Lak Ananth

If you enjoyed our first blog on the metrics that matter for Verticalized SaaS then don't miss on the Part II of the series where my colleagues Devraj Hom Roy and Matt Schaar discuss the strategic and operational choices to improve these operational indicators. https://lnkd.in/g5QkCrcH

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This Sequoia Capital article is easily the best article I have read on product-market fit. (link below) Its very relevant to (disruptive) deep tech startups, a category I often feel is ignored in these articles. 3️⃣ There's three methods to get to PMF, and the largely depend on the nature of the product and the perception of the market: 🔥Hair on Fire: Customers are acutely aware of the problem and actively looking for solutions. Success hinges on delivering the best-in-class solution through differentiation. [Smartphone market, after the iPhone] 🪨Hard Fact: Customers acknowledge the problem as an inevitable fact of life and haven't actively sought solutions. The challenge lies in convincing them that there's a better way and overcoming inertia. [Uber/ AirBnB] 👀Future Vision: Customers are either unaware of the problem or believe a solution is unrealistic. The entrepreneur needs to create a new paradigm and win over customers to this vision. [Apple iPhone/ OpenAI] Each of these have different approaches, as the nature of problem to be solved is different. 🔥Hair on Fire: Act fast and prioritize a great product with a strong go-to-market strategy, usually with a unique insight, because if its a hair-on-fire problem, there are likely existing competitors. [Rippling, the HR software did it unified HR Database for businesses] 🪨Hard Fact: Educate the market about the problem and how your solution offers a better approach. [Square had to do this to overcome the cash-only mentality] 👀Future Vision: Be prepared for a long journey, focus on attracting top talent, and find strategic pit stops for commercial traction along the way. [Nvidia did this with gaming chipsets] So which type of problem is your startup solving?

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The secret—if it ever was one—is out on private equity fondness for vertical software. While PE-backed acquisitions were down 50%+ from a peak in 2021, vertical buyouts have continued to grow, and the fervor seems to be gaining steam. In today’s essay, we will pose an answer to one question: is PE a viable path to exit for a venture-backed startup?

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What do you do when a radical new technology puts your main product right in the crosshairs of disruption? Listen to David Okuniev — co-founder of Typeform | Ask awesomely — discuss the challenges of innovation within existing structures. David shared a game-changing insight: Radical innovation is really, really difficult to do inside your own product. He emphasized the need to break free from the constraints of familiarity and embrace change from outside the box. Henrik Werdelin and I have both seen our fair share of this in our respective careers. What struck us most was how David leveraged structure to overcome the innovator’s dilemma. By creating a culture of experimentation and providing space for bold ideas, he propelled Typeform beyond incremental improvements. What other hacks have you seen or employed to help your organization overcome the innovator’s dilemma? Share your stories below! 👇 And if you want to dive deeper into our conversation, click the link in the comments to catch the full podcast episode!

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Excited to share Marathon Venture Capital's investment in Eva Magnisali's DataForm Lab! Construction is large enough to be measured in GDP terms, yet remains a laggard in the adoption of automation. Our buildings are still constructed manually! Offsite manufacturing, i.e. assembling buildings in factories, provides the perfect canvas for putting automation to work – still, however, robots are nowhere to be seen... Eva studied architecture and robotics, and worked with design firms, developers and industry vendors, realising first hand what's keeping the industry stuck in the past. Then she got to work... Dataform Lab's software platform translates designs to production drawings and machine code, along with optimising processes and scheduling, essentially offering a modern operating system for construction factories. The company already works with some of the most prominent offsite manufacturers worldwide. Today it announces the completion of a GBP 1.1m Seed round led by Marathon. Eva and her team are on a mission to drive automation in offsite manufacturing. If you are excited about working at the intersection of technology and construction, get in touch! Building construction has been slow and expensive for far too long. Our next homes and schools may come from fully-automated factories, delivered at a fraction of today's time and cost. Keep an eye on Dataform Lab! https://lnkd.in/dVVfnudS

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💡Benchmarks in the investment industry serve as a standard for measuring the performance of securities, mutual funds, or investment managers. They provide a reference point for analyzing allocation, risk, and return of a portfolio, enabling investors to make informed decisions. Thanks Peter Walker for keeping us all informed!! Can’t wait for this!! Follow and get on the waitlist for this one! #benchmarks #fundraising #Capitalraise #founders #womenshealth #femhealth #medtech #wellness

