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Venture Capital News
Saastr
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The Best Stuff to Sponsor ASAP, Right Now, at 2025 SaaStr Annual. It’s May 13-15 2025!!
- #1. Braindate Sponsorship: Sponsor 3 days of 1000+ small sessions, 1:1s, and mentorship sessions.
- #2. The Founders' Lounge: Sponsor the massive sponsor lounge and get your own tabletop to meet CEOs and founders.
- #3. CRO, CMO, CFO, and CCO Summits Platinum Sponsor: Get in front of top CROs, CMOs, or CCOs by being the exclusive sponsor.
- #4. VC Lounge Sponsorship: Exclusive sponsorship to access 800 top VCs in SaaS, Cloud, and AI.
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Medium
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A VC Asked to See My Financial Projections: Here’s What Happened
- Financial projections are a tough area for founders to handle, especially since projections could be more fictional than factual.
- When an entrepreneur finally scores a meeting with a big-time VC, and they’re asked to present the company’s financial projections, it is both an exhilarating and anxiety-inducing experience.
- While presenting their product, the VC asked to take a look at their financial projections, an area of particular discomfort for the entrepreneur. But instead of panicking and bullshitting her way through the meeting, she found the courage to admit that their projections were based on the best facts they had at the time, but that they would remain in a state of flux so long as new information was coming in.
- VCs look for founders who know how to handle questions with aplomb, particularly when it comes to financial forecasts. An honest and open approach can go a long way.
- It's important to have a strong understanding of your business so that you can explain how you're thinking about growth, even if you don’t have everything figured out. Be transparent about your assumptions and acknowledge what you don't know.
- VCs don't want to hear a perfectly rehearsed pitch; they want to have a conversation. So, entrepreneurs should be ready to pause, take a breath, and be real.
- The writer realized that financial projections are just one piece of the puzzle and that investors are looking for something less tangible such as how a founder handles pressure, responds to tough questions, and confronts unknown challenges.
- VCs want to know whether entrepreneurs are willing to figure things out or if they'll crumble under pressure.
- Having a solid understanding of the business and being truthful about what you know and what you don't know can go a long way in building investors' trust.
- Entrepreneurs shouldn't panic when presenting their financials. Instead, they should focus on conveying a holistic understanding of their business's growth patterns, transparent assumptions, and how they plan to adapt based on new facts.
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Medium
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10 Key Gaming Metrics to Monitor
- Retention, DAU (Daily Active Users), ARPU (average revenue per user), ARPPU (average revenue per paying user), Conversion rate, Churn rate, Depositors, Deposits, Dormants, and Lifetime Value are the 10 key gaming metrics that evaluate a game's overall health and its ability to keep users coming back daily.
- Retention is crucial to examine retention trends over time to identify when the game loses users. The first 24 hours of gameplay is the most significant drop in retention.
- DAU (Daily Active Users) provides insight into the game’s overall health and its ability to keep users coming back daily. Monitoring DAU helps to assess the effectiveness of in-game events, promotions, or new features.
- ARPU (average revenue per user) is often the first metric looked at for monetization. A low ARPU doesn’t always indicate a problem with the monetization strategy, as a low ARPU could simply mean there are many users playing the game.
- ARPPU (average revenue per paying user) is a crucial metric because it gives insight into repeat payers and their spending behavior. In gaming, most revenue comes from “whales” — the small percentage of players who spend significant amounts.
- Conversion rate — the percentage of users who completed a desired action over a certain period of time out of the total number of users. In gaming, this typically refers to the percentage of users who have made a purchase per day.
- Churn rate measures how many users have stopped playing the game. Unlike most other metrics, we want to see this one decrease.
- Lifetime Value (LTV) is difficult to estimate in gaming, making it a less useful metric. However, properly segmenting users based on behavior, spending habits, or characteristics like geography and age allows developers to tailor offers, in-game experiences, and promotions to specific user types.
- User segmentation strategies vary significantly from game to game and across genres. However, understanding these key metrics gives a strong foundation for making informed decisions, whether you’re developing a game or looking to invest in the industry.
- Each game is different, and success depends on various factors, including user base, genre, monetization strategy, segmentation mechanism, and more. Ultimately, the ability to track and adapt based on these insights is what sets successful games apart in an incredibly competitive landscape.
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Saastr
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How to Implement a Customer-First Strategy and Structure with Dashlane’s CPO
- Building a customer-centric strategy and structure for your business is about accommodating people, processes, and tools.
- A big challenge for companies is corraling feedback and turning it into something actionable, instead of just an email black hole.
