Being a founder is hard. Being a solo founder is even harder. Being a solo non-technical founder–forget about it. Jeff Bezos may disagree, but there aren’t many Jeff Bezos in the world. Solo founders often believe they are the only ones who can pull off their vision. While...
In 2001, Mailchimp sprouted as a humble side project to an otherwise floundering design agency. In running their agency, Ben Chestnut and Dan Kurzius saw clients struggle to navigate email marketing. To toss them a lifeline, the duo created a simple email marketing tool–called "Mailchimp." Mailchimp'...
Seinfeld's four main characters: Jerry Seinfeld, George Costanza, Elaine Benes, and Cosmo Kramer are renowned for talking about nothing and challenging the norms of society. You may be surprised to hear how these characters are not so different from the limited partners ("LPs") in a venture...
Have you ever wondered how venture capital funds can optimize their investments to deliver the best returns for their investors? One way is by implementing strategies that increase the odds of generating outsized returns, such as recycling management fees. In this post, we will explore the concept of recycling management...
We are partnering with our friends over at Angel School for a series of posts on all things venture investing. In this post, Jed Ng discusses the benefits of angel investing through syndicates and the process of building your own network for syndicates. You can find the original post here....
We're teaming up with our friends at Sydecar to publish a three-part series on the legal (and non-legal) aspects of starting (and running) a venture capital fund. Sydecar aims to bring more efficiency to private markets by standardizing how investment vehicles are created and executed. Their products allow...
We're teaming up with our friends at Sydecar to publish a three-part series on the legal (and non-legal) aspects of starting (and running) a venture capital fund. Sydecar aims to bring more efficiency to private markets by standardizing how investment vehicles are created and executed. Their products allow...
Growing a venture-backed startup is difficult–even if you started on the right foot by initially incorporating as a Delaware C-Corp. Unfortunately, this difficulty isn’t alleviated for many administrative tasks, such as filing annual reports and paying Delaware franchise taxes. In fact, around this time of the year, we...
We provide an overview of the legal and non-legal aspects of starting and running a venture capital fund.
If you’ve been on Twitter lately, you’ve probably seen some of the fantastic (and funny) things people do with OpenAI’s ChatGPT bot. my job is now 100% automated pic.twitter.com/uyk6PurvgH — Turner Novak 🍌🧢 (@TurnerNovak) December 3, 2022 However, who owns the intellectual property rights related to...
Lessons in corporate governance come quickly.
Even with capital markets in a state of decline, capital continues to flow into venture capital. Pitchbook data indicates that U.S.-based VCs have $290B in dry powder and have raised a record amount in the first quarter of 2022. Aside from the potential for outside returns (e.g....
Over the last decade, we've seen dramatic growth in distributed ledger technology and blockchain-based digital assets. However, from the ICO boom of 2017 to the NFT craze of 2021, there has been no shortage of nefarious activity.
Early Exercising Stock Options & Implications for Start-up.
Tax Benefit, Burden or Break Even?
Tax Benefit, Burden or Break Even?
For many entrepreneurs, venture capital is, as Elaine Benes would put it—an enigma, a mystery wrapped in a riddle. The unique language used by venture capitalists (VCs) creates part of the mystery. What is Venture Capital? The National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) defines VCs as: Professional, institutional managers of...
Founders using convertibles like SAFEs and Convertible Notes often miss a crucial negotiation point, which can result in significant dilution–whether the valuation cap is pre-money or post-money.
For early-stage financing rounds (e.g., pre-seed and seed), SAFEs and Convertible Notes are often the investment instrument of choice for founders and funders alike.
A new breed of blockchain applications is threatening the landscape of traditional venture funding.
For startups, equity compensation is one of the most effective ways to obtain, retain, and motivate a talented team.
