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Recent Posts
Entrepreneurship
One of the best parts about having a strong portfolio filled with smart people is the wise advice that founders share with each other. In this case, one of V1’s portfolio companies has been looking to hire a VP of Sales and I asked Jon Zimmerman (@jpzimmerman), CEO of Front Desk, to share his experiences […]
Entrepreneurship
When entrepreneurs are thinking about an exit, they typically wonder if they should hire an investment bank to help with the process. Will a bank bring in new buyers and better terms, or will you just be sinking money into the bank’s coffers? Since I’m often asked about the process, I thought I’d break down my […]
Data / AI / ML
In November, I introduced some basic statistics to help startups make sense of their data. Then last month, I described an engagement pyramid, which organizes a user’s behavior in a hierarchy. It helps you identify the highest level of user engagement so that you can allocate resources to achieve that outcome. For this blog post, […]
Version One
Just like last year, 2014 has been busy and eventful here at Version One. We added 8 new companies to our portfolio: Clio, a cloud-based practice management platform for the legal industry; Dwellable, a mobile-first vacation rentals marketplace; HandUp, a donation platform that lets you give directly to a person in-need; Mattermark, an analytics platform […]
Data / AI / ML, Entrepreneurship, Marketplaces / Social / Collaboration / Network Effects
One of the first blog posts that Boris shared with me when I was starting out is “Don’t forget your logged out users” by Fred Wilson. Fred notes that with many social platforms, a huge number of their regular users don’t actually login because they are able to derive value from their services on a “logged […]
Version One
The end of every year brings a proliferation of prediction lists. As we end an incredibly active 2014 in the tech/investment world, I am adding my own thoughts on what might be coming in 2015. A killer app for Bitcoin emerges We’ve seen Bitcoin adoption by major retailers like Overstock.com and Dell, but there’s still […]
Data / AI / ML
Now more than ever, companies are collecting large amounts of data at a high frequency. This is thanks to cheap storage and a multitude of tools available to automate the process (i.e. Google Analytics, Flurry, Mixpanel, etc.). While collecting data is one thing, finding meaning or actionable insights is another task altogether. Over the past […]
Entrepreneurship
You may have noticed that we recently revamped our website in conjunction with the Fund II launch. As we updated the content, we quickly discovered that many of the company descriptions on our Portfolio page were out of date. After all, startups iterate quickly, evolve, and even pivot. Without actively managing their digital presence, messaging […]
Version One
In the course of your career or start-up, nothing is more powerful than catching a big wave at the right time. I was reminded of this as we celebrated the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9th. I was 16 and living in (West) Germany when the wall was torn […]
Entrepreneurship
The relationship between entrepreneurs and investors is never an easy one – like in a marriage, you have to work every day on making it better and more productive for both sides. So it put a real smile on my face when I got this email from an entrepreneur this morning whose company we just […]
Version One
On behalf of our team at Version One, I am incredibly excited to announce that we have just closed our second fund. Version One Fund II is $35M, slightly larger than our initial fund. In many ways, Version One Fund II is identical to Fund I. It’s the same investing team (myself in Vancouver and […]
Entrepreneurship
Over the years as an investor, I have come to realize just how much a start-ups’s DNA is driven by the original founders. The personalities, strengths, and focus of those first founders shape a business long after the individuals have moved on. In the early days, it is incredibly hard for a founding team to […]
Entrepreneurship
Rick Perreault of my portfolio company Unbounce recently called my attention to an interesting comparison between two SaaS models: Hubspot & Moz – A Tale of Two (Very Different) SaaS Business Models. At first glance, Hubspot and Moz are very similar companies: both are popular marketing platforms, use web-based subscription models, and primarily target the SMB […]
Entrepreneurship
Finding the right engineer, UX designer or marketer can make all the difference for your start-up. After all, the caliber of talent makes or breaks a company, no matter its size. But recruiting is hard, particularly in these bubbly times when top tech talent can pretty much go wherever they choose. This hiring challenge has […]
Entrepreneurship
There are many great articles that outline what an entrepreneur should cover during a pitch, but very few discuss how to deliver that message in a compelling manner. That’s why I wrote, “A good story is the key to any pitch”, earlier this year. I thought I’d revisit this topic with my visual guide to […]
Portfolio
Shipping is a huge pain point for smaller e-commerce businesses of any size. They don’t process enough volume to grant them bulk discounts from the major providers. It’s costly and resource-intensive to work with shipping carriers, and the barrier to entry is extremely high. Prices aren’t transparent and negotiating as a small business is next […]
Entrepreneurship
How does your startup think about innovation? Is it a new feature that gets incorporated into the next release? Is it a new market breakthrough that’s years away? I recently held a mini Tweetstorm where I opened the conversation to innovation across three horizons: short-term, mid-term, and long-term. Here’s more dissection on the topic beyond […]
Entrepreneurship
With the influx of seed money, much has been written about the fact that start-ups that are taking far more funding than they need. For example, check out Fred Wilson’s post where he compares funding a start-up to walking up a flight of stairs. When building a company, it’s smarter to hit each step on […]
Version One
Today marks my first full year in VC at Version One. Over this time, I have grown so much and am happy to report that being an investor is still very much aligned with my core values. As I reflect on the past year, I want to share what I have discovered about these 3 core […]
Entrepreneurship
A community can make or break a marketplace. I owe much of the success of my former company, AbeBooks, to the passionate community of book lovers that came to our site. Considering more than 1/3 of Version One’s portfolio are marketplaces, I appreciate just how much a strong community can be one of the most […]