would have wanted to follow through.

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#48

Post by puredemo »

dedward wrote: post #41

Can I just say that the fact that either party here is duking this out in a public forum is just..... unprofessional? Especially from the VC firm itself? I suppose I'm a newcomer to this "VC/incubator/startup" community - but in any other life situation, when I decide to pack up and move somewhere far away, I make sure I have stuff in writing, and cash in the bank, and all my i's dotted and t's crossed before I quit…

Well, unfortunately I think Bootup Labs had to respond to the claim that they "had no money".

Re: Booted out of Bootup Labs

#50

Post by cperciva »

dedward wrote: post #41

Can I just say that the fact that either party here is duking this out in a public forum is just..... unprofessional? Especially from the VC firm itself? I suppose I'm a newcomer to this "VC/incubator/startup" community - but in any other life situation, when I decide to pack up and move somewhere far away, I make sure I have stuff in writing, and cash in the bank, and all my i's dotted and t's crossed before I quit…

Can I just say that the fact that either party here is duking this out in a public forum is just..... unprofessional?

Perhaps a bit unprofessional, but I'm personally glad it happens. The startup/VC world is all about reputation, and anything which moves the world from "talk to your friends at other startups and find out if they know anything about X" to "google for X and find out what people are saying about it" is a good thing for startups who are less than fully connected in the gossip network. Think of this as the natural continuation of what thefunded started.

Of course, as a Vancouverite I'm sad that it's Bootup Labs which is getting a bad reputation like this. :-/

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