- Another challenge is building the right thing: many companies lack research and validation that they are building the right things.
- To build a customer-first structure and strategy, you have to bring on insatiably curious people who are empathetic and understand what motivates and drives customers.
- A customer-centric structure starts with a triad at the core made up of the product manager, designer, and engineering manager or tech lead.
- The next outer ring contains a few roles, and their job is to provide input into the prioritization process. Research and data analytics live here, along with the development team.
- For companies in the early stages, building is based on projects and checking boxes, but they don’t fully understand it. You want to build processes that incentivize people to think in a broader context and solve bigger market problems.
- Tools can help manage feedback and reduce the burden on teams, but at some point, too much feedback can still be overwhelming.
- Investing in a prioritization framework and improving processes to optimize how people work will help you build the right thing and be more customer-centric.
- Roadmaps are always wrong, so it's important to have milestones and check-ins to ensure you're on track to hitting your broader goals.
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Medium
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Venture Capital #2: How Investment Terms Influence Risk and Returns
- Venture capital is considered the riskiest investment compared to other alternative assets.
- The investment terms of a venture capital fund, such as fund and ticket size, leading or following, investment thesis, investment stage, and investment period, impact its risk profile and return potential.
- Fund and ticket size determine the balance between risk, return, and resource allocation in portfolio management.
- Investment stage and sector choice significantly influence the overall risk profile and return potential of a venture capital fund.
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Medium
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Venture Debt: A Lucrative Path for Institutional Investors
- Venture debt offers a way to invest in innovation, providing lower risk and attractive returns while complementing traditional venture equity.
- Venture debt consists of senior secured loans combined with equity warrants, made to venture-backed startups that have reached a growth or expansion stage.
- These loans are typically made to Series B through Series E companies that are producing between $10 million and $150 million per year in revenue and can service debt payments.
- Venture debt loans are typically short maturity, secured by all assets of the borrower, have a floating rate coupon and produce high income with historically yielding mid-teens returns.
- The Cliffwater Direct Lending Index demonstrates that the yield on 641 venture loans worth $7.4 billion held by BDCs yields 14.48 percent.
- Compounded at 15 percent per year, an investment in venture debt over 10 years produces a 4x multiple on invested capital. When the equity kickers are included, compounded returns can reach 20 percent per year, producing a 6.2x MOIC in 10 years.
- Annual venture lending in the US has increased 8x since 2010, from a little under $4 billion then to over $32 billion in each of the past two years, according to the PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor, Q2 2023.
- Institutional powerhouses like BlackRock and Blackstone are leading the charge into venture debt, with BlackRock’s acquisition of Kreos Capital highlighting the strategy’s attractiveness for income generation, low volatility, and portfolio diversification.
- Private market giants such as KKR and Bain Capital are considering expanding their venture debt programs, possibly through acquisition.
- Venture debt is becoming an increasingly popular investment option, offering strategic avenues for returns and diversification, and not just for minor institutional investors.
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Medium
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Addressing the Geriatrician Shortage: How MemoryCareAI Empowers Care Teams with AI-Driven Solutions
- MemoryCareAI is an AI-driven platform that helps address the geriatrician shortage.
- It empowers care teams by offering advanced tools for diagnosis, monitoring, and treatment.
- The platform leverages AI to analyze patient data and provide actionable insights.
- MemoryCareAI amplifies the capacity of healthcare professionals to deliver personalized care.
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Saastr
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What’s a Mature SaaS Company at $240m ARR Really Worth? Maybe 3.6x ARR
- Sharefile, a mature SaaS company, has been acquired for $875 million with an ARR of $240 million, resulting in a valuation multiple of 3.6x ARR.
- The company was bootstrapped for 6 years before being acquired by Citrix in 2011, likely for around $100-150 million.
- The low valuation multiple can be attributed to the company's slow growth and the acquirer's negative growth rate of -2.3%.
- While the deal makes sense for the acquirer, it highlights the importance of focusing on growth rather than efficiency in order to achieve higher valuations.
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20VC
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Mike Hudack, CEO @SlingMoney : How Facebook, Monzo and Deliveroo Build Great Products
- Mike Hudack is the CEO of SlingMoney and has held product leadership roles at Monzo, Deliveroo, and Facebook.
- In the podcast episode, he discusses the art and science of product development, the lessons learned from leading ads at Facebook, his experiences at Deliveroo, and building the biggest bank in Britain with Monzo.
- Key topics include the importance of simplicity in product, balancing intuition and data in decision-making, and the impact of competition in the market.
