Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
1–10 of 16 posts
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#2From the article :
The fund will focus primarily on companies seeking seed funding and early stage funding, and Google Ventures will have the ability to make investments ranging from tens of thousands to "several tens of millions" of dollars, Maris said.
The seed part in the "tens of thousands" sounds a lot like YC.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#3I think a lot of people will be scared to pitch to Google in the seed stage.
Google has pretty much established itself as "anything goes" company. So no matter what you pitch, you'd worry about them stealing your idea.
And why should Google back someone like you with no connections/traction etc, if they have plenty of resources to implement your idea on their own.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#4I think a lot of people will be scared to pitch to Google in the seed stage. Google has pretty much established itself as "anything goes" company. So no matter what you pitch, you'd worry about them stealing your idea. And why should Google back someone like you with no connections/traction etc, if they have plenty of resources to implement your idea on their own.
I certainly would be hesitant to just email them a business plan...While Google itself might not "steal ideas"; What's to prevent an engineer at Google from culling through great ideas and starting up his/her own company?
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#5VCs are competing with YC the same way that bachelors programs are competing with PhD programs.
Edit: Title originally mentioned Google competing with YC.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#6I think a lot of people will be scared to pitch to Google in the seed stage. Google has pretty much established itself as "anything goes" company. So no matter what you pitch, you'd worry about them stealing your idea. And why should Google back someone like you with no connections/traction etc, if they have plenty of resources to implement your idea on their own.
A lot of people would be dumb to pitch to Google in the idea phase. If you're a first time founder without a convincing, working (and probably already with users) prototype or some really, really convincing connections your email is going to go straight into the circular file.
The "steal my idea" thing is one of those notions that makes sense until you're out there for a little while. I worried about it too until I realized, wait, nobody cares. A lot of good ideas seem to only look good in retrospect.
Google, "We're building better search." "Uh, huh. Yeah. You do that. Graphs you say? Dweebs."
Microsoft, "We're building a commodity operating system." "Without a computer? Why?"
Facebook, "We're starting a social network for college students." "Uhm, like MySpace?"
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#7I had both feelings of initial excitement and concern. My concept might be 'perfect' for a Google property, but that becomes a double-edged sword. Sure, GVentures will not want to get a rep for stealing ideas from submissions, but it's not about intent. It's always been the main reason I wouldn't be concerned so much about NDAs with VCs is that they're really not in the position to implement at the drop of a dime, or effectively weave key parts into an existing project. Google on the other hand... Hmmm.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#8I think a lot of people will be scared to pitch to Google in the seed stage. Google has pretty much established itself as "anything goes" company. So no matter what you pitch, you'd worry about them stealing your idea. And why should Google back someone like you with no connections/traction etc, if they have plenty of resources to implement your idea on their own.
I certainly would be hesitant to just email them a business plan...While Google itself might not "steal ideas"; What's to prevent an engineer at Google from culling through great ideas and starting up his/her own company?
These concerns are overblown. Reminder: Ideas are worthless. Implementation matters. Business plans are dime a dozen.
Furthermore google knows that such an event would kill their credibility as a VC instantly and hurt the Google brand as a whole due to the motto violation.
I can't think of an idea or business-plan that could possibly be worth that risk, therefor I assume google will take proper care of confidentiality.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#9Google is slowly morphing from technology company to tech focused private equity firm.
Re: Google Forms $100 Million Venture Fund
#10VCs are competing with YC the same way that bachelors programs are competing with PhD programs. Edit: Title originally mentioned Google competing with YC.
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