My morning today includes 18 pitches at the quarterfinals of Social Venture Partners Seattle’s Fast Pitch competition. 18 first-time entrepreneurs, each with just five minutes and no Q&A, hoping to impress the judges enough to make it to the semi-finals. It’s a tough format. 40 judges in auditorium seating in a University of Washington classroom. 40 judges staring down on the...
In the last post, I talked about how revenue-based investments are a lower cost of capital than traditional equity. In this post, as promised, I’ll explain how they also better align the the incentives of investor with the entrepreneur. To start with, always remember to put yourselves in the other person’s shoes when raising money. Investors invest to make a positive return on their...
Revenue-based investments are quite uncommon in startup investing, and as such, few entrepreneurs and few investors understand their benefits. The traditional form of startup capital is equity, with investors expecting a “10x” return on their investment, i.e. they expect that the company will be acquired for a sufficient amount that the investment will earn the investor at least 10...
Just about every post I write comes from a conversation with an entrepreneur or fellow investor. Same with almost every chapter in every one of The Next Step series of books I’ve published. When the same topic keeps coming up, I write it down so I don’t have to explain for the third time to the next entrepreneur who asks. When is the best time to launch your company? Have you...
