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How VC’s Get to “Yes”

robgo.org

1–10 of 14 posts

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#3
> fundraising is about “searching for true believers, not convincing skeptics.”

Interesting and well said. Makes sense, but I hadn't thought of it in those terms.

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#4
> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B.

Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#5

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

First two reasons I can think of.

Imagine you're doing that on an expensive cloud hosting setup and your expenses are really high. An infusion of capital could allow you the opportunity to build out your own server infrastructure(or pay annually on the cloud infrastructure) and dramatically lower your expenses and push your margins up a lot.

It would also offer you the flexibility in your funnel to offer back loaded deals to get larger clients onboard.

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#6

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

For a whole bunch of reasons, ie to pick a few:

- you may have a NWC situation where cash isn't paid up front - you may want to continue to invest in R&D / tech development on newer projects that aren't currently generating revenue - you may simply want to grow faster / hire more than your current financials can support

It seems pretty logical to me - at that point, you probably have a solid stepping stone, and want to decide what to do next.

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#7

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

Because you want 10m MRR?

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#8

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

You might want capital, but perhaps a cheaper form of capital than VC?

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#9

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

Building a large sales team to go to market is initially expensive or your burn rate relative to the capital in the bank is growing despite your profitability (you may not want to risk your limited run way if the economy goes bad).

Re: How VC’s Get to “Yes”

#10
post #5

> For example, there is sort of a magic number for SaaS businesses to achieve $100K MRR, which is usually a good benchmark for being able to raise a decent VC-led series A or B. Wait, what? If you have $100k MRR, why do you need any venture capital at all?

First two reasons I can think of. Imagine you're doing that on an expensive cloud hosting setup and your expenses are really high. An infusion of capital could allow you the opportunity to build out your own server infrastructure(or pay annually on the cloud infrastructure) and dramatically lower your expenses and push your margins up a lot. It would also offer you the flexibility in your funnel to offer back loaded…

An extra large EC2 instance is $360-$3311 per month. Maybe I have an imagination failure, but I can't see how cloud costs could be past 10k per month. So, how much could the infrastructure cost, and still be worth the investment?

Maybe I just don't understand the costs.

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