It may not be as moving and important as Dr. King’s, but I also have a dream… I’ve been investing other people’s money (alongside my own) in early-stage software companies for almost three years now — not very long in career terms, but long enough for it to have more or less become my professional continue…
I’ve been sitting on this one for a while (more on that below) but now that TechCrunch and Mashable have let the cat out of the bag I can finally share it here as well: Portland-based PHP Fog has just raised $1.8MM in a Series A led by Madrona Venture Group with support from First continue…
When it rains, it pours… TechCrunch just broke the news of our investment in Estately alongside 500 Startups, Founders Fund, Jeff Clavier and AngelList’s Naval Ravikant. We’ve been tracking CEO Galen Ward’s progress for a while and just love how he thinks about building an online business. He’s now raised slightly more than $1MM in continue…
There’s plenty of news out about the deal (see here, here, and here) but I wanted to pile on with a quick shout-out to the Nearlyweds! team on their acquisition of Chicago-based OneWed. The company has been executing like crazy on their core business since we first invested a year ago, striking deals with some of continue…
Almost 15 years ago I headed up the effort to build outdoor retailer Patagonia’s first online retail store. About 20 minutes ago the company released its first native iPhone app, offering a full branded retail experience on the world’s coolest smartphone. Best of all, the app was built by the rockstars at Sprella, a mobile continue…
I was out for the past two weeks so TechCrunch beat me to the punch, but just before I left town we closed an investment in SPARQCode (the company has been operating as MSKYNET but is rebranding to match their flagship product name). I think of SPARQCode as “Bit.ly for the real world” – a drop-dead easy way continue…
It’s only Tuesday but it’s already been a big week here at Founders Co-op. First, the news broke about our newest company, RevenueLoan, raising $6MM to create a new and potentially disruptive finance offering for high-tech companies. Then BigDoor Media, a Founders Co-op portfolio company, announced a $5MM venture round led by Brad Feld at continue…
TechCrunch just published a terrific introduction to our newest Founders Co-op company: RevenueLoan. Andy and I got excited about the idea of royalty based finance for early-stage companies more than a year ago and have experimented with the structure in our first fund. As we worked through the details on these deals we realized that there continue…
One of our Founders Co-op portfolio companies just shared some eye-opening numbers about close rates for new inbound sales leads based on the speed with which they were followed up. Unsurprisingly, most leads turned cold after just a few days, with just 9% of closed sales occurring beyond the 72-hour aging mark. What got their – continue…
Before all you fanboys out there get your backs up, let me start by saying that Apple gets full credit for blowing up the mobile software business and creating an entirely new market for software entrepreneurs. The iPhone / iPod Touch / iPad / iTunes juggernaut is one of the most awesome technology ecosystems ever continue…