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EMC buys portfolio company Greenplum – more behind the story

Jul 7, 2010
in Entrepreneurship, Open Source

Congratulations to Greenplum and Scott Yara, Bill Cook, and Luke Lonergan in particular! It has been quite a roller coaster ride over the last 10 years and there were a number of times we stared at the abyss only to come back stronger.  This is a story of great people and incredible perseverance.  The great [...]

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4 Types of CEO Behavior when Dealing with Boards

Apr 30, 2010
in Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

As I have stressed over the years, it is imperative for board members and their management teams to have open dialogue.  If you are a CEO, I encourage you to share more rather than less information.  One of the best tools that a number of our CEOs use is a weekly email summarizing by department [...]

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Is it a feature or product?

Mar 30, 2010
in Entrepreneurship

During the last month I have spent more time looking at Angel investments as I believe it is a great time to start a business.  However, one key question I keep asking myself after meeting with entrepreneur after entrepreneur is whether or not what they have is just a feature of a larger product offering, [...]

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Market positioning for startups – focus, focus, focus

Jan 22, 2010
in Entrepreneurship

I was on a call yesterday with an inspired and talented management team.  As we walked through the deck, one point particularly struck me as I listened to their well-honed pitch.  The company was trying to boil the ocean and do everything for its customers.  While it was great that the team seemed to understand [...]

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When to ramp sales

Jan 14, 2010
in Entrepreneurship

While 2009 was a tough year, I must say that it was nice to see a number of our portfolio companies have blow out 4th quarters for bookings and growth.  Despite that, I am still taking a cautiously optimistic approach to 2010.  There are still conflicting reports on the growth of the economy and it [...]

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Startups and financial models for SAAS companies

Dec 10, 2009
in Entrepreneurship, On Demand

The other day I met with an entrepreneur I was advising as he prepared to raise his next round of funding.  In the meeting, he wanted me to narrow in and focus on his financial model.  Financial models for startups are important from a big picture perspective, but I never like to get mired in [...]

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Washers, dryers and secret sauce – why naming your technology is important

Sep 16, 2009
in Entrepreneurship

Our washer and dryer was on the fritz today, and as I started to do some research on large capacity stackable units I started to get overwhelmed with all of the new terminology and features.  After all, isn’t a washer a washer and a dryer a dryer.  How many different combinations and features could there [...]

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Lessons from Joost

Jul 1, 2009
in Entrepreneurship

I am not going to rehash Om Malik's excellent summary of "What went wrong with Joost" but I did want to dive deeper into a few points.  As I have always said, raising too much money can be a curse and not a blessing.  Here is an excerpt from my post in 2006Trust me, I [...]

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I want it NOW, I want it REAL TIME

Jun 16, 2009
in Entrepreneurship, On Demand

I was recently asked by a friend if he should get his son the new Nintendo DSi.  This would be an upgrade from the current DS and also add the photo capability.  As I thought about my own son's usage of the device, I said no.  Once my son got an IPod Touch for music [...]

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Occam's Razor and the current state of venture

Jun 2, 2009
in Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

I have made many posts in the past about focus and doing more with less, and as I continued on this path it reminded me of Occam's Razor, the idea that the simplest explanation to any problem is the best explanation.  Of course Occam's Razor can get more complex but over the years it has [...]

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