Disqus - Friends of CoryArmbrecht

Re: Two Word Titles

Healy Jones — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:39:00 -0000

Me ROAR!

Re: No Context

Healy Jones — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:42:24 -0000

Batteries dead?

Re: Two Word Titles

Healy Jones — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:42:48 -0000

fun man - although I completely missed the point and put up some titles more than two words.

Re: What are the insitutional innovations needed for government?

Healy Jones — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 09:40:40 -0000

I think your second question is the core issue to address. If I can rephrase it, the question is "how does the government think of entrepreneurs as customers."

From the entrepreneurs' point of view, how can the government help grow my business and how do I get answers from the government when I have questions? I love New York City's model with the 311 phone line for citizens, where they can call one number and speak with a competent operator who can direct them to the right city department to answer their question.

There are lots of questions when starting a business, such as getting the right permits and filing the right tax forms, etc. These things can seem scary to someone who has never done them before, but a friendly government can make these steps a lot easier.

If a government has special programs to help fund or encourage startups to happen in a particular area then these need to be easy to understand and well promoted. Government can also help by creating a sense of community; this can be as simple as allowing startup networking events to happen in large rooms in government buildings once a month. The Governor of Massachusetts recently spent time at a technology incubation center in Cambridge (his team even responded to tweets during the visit) - this was a simple move that provided a lot of positive attention on the importance of entrepreneurship in the area.

Anyway, thinking a bit like a startup founder can really help understand the needs of new companies and their teams. I actually think Singapore does this pretty well, much better than most areas. Hopefully this positive spirit will continue through the current downturn.

Re: http://www.kennykellogg.com/2009/03/new-york-times-on-san-francisco.html

Healy Jones — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 11:42:03 -0000

Scott, several good points, although living in SF I always thought it was the center of the Bay Area...
Re: Newspapers morphing into blogs. I see where you are coming from, but the vast majority of bloggers can't make it as full time reporters because they can't make enough money to feed their families. I don't think the revenue model works.

Re: San Francisco Chronicle Embraces Blogging

Healy Jones — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 11:56:35 -0000

Doh! This is just going to reinforce your theory of newspapers becoming blogs...

Re: San Francisco Chronicle Embraces Blogging

Healy Jones — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:32:48 -0000

Well, if this move by the Chronicle makes them cash flow positive then I guess you win!!

Re: San Francisco Chronicle Embraces Blogging

Healy Jones — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 15:48:44 -0000

I like my Sunday newspaper so I hope you are right... but as I've said before I just don't think the economics work. We'll see!

Re: VCs are turning the screws with financing terms

Healy Jones — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 20:22:06 -0000

The key take away from this is GET A GOOD LAWYER when you are raising venture capital. Not your buddy or your college roommate or your neighbor, but a really really experienced early-stage lawyer. Otherwise you might as well hand over all the stock certificates to the investor. Also, I've found that inexperienced attorneys usually end up costing MORE in fees than experienced ones because the VC’s attorney will have to argue over all sorts of stupid, non-standard things – and that chews up billable hours for both sides.

Re: Razeghi & the Power of Scribd

Healy Jones — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 13:26:07 -0000

that's pretty cool man!

Re: A Second Market Is Emerging

Healy Jones — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 12:34:36 -0000

Aren’t small tech IPOs suffering because supposedly there aren’t enough mutual fund investors who want to buy their shares? Who are going to be the buyers in these secondary marketplaces, and if they are so hot to trot to buy shares in small technology companies why haven’t they generated enough interest to help get these same tech companies public? If these buyers aren’t interested in large enough amounts of stock then I fail to see how a secondary market will become big enough to really matter. While it might be nice for a manager or seed investor to dump a few hundred thousand dollars worth of stock it doesn’t really meaningfully change the game for anyone.

Re: When a VC turns you down

Healy Jones — Mon, 04 May 2009 17:14:02 -0000

I hate turning people down. Ugh.

Re: Career Decisions Part 1: 3 Questions to Ask Yourself

Healy Jones — Mon, 04 May 2009 18:26:16 -0000

Very introspective today Rob!
I'd at the typical VC-like question to the job search: do I think this industry will be a good one in 10 years, or will I have learned skills that would also fit in a good industry.

Re: Rob Go's Tumblelog - The soundtrack from this clip was the theme song...

Healy Jones — Mon, 11 May 2009 13:40:56 -0000

I hope someone shouted "Spock, NO!" in the meeting too...

Re: Stop Pitching

Healy Jones — Fri, 15 May 2009 10:15:20 -0000

Agree that it is a major problem that many startups don't do enough talking to customers prior to approaching venture capitalists. A VC is going to make diligence calls into the market; you better have been there first and know what a representative sample of your potential customers are going to say. Also, you need that sort of potential customer/partner feedback to build an effective product. Building great stuff in the dark is very hard!
The one word of caution I would throw out there is that you should be careful when having conversations with VCs not to be too unstructured. The pitch slidedeck helps keep you on track, hit all the relevant points and seem organized. The vast majority of investor/company 1st meetings that I've been in where the entrepreneur decides to not use a slidedeck have been horrible because the entrepreneur was ALL over the place and came across as a flake.