- Mike also shares his insights on the biggest mistakes made by Facebook, Deliveroo, and Monzo in their product journeys.
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Medium
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5 Mistakes To Avoid When Creating A VC Pitch Deck
- A good VC pitch deck is very pivotal on the road to fundraising for any startup.
- The one biggest mistake that start-ups make is a lack of clarity around their Unique Value Proposition (UVP).
- Trying to include too much data or text in one slide is another mistake startups make.
- Investors would like to be convinced that you know your market inside and out.
- Ignoring the competition or minimizing its presence is a fatal mistake in VC pitch deck creation.
- Without a story across the pitch deck, this may spell disaster when attempting to impress such a presentation on the venture capitalist.
- Defining a problem your product or service solves, and showing how your solution addresses this better than existing alternatives, are key.
- Showcasing existing traction provides proof of concept and reassures investors that your startup is gaining momentum.
- Introducing the background, skills, and experience of your team members is an important factor.
- By focusing on problem definition, solution presentation, business model outline, traction, and highlighting your team, you can create a pitch deck that resonates with venture capitalists.
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VC Cafe
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Weekly FIRGUN Newsletter – September 13 2024
- Israeli culture has a modern term, "Firgun," which describes genuine, unselfish delight in the accomplishments of others, which is the opposite of schadenfreude. The Israeli startup ecosystem raised billions of dollars in funding so far this year and demonstrated its strength, even during wartime. VC investments in AI startup have reached $64.1 billion this year, which is around 30% of total VC dollars invested. OpenAI recently released 01, a new series of AI models capable of reasoning with impressive results. Apple launched its new iPhone 16, which has new AI features. Hugging Face launched its newest high-quality annotated video dataset with a creative commons license, FineVideo. Adobe announces that they are launching an AI-powered tool that would allow users to create and edit videos seamlessly using AI prompts.
- The world of tech AI was filled with developments this week as companies continue to innovate in this space.
- Israeli startups raised $7.8 billion in funding so far in 2024, with mergers and acquisitions reaching $9.6 billion this year.
- Israeli exits so far in 2024 reached $9.6 billion despite ongoing war conditions.
- Quantum Source has raised $50 million to advance photonic quantum computers, while Zafran Security has secured a $40M series B for its risk and mitigation platform.
- Darris, an Israeli med-tech start-up, raised $15M for its AI-powered compliance and risk management platform.
- Odigos raised $13M in seed extension to automate distributed data tracing to detect performance issues more easily.
- Discure Technologies raised $11M in series A funding for degenerative disc disease treatment.
- Element Security secured a $5M seed round to help organisations manage their external attack surface.
- Edge Medical Ventures has launched a $70M med-tech fund and venture studio focused on early stage Israeli startups.
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Guardian
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Vodafone-Three merger: tens of millions could face higher bills, says UK watchdog
- The proposed merger between Vodafone and Three in the UK could lead to higher mobile bills for customers.
- The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has expressed concerns that the merger would reduce competition and negatively impact those who can least afford mobile services.
- Vodafone and Three disagree with the CMA's findings and argue that the merger would improve the country's mobile market and bring investment.
- The final decision on the merger is expected by 7 December.
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Medium
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Navigating the African Investment Landscape: Tips for New Investors:
- Africa's fast-growing economy presents opportunities for investors.
- Certain countries are attractive investment destinations.
- Investors should be aware of the challenges in the African investment landscape.
- Strategies for successful navigation include thorough research and building local partnerships.
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Intelalley
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ParaFi Tokenizes VC Fund on Securitize with Avalanche
- ParaFi Capital has partnered with Securitize to tokenize an interest in one of its venture funds on the Avalanche blockchain.
- Through this tokenized fund, new investors can access ParaFi's venture strategy and join its existing institutional investor base.
- Securitize, known for tokenizing assets, will provide the foundational infrastructure for the tokenized fund.
- The collaboration highlights the benefits of using blockchain technology for streamlined settlement processes, reduced costs, and increased liquidity in the private market.
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Medium
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225
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SMBC invests in Japan Hydrogen Fund, SMDAM to be co-manager
- SMBC Group has made an LP investment in the Japan Hydrogen Fund through the Social Value Creation Investment Fund.
- The Fund will be managed by SMDAM, Advantage Partners, and The Japan Hydrogen Association.
- SMDAM will focus on sustainable investment evaluation, while AP group will provide advisory services and operational support.
- SMBC Group's investment aims to support hydrogen-related projects and contribute to the development of a new energy market and decarbonization.
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