There is a good article by Al Schneider, a senior person at both Pasadena Angels and TCA, that was recently posted on SoCalTech.com.   Check it out:    How To Value Your Startup.

On the 22nd I will be talking about business plans and fundraising for the 3rd time with the Tech Coast Venture Network in Orange County. I thought it would probably be appropriate to update the presentation a bit…

Attached is a revised version of the presentation I’ll be giving.

I hope you find it helpful!

Business Plans and Fundraising

I sat on a panel today, “Business Pitches that Hook Investors”. It seems all of the panelists took the position that you should skip the long process of writing a business plan (at least as a fundraising tool). Several people in the audience asked for a copy of my presentation, you can find it in a previous blog post: Why You Shouldn’t Write a Business Plan.

As a side note, I will be giving a longer version of this presentation along with some new material at the Tech Coast Venture Network meeting this Thursday, May 22nd. Details of the event are at www.tcvn.com.

Some of you may be attending the upcoming Harvard Business School Entrepreneurs Conference on Monday May 19^th in Anaheim, CA. As these things go it is definitely one of the better early stage events. While it does attract its share of service providers, it also seems to attract a nice cross section of entrepreneurs. I think this will be the 6^th year that I have attended. This year one of my other Momentum partners, Matt Ridenour, and I will be speaking on the panels. I am particularly excited about the topic that my panel (first panel of the day at 9AM) addresses: Do You Have the Right Stuff? Characteristics of Successful Entrepreneurs. Continue Reading »

On Friday, I moderated the Idea Validation panel at UCLA’s Anderson School Entrepreneurs conference. Thanks again to the four panelists – Jimmy Henricks and Patrick Dillon, co-founders of www.collarfree.com; Dr. Vladimir Ban, CEO of PD-LD, Inc.; and David Silver, author of Smart Start-Ups and President of Santa Fe Capital Group – all of whom pulled from their own experiences give helpful advice on how to think about validating a startup business idea.

One discussion item really stuck with me after the panel – whether women entrepreneurs face a tougher road when trying to raise venture capital. A panelist made the observation that women have a tougher time raising capital than do men and in a slightly tongue-in-cheek way, advised women to partner with men if they were to hope to raise funds. Several members of the audience disagreed strongly including an ex-associate from a Sand Hill Road VC and a fund-to-fund expert who made the point that “VC’s want to make money and couldn’t care less what you look like if there is a good ROI to be made.” I tend to agree with the audience but would love to hear what others with personal experience have to say on the point. I know several woman entrepreneurs who have successfully navigated the VC process and don’t recall any hearing about any specific bias against them. But I may be blind to the issue.

The panelist also cited data that supported his point. I do know there are fewer female venture funded entrepreneurs than there are male, but I’ve never seen any data that supports the claim that it’s the VC process that creates the disparity. If anyone has data, I’d love to see it.

I’m moderating a panel at this Friday’s UCLA Anderson School Entrepreneur’s conference (www.uclamba.com/eac/2008) titled, Idea Validation: How do entrepreneurs validate an idea before investing time and capital. I thought I’d jot down a few preliminary thoughts on the subject here and then see which direction the panelists decide to take it.
Continue Reading »