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…
Earlier this year I was invited to run a training session for the Seattle-based coaches for SCORE, a Federally-funded program offering advice and training to entrepreneurs. Most of the companies in the program aren’t likely candidates for outside financing, but the Seattle program attracts a more tech-savvy cohort than most, and the coaching team wanted continue…
John Cook broke the news earlier today, but I wanted to add a quick congratulations to Bill Harding and his team at Bonanzle from all of us at Founder’s Co-op. We first talked to Bill about what he was up to in the fall of 2008, and have watched with admiration as he bootstrapped his continue…
Andy has a long post up today on how TechStars came to Seattle, so I’ll keep this short and sweet. TechStars is a fantastic program for early-stage software entrepreneurs who want to radically accelerate their progress and multiply their odds of success. The program has had a big impact on the early stage scene in continue…
I really enjoyed Mark Suster’s post earlier this week, What’s it Like Being a VC?, in which he details the pluses (many) and minuses (few) of “crossing over to the dark side” from entrepreneur to VC. Having made the same switch – albeit on a <cough> somewhat smaller scale* – his description of both the continue…
John Cook broke the news earlier this week about our investment in Untitled Startup. Andy led the deal for us and has been closely working with Damon and Aviel for several months now, but I wanted to take a minute to publicly welcome Untitled Startup to the Founder’s Co-op family and share some of the continue…
I’m excited to announce that Founder’s Co-op just completed an investment in Urban Airship, a new mobile infrastructure company that’s making it radically easier for smartphone developers to implement core features like push messaging and in-app transactions. The deal is is a first for us in several ways: it’s our first significant investment outside Seattle continue…