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Key takeaways from VC Goat - Vinod Khosla podcast. - The firm cares more about working on interesting problems with large technical solutions rather than just maximizing IRR. The team is there because they believe in the mission. - Khosla assumes they've lost the money the day they invest, and then maximizes for the upside opportunity. He calls it "option value investing" rather than IRR investing. - Khosla has contrarian bets in AI (neuro-symbolic computing, probabilistic approaches), biotech, robotics, crypto, and more. - He believes aviation fuels, fusion energy, new transit systems, and other contrarian areas ignored by most investors will be huge opportunities. - Most large innovations come from outsiders, not industry insiders. Khosla looks for founders who can learn a business rapidly rather than have deep domain expertise. The Future Impact of AI - AI will be deflationary and increase productivity growth to 4% annually vs the typical 2% forecast. This will cause great abundance but also increasing income inequality. - Bipedal robots will take over most manufacturing and manual labor jobs within 20-25 years. This will free humans to be more creative and pursue their passions. - Education will shift from job training to creativity. Uniquely human elements like taste and curation will be most valued in an AI-enabled world. https://lnkd.in/gqBsmbks

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Early-Stage Startup Success Cacheflow’s CEO, Sarika Garg, shares key advice for early-stage founders on how to prepare for acquisition: Get a Part-Time CFO Early: Don’t rely solely on a bookkeeper; a part-time CFO can keep your financials clean without taking up your time. Invest in Organization from Day One: Use simple tools like Google folders, ClickUp for project management, Zendesk for support, and a well-structured CRM like HubSpot. Be Prepared for Opportunities: You never know when a potential buyer might reach out, so keep your books and reports ready-to-go. Being organized early saves time and headaches later—how prepared is your startup for that unexpected opportunity?

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🌟Innovative VC Firm Overcomes Exits Drought with Secondary Sales🌟 ⛵Navigating a challenging landscape where exits are scarce, Santa Barbara Venture Partners (SBVP) has pioneered a novel approach to sustain its growth and attract investors for its second fund: secondary sales. Instead of waiting for traditional exits like IPOs or acquisitions, SBVP opted to sell shares of its portfolio companies, demonstrating its ability to generate returns for investors and stand out in a competitive market. 🎤According to Dan Engel, founder and managing partner of SBVP, these secondary transactions have been a game-changer, sparking investor interest and bolstering the firm's credibility. By leveraging its recent successes, including a lucrative stake in sports-betting company DraftKings Inc.' acquisition of digital lottery app Jackpocket, SBVP seized the opportunity to return profits to its limited partners (LPs) and pave the way for its second fund. 💡Engel highlighted the challenges faced by young VC firms in raising subsequent funds, particularly amid a downturn in exit activity and heightened investor scrutiny. With traditional exit routes becoming increasingly elusive, the pressure is on for firms to demonstrate tangible returns and establish a track record of success. ✨"For us, secondary sales have been a game-changer. They've helped us return profits to our LPs and attract investors for our second fund," said Dan Engel. 💰For SBVP, the decision to pursue secondary sales was driven by the need to provide liquidity to LPs and validate its investment thesis in the eyes of prospective investors. By strategically offloading portions of its holdings in high-performing portfolio companies like Bark Technologies and Rad AI, SBVP not only generated substantial returns but also bolstered investor confidence in its ability to deliver results. ⚠Despite the complexities and potential stigma associated with early share sales, Engel emphasized the importance of prioritizing investor returns and seizing opportunities to unlock value for stakeholders. With a focus on profitability and transparency, SBVP remains committed to its mission of delivering sustainable growth and maximizing returns for its LPs. 🔍 "Returning profits to our investors is our top priority. By strategically selling shares, we're proving our commitment to delivering results and driving value for our stakeholders," added Engel. As SBVP continues to explore secondary transactions and expand its investor base, the firm stands as a testament to innovation and resilience in the face of market challenges. 🚀 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #fund and increase the international pool of your LP #investors?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE #VCInnovation #SecondarySalesSuccess #InvestorReturns #ValueCreation 

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During yesterday's LibreQoS APNIC webinar, I posed the question: won't more bandwidth solve these problems? As Herbert Wolverson said, yes, more bandwidth is good, but, still these problems remain if queueing is done incorrectly. Here's my take on why bandwidth alone is not as good as bandwidth + good queueing policies: Generally it was believed that 'data is important, so don't throw it away; hang on to it and send it later'. In practice, this has proven to be suboptimal as two issues may emerge: 1) latency increases for some flows due to heavy demand from other flows using the same bottleneck link, 2) even a single flow can have excessive latency due to aspects of typical TCP behavior (referred to bufferbloat) when the buffers grew large enough that the data being buffered was retransmitted anyway. It turns out that not all data is equally important. Active Queue Management is the art of deciding priorities, both in deciding what data to throw away, but also in allowing some later arriving data to be transmitted ahead of data in another connection that arrived before it. These problems have been studied, and good solutions have been found by using certain queueing policies in routers and switches, referred to as “fq_codel’ and “cake”. These track the different flows not by classifying the data, but by watching the behavior. Flows that send relatively little data (DNS lookups), or at a measured pace (video chat) have priority over flows that send a lot of data as quickly as possible (App and System updates, Video and ISO downloads).

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The state of venture capital is wild right now. We are witnessing a surge of innovation across the spectrum: - Funds merging - VC doing PE - PE doing VC - Secondary funds - Buyout funds - Spin-out funds - Debt funds - Continuation funds - Infrastructure funds - GP turnover - Hard Tech surging - Family Office uptick

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Since early 2021, VC quarterly exit values have plummeted to $50B or below, a stark contrast to the six consecutive quarters of $100B+ exits before then. With IPOs dwindling and M&A activity slow, the future of venture industry exits appears uncertain. Will we see a surge in private venture-backed company acquisitions? This could be a crucial and innovative strategy to boost VC exits. Increased private acquisitions might offer a much-needed lifeline, providing a creative solution to the current exit drought in the venture capital market. #venturecapital #inspireglobalventures

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The hidden years of inception stage. Founders & LP’s rarely understand that the journey of building a great company can involve up to three years of work before an early stage VC will get involved. h/t Peter Walker for the years from incorporation data from Carta https://lnkd.in/e5fFkvDt #vc #founders #investing Antler

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Deep tech startups are grappling with challenges like prolonged development timelines and high capital demands, pushing them to forge strategic international partnerships. Today, this means startups must professionalize internal processes and build robust networks early to navigate these complexities. Mastering these strategies will be crucial for scaling globally and ensuring long-term success in the competitive tech landscape. #BusinessGrowth

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Really interesting question. Can it be done? Does the outdoor industry need it? Clearly some of the largest retailers have struggled with maintaining the correct amount of the right inventory and teams that are helpful and knowledgeable. But building a logistical beast such as Amazon is complex. Cheryl Stark any perspective?

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Looking forward to diving into the state of the late-stage venture market at TechCrunch Disrupt next week with Karthik Subramanian. With late-stage companies facing tougher paths to exit, we’ll be debating whether the market is actually rebounding, sharing our thoughts on the outlook for future IPOs, and discussing how founders can navigate these shifting dynamics. Hope to see you there! #TCDisrupt #VC

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At some point, we all hope our startup goes from launch phase to momentum phase. But, as I learned, that phase requires a new set of skills 👇 In 2007, my co-founder and I launched our first startup. The first two (2) years were tough, but looking back it was really fun "building" something new. The leadership challenges started when the business went through a rapid growth phase in 2010, 2011, and 2012.  We went from 1 employee to 70+ employees... We went from $2 million in revenue to $12.5 million in revenue... We were still doing cash flow on an excel spreadsheet...  We didn't have the systems, playbooks, or processes in place to scale the business to $25M, $50M, or $100M.  We had a great Purpose. We had amazing People. We had some rockstar Partners. We had Profit. But, we were missing a "P". How's your 5P equation looking? Purpose + People + Partnerships + Playbooks = Profits

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Great analysis by the AGC team on SaaS public company comps. It's worth a look as we recalibrate mid-way through earnings season. The analysis aligns with the broader Nasdaq equity performance, where the Mag 7 (or fab 4 now :-)) have shown more resilience than the rest of the market. #AGC #SaaS #EarningsSeason #Nasdaq #EquityPerformance

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