From the Investors
Mark Solon of Techstars recaps the past 16 years of VC advice around public and private markets for new investors in the game in “Some Gray Haired Insights for New Investors”
Mark Suster of Upfront Ventures describes the ‘right level’ of burn rates for a startup in today’s market and outlines all sides of the valuation conversation in “What Most People Don’t Understand About how Startup Companies are Valued”
Patrick Meenan of Arthur Ventures tells entrepreneurs outside the valley that the market downturn may impact them less than they think “How the tech market volatility really impacts entrepreneurs outside the valley”
Sarah Tavel of Greylock Partners advises founders create a ‘10x product’ and to recast incumbent cost structures in “How to Build an Enduring, Multi-Billion Dollar Business”
Arielle Zuckerberg of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers discusses her perspective of going from startup employee to VC, how she sees the AI space, her thoughts on fiduciary responsibilities to LPs and more in “20VC: Arielle Zuckerberg” (podcast)
Elizabeth Yin of 500 Startups says there are no shortcuts in fundraising and offers tips founders should keep in mind in “Why Fundraising Takes so Long (for Most Entrepreneurs)?”
Ash Fontana of Zetta Ventures explains why vertically-focused Machine Learning companies are beating horizontal platforms and what companies should do about it in “Vertical Beats Horizontal in Machine Learning”
From the Operators
Adam Price of Homer walks through the ‘Unit Economic Theory’ equation and each variable in “The Unit Economics of On-Demand Startups Explained”
Jeff Bezos of Amazon reveals Amazon’s milestones in 1997 and how and why he envisions the company to be massive, in the then future (which is now) in “Amazon Shareholder Letter from 1997”
Andrew Chen of Uber talks about growth, what he has learned from trying different tactics, and how to evaluate the success of growth initiatives in “Growth is a System, Not a Bag of Tricks”
Brendan Baker of Baker Original helps people coming from outside industries and other functional areas think about how to join an investment firm in “How to (Possibly) Get a Job in Venture Capital”
Sarah Nadav of Simplifly calls attention to an investor’s perspective that women ‘should focus on raising children’ even if they’re founders in “VCs – Don’t Compare Me to Your Wife, Just Don’t”
John Saddington from TOMO reviews his tough decision to pivot the direction of the company and product in “The Importance of Doing Things That Don’t Scale”
Hilal Koc of LinkedIn shares the personality traits to avoid when evaluating the opportunity to team up with start-up founders in “Want to be more Productive? Here’s What to Avoid – especially in the Start-up World.”
Surviving Whatever Comes Next
Mattermark CEO, Danielle Morrill, is back on the blog, this time writing about how to keep your startup from dying.
Do this, and then do not die.
