Paul Scott shares lesson learned writing SBIR grants. His presentation covers the Grant Writing Application Process: – Letter of intent – Concept paper – Full proposal About the Speaker: Paul Scott has been a technical writer for over 20 years. He uses his training and experience as a scientist to help clients convey highly …
Lean Culture: Seed Funding Without Loans – An Introduction to SBIR Grants Read More »
This post explores meaning of financial capital for bootstrappers. It addresses the real costs of market exploration and product validation and verification.
A summary of my talk at Women in Consulting lunch meeting today on “Startups: What’s Hot / What’s Not (2018).” Includes slides and links to sources.
If you have bootstrapped your startup to the point where you have a business that both merits and would benefit from outside investment then you may need to consider seeking investment. Here are some common formats we have seen for an investor presentation.
If you want to be a succeed as a bootstrapper, start with what you’ve got: you have an insight into an opportunity, a marketing edge, a particular problem where you’re going to bring distinctive value.
Dan Scheinman (@dscheinm) graduated from Duke Law School in 1988 and went to work as an associate at DLA Piper before joining the Cisco legal department. Once inside he worked his way up to General Counsel, then ran corporate development which included managing minority investments and acquisitions, and finally was general manager for Cisco’s Media Solutions …
Dan Scheinman’s Blue Ocean Venture Strategy: Target Entrepreneurs Over 35 Read More »
Here are some back of the envelope models to estimate prospect counts and market sizes.
Tim Draper, founder of the VC firm Draper Fisher Jurvetson, is taking a holistic approach to entrepreneurial education with his “Draper University for Heroes” in San Mateo. Here is a promo video from the school’s website. [vimeo clip_id=”45872530″ width=”400″ height=”300″ frameborder=”0″] In a planning document submitted to the City of San Mateo on March 16, …
Draper University of Heroes Takes Holistic Approach to Teaching Entrepreneurship Read More »
Ryan Waggoner wonders if the popularized approach to startups is wrong. Instead of putting health and relationships at risk, try patience and humility.
MyPermissions: Checks for third party application access to your Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo, LinkedIn, Dropbox, Instagram, and Flickr accounts. SocialMention: Allows you to do keyword and phrase search across more than one hundred social media sites including Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed, YouTube, Digg, Google, etc… HackerFollow: follow comments and posts by your favorite Hacker News contributors
Isaac Garcia, co-founder and CEO of Central Desktop, will share “Lessons Learned Bootstrapping Central Desktop” at the Milpitas Bootstrappers Breakfast® on February 11, 2011 at 7:30am. Central Desktop delivers a SaaS collaboration platform that helps businesses manage projects and documents in the cloud with colleagues, customers and partners. Isaac Garcia (@isaacgarcia) oversees business strategy and …
Isaac Garcia on “Bootstrapping Central Desktop” at Feb-11 BB in Milpitas Read More »
“Some buildings need air conditioning because they have air conditioning. Because they were designed to be air conditioned, they have no natural ventilation and would be miserable to inhabit without air conditioning.” John Cook in “Maybe You Only Need It Because You Have It“ I wonder if the same thing happens to some fraction of …
Steve Blank gave a thought provoking talk at the Startup Lessons Learned Conference on “Customer Development 2.0: Why Accountants Don’t Run Startups” (slides here and related blog post “Why Accountants Don’t Run Startups” which is part of a category of blog posts on “Durant vs. Sloan“). He also referenced Robert Shedd‘s list of startup accelerators …
Many entrepreneurs planning their first software startup get stuck on funding and ownership issues. Here are some simple rules of thumb that may help you reframe an issue: Revenue, especially break even revenue, is never dilutive of your ownership. The right co-founders, while dilutive, substantially increase your chances of success: they give you a smaller …
Jason Calacanis has gone a little bit off the dial on “why startups shouldn’t have to pay to pitch angel investors” but he is nonetheless correct that you should not pay large fees to potential investors for consideration or the right to present. Our focus is helping bootstrapping technology startups but we do get startups …
I was still mulling over the implications of yesterday’s briefing by Nate Burgess when I came across “Prediction: Angel investing in 2009 will be up?” by Alexander Muse on the Texas Startup blog. Briefly his thesis is: The angel investment market hovers around $12 billion each year. I predict that the turmoil on Wall Street …
Update Tue-Sep-23: Sold Out, No Walk-ins. We will offer it again: you can sign-up to be notified of upcoming workshops We just finished our last rehearsal for next Wednesday’s (Sep-24) “Financial Modeling for Startups” workshop we are doing jointly with Nathan Beckord of Venture Archetypes. I think it will be a good lunch and learn …
Financial Modeling for Startups Workshop–Early Bird Ends Tomorrow Read More »
SOLD OUT — NO WALK-IN ACCEPTED Getting a handle on your financial roadmap is a key element of any startup’s success. A solid financial model will help you: i) gain insight into your business; ii) set a common direction for management; and iii) secure angel or venture capital investment. Wed Sept. 24 11:30-1:30pm Plug & …
Financial Modeling for Startups on September 24, 2008 Read More »
Three key points about seeking investment.
Are you trying to raise venture capital? If so, the Plug and Play Tech Center Expo is the place to be. The full day agenda included presentations from thirty-one companies to a panelist of investors from Norwest Venture Partners, Menlo Ventures, Foundation Capital, Amidzad Ventures, and Mohr Davidow Ventures. The Expo consisted of two parts; …
