31–40 of 97 posts
Has the number of tiny trivial startups increased lately? Judging from demo days, I would say yes. The startup is the the new garage band. If you like what you hear, we're selling CDs after the show.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you haven't found market fit on $5M, which you can raise on AL, you need to fold, not try to raise $10-$20M. No one will give you that kind of money without mega traction.
I don't think your numbers will work out. It is going to be very difficult to raise $5M on AL. Here is an example of someone who raised $250K. He needed 35 backers[1]. This is during the heady starting days. At an average investment of $10K to $20K you will need 500 investors to get to $5M. How will this work with so many investors? My guess is you will get to $1Million, tops and stop. I doubt you can show market fit…
The enterprise is increasingly consumerized so any play that offers that opportunity should be interesting.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you haven't found market fit on $5M, which you can raise on AL, you need to fold, not try to raise $10-$20M. No one will give you that kind of money without mega traction.
I don't think your numbers will work out. It is going to be very difficult to raise $5M on AL. Here is an example of someone who raised $250K. He needed 35 backers[1]. This is during the heady starting days. At an average investment of $10K to $20K you will need 500 investors to get to $5M. How will this work with so many investors? My guess is you will get to $1Million, tops and stop. I doubt you can show market fit…
Crave just raised $2.5M on AL - see http://blogs.wsj.com/venturecapital/2013/09/19/50-shades-of-...
Crave is showing lots of fit - market or otherwise.
With AL syndicates, getting to $5M for a hot startup on AL will be a cake walk. All you need is for a few of the top syndicators to get excited about you and you're at serious money. In fact, some of them are actively contemplating that possibility: see http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130928204536-24...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The value of most FAILED startup can be salvaged from the team, you will never see a startup with a valuable/popular product gets acquit-hired. Sure, the team has value as engineers, but a company that keeps failing with their products and keeps "pivoting" puts doubt on the value of their founders as entrepreneurs (they may still be brilliant engineers). VCs like to invest in entrepreneurs (especially entrepreneurs w…
Since most startups fail wouldn't this make the parent's comment true?
Somewhat odd because some of the most valuable enterprise ventures recently have begun as consumer plays with a path to the enterprise. Dropbox is one example. The iPhone was consumer before enterprise. Github focused on individual debs before it made its enterprise play. I'd argue that AirBnB kind shows the same because I've noticed an uptick in the number of business travelers requesting to stay with us (i.e. they…
Somewhat odd because some of the most valuable enterprise ventures recently have begun as consumer plays with a path to the enterprise. Dropbox is one example. The iPhone was consumer before enterprise. Github focused on individual debs before it made its enterprise play. I'd argue that AirBnB kind shows the same because I've noticed an uptick in the number of business travelers requesting to stay with us (i.e. they…
To me this is essentially admitting that Andreesen Horowitz is loosing the ability to identify impactful startups. That is fine, its harder to do at scale, but nothing is different now than 5 years ago. We have lots of people doing experiments, some hit early success, some pivot. Once you get product market fit, you raise that B/C/IPO on the back of the growth you've been able to afford thanks to your raises and reve…
Andreesen Horowitz is loosing the ability to identify impactful startups Pet peeve: it's losing, not "loosing". I don't know if anyone can properly guess if a consumer startup is going to get traction until it does, especially in the mobile space. That said, they did manage to get a 312x return on their seed investment in Instagram (which they declined to invest in a second time as explained here: http://bhorowitz.co…
A classic example is the drug Viagra, one of the most profitable consumer technology investments in recent history. Its (most profitable) use today was originall reported as a "side-effect" in early clinical trials.
Somewhat odd because some of the most valuable enterprise ventures recently have begun as consumer plays with a path to the enterprise. Dropbox is one example. The iPhone was consumer before enterprise. Github focused on individual debs before it made its enterprise play. I'd argue that AirBnB kind shows the same because I've noticed an uptick in the number of business travelers requesting to stay with us (i.e. they…
Two things are worth highlighting in your comment. One is that the examples are "yesterdays" companyies that are not all that new (in dog years;). Two, is that the entry point and the profit sweet spot were not the same. The Bet now (as per the article) is that markets that before were not likely adressable directly, are now so. Ie, there is a change in the enterprise maket (ie, latent demand) that is now directly ac…
I'd say that the biggest change in the enterprise space is that individuals are increasingly responsible for purchases as opposed to some centralized purchasing department. Grassroots IT is the only adoption strategy with an element of virality.
To me this is essentially admitting that Andreesen Horowitz is loosing the ability to identify impactful startups. That is fine, its harder to do at scale, but nothing is different now than 5 years ago. We have lots of people doing experiments, some hit early success, some pivot. Once you get product market fit, you raise that B/C/IPO on the back of the growth you've been able to afford thanks to your raises and reve…
Andreesen Horowitz is loosing the ability to identify impactful startups Pet peeve: it's losing, not "loosing". I don't know if anyone can properly guess if a consumer startup is going to get traction until it does, especially in the mobile space. That said, they did manage to get a 312x return on their seed investment in Instagram (which they declined to invest in a second time as explained here: http://bhorowitz.co…
No where in your comment did you outline where my reasoning is wrong. Losing vs Loosing. Instagram doesn't address why they are dropping series A investments. 300x growth on nothing is still nothing.
As for seed investments into YC companies, who cares? If they are getting out of the seed and series A game, I assume that that extends to everything else.
The fundamental point is that the further you move down the investment line the less you are likely to be able to identify revenue before it happens.