The most successful Bitcoin / Blockchain company won’t look like any we have today
The Blockchain is such an innovative and fundamentally transformative technology, but Bitcoin and Blockchain apps have not yet scaled as much as I would have liked. This slow traction is likely due to two things. First, Bitcoin startups that focus on commerce/payment solutions in North America are competing with existing products with strong network effects. […]
The most important lesson learned in early-stage investing
Sean Silcoff had a thoughtful article in Saturday’s Globe & Mail on my path from entrepreneur to investor. It is a well-written piece with many great quotes and anecdotes and included the most important lesson about early-stage investing that I learned over the past 8 years: “If the fail rate of our companies is not high enough, it’s […]
Nine common things that start-up founders tend to underestimate or overestimate
When you’re in the midst of building a company, it’s hard to fully assess the significance of various activities and decisions- particularly for first-time entrepreneurs who don’t yet have the wisdom learned from prior mistakes. As an investor (who was also once a first-time entrepreneur), I have noticed several key areas where founders either overestimate […]
How to bootstrap your way into becoming a VC
One of the most common questions I get is “How can I become a Venture Capitalist?” I suppose this is because to many people, being a VC is a coveted position: you control large amounts of money and can pick and choose where that capital goes. [But let me tell you that the VC business […]
Should you outsource your financial operations?
This week everyone has been talking about Zirtual – the on-demand virtual assistant company that collapsed on Sunday night, suddenly laying off more than 400 employees (the company now is going to be acquired by Startups.co). Zirtual CEO Maren Kate Donovan blamed the collapse partly on an outsourced CFO firm and numbers that failed to […]