Re: Three Reasons to be Optimistic About Entrepreneurship in New England

Healy Jones — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:18:43 -0000

I hope you're right Rob, otherwise I'm a sucker for leaving San Francisco! At least most of the states in NE aren't about to go bankrupt...

Re: What VCs Are Worrying About

Healy Jones — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:10:54 -0000

This is strategy is one that growth funds can occasionally play successfully, assuming the investment has enough cash flow and the investor holds the company for long enough.
However, a dividend based returns model does not work for most early stage investors. The time horizon + risk/return profile is too poor – still incurring all the risk and time of getting a business off the ground to a self-sustaining point plus the generally small amount of capital that can be pulled out of a business w/o damaging its ability to continue to be self-sustaining.

Re: Spotting a Liar: Cliff Notes from CIA Training

Healy Jones — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:50:00 -0000

Now I'm re-analyzing the conversation we had yesterday to make sure I didn't mistakenly look like a liar on anything!

Re: Board Effectiveness Tip #2: Board Package

Healy Jones — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:30:00 -0000

I love the post, and agree with everything except the point about preparing for the board meeting not creating "hardly any additional work." I think preparing for the board meeting takes a ton of time and it shows when a management team has not taken a board meeting seriously. It is true that most of this work, such as taking the time to think strategically about the company, the competition, analyzing the monthly dashboard, etc need to be done. But to prepare to present this data thoughtfully and concisely to a room full of highly intelligent and motivated investors/directors takes a serious time commitment.

Re: Startup Hotbed Inferiority Complex

Healy Jones — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 11:25:09 -0000

I recently blogged on an academic study that just came out claiming only 3 regions in the US matter for venture funding. I thought that the study was interesting, but didn’t completely agree with all the conclusions. However, I did take away that a non-SF/Boston/NYC entrepreneur going down the Series A VC route should talk to some VCs in the major markets since these investors likely have much greater deal/idea flow and may provide better market intelligence vs. smaller market VCs. I would love people’s comments. http://www.startable.com/20...

Re: Greenback Emissions

Healy Jones — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 11:48:11 -0000

I have been afraid of inflation for a while too, but the funny thing is that consumer prices actually fell last month (I read that somewhere but am too lazy to actually google a link for this comment.) When do you think it's going to hit, and why is it not happening at the moment? Personally, I think the impact of the price of oil is always under appreciated in our economy, and I think that the recent... um, good behavior, of oil's price has been helpful to keeping inflation down. Additionally, the fact that so many people are without jobs is also keeping prices down - and I'm fearful that there is no near term increase in employment coming.

Re: Greenback Emissions

Healy Jones — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:44:06 -0000

Evidence of the inflation that you've been looking for, and in a place that will impact us all:
http://articles.moneycentra...

Re: The #2 Reason Why VC’s Say “No”

Healy Jones — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 10:51:10 -0000

Rob, I agree with your points although I do believe that some good businesses have been run into the ground because the VCs and founders were chasing too big of a dream. Too many entrepreneurs get stars in their eyes and convince themselves they *must* raise capital from only the biggest and best VCs but they do not understand that they are forcing their company to have a very binary outcome - huge success or crater in the ground. There is a lot of prestige to raising tons of cash from high profile venture capitalists, but it sometimes makes more business sense to take capital from groups or individuals who are more closely aligned with the business' potential. Even if it doesn't give you the bragging rights that a KP partner on the board does.

Re: Top 5 things missing from most entrepreneur pitches

Healy Jones — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:32:39 -0000

A lot of east coast VCs need more than a "theory" for number 3. Customer acquisition is something that I saw missing all too often in many pitches. Sure, you can build a cool product but potential customers need to find out about it and be convinced to convert to actual customers.

Re: Slow Capital

Healy Jones — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:46:53 -0000

I love the concept, and I think that many other VCs strive to have a similar style to investing. However - I think the accountants of the world are against you. These silly annual valuations for venture funds defeat the purpose of slow investing. "What is it worth now? How about now? How about now?" This just doesn't add any value to the investors or the fund, and somewhat forces VCs to think like short-term investors. The truth is no one knows what an early stage startup is worth until someone decides to buy it or another qualified investor comes along and makes an investment. Slow capital introduces a lot of unknowns, since the result of an investment, or the entire fund's investment, won't be known for a long time. Real value in a venture investment is generated over several years, not at arbitrary fiscal year ends. Accountants need to chill out. (Sorry for the rant, I was once a junior VC at a fund and had to help with these valuation exercises. Painful and pointless.)