Your office space is the face of your startup. Not only does it communicate an outward message, but like a face, a startup office provides insight into what’s going on underneath the surface. A startup’s space tells a story to […]

I recently received a email from an entrepreneur who I know with a genuine question about terms of his financing: “How do you guys at NextView feel about one of our investors holding super pro–rata rights for the next round?”  We at NextView […]

Over the past fifteen years on the internet we’ve seen a few waves of e-commerce innovation.  From the initial humble beginnings of simply selling books online, to shopping/pricing comparison engines for electronic and other feature-laden items, to this current wave […]

When is the right time of the year to fundraise for a venture round?  There’s a lot of conventional wisdom disguised as insight which entrepreneurs follow about optimizing the timing of their fundraising.  It’s correct in principle, but in reality […]

Whether a startup’s initial Seed round is comprised of individual angels, seed-focused funds, larger VCs , or some combination of the three, when it’s time for the entrepreneur to raise a true Series A round, of course the goal is […]

Last September I wrote a post outlining my view of the venture capital industry: increasingly evolving like the beer industry as it continues to mature.  Large VC firms resemble Budweiser-type macrobrews, competing based on scale and brand with a standardized product […]

Everything in startups is selling.  Selling to financiers.  Selling to customers.  Even for consumer-facing online services, UI and product design is about selling users on what actions you’d like them to take.   Recruiting new employees is one of the […]

A lot has been written for entrepreneurs about optimizing a venture capital fundraising process, but one aspect which isn’t discussed very often is the pacing of it.  Two (seemingly contradictory) maxims that are often repeated in this context are: “it […]

One of the most boring things to do in any business decision is making reference calls.  Usually you’ve already made a selection of whatever type (hiring a new employee, deciding on a VC, choosing a new vendor), and then the […]

In the past couple years, I’ve written a couple blog posts explaining how startup offices are like faces, which can basically be summed up in an excerpt paragraph – “they [startup offices] communicate what is going on in the inside.  […]