The Equity Kicker - Latest Comments

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

Sharky Rechinas — Wed, 16 May 2012 13:02:03 -0000

Rovio with their Angry Birds considered Windows not worth the effort of rewritting their game. That's not a good sign.
Ovi Store is out, Blackberry out this January. Windows should have taken advantage and grow. They should have thrown lots more money to app developers much more sooner. They lack traction.

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

brisbourne — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:43:14 -0000

:-) I think their mobile market share is too small for anybody to bother about

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

brisbourne — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:42:10 -0000

Tks Sharky

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

Sharky Rechinas — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:28:23 -0000

Fragmentation is more difficult than at first glance. Different Screen ratios means more pain. UI at least until 4.0 is very basic compared with iPhone.. You need to do a lot of coding for stuff which on iPhone is ready to go. Iphone screens - how cool is that - Iphone 4gs having exactly double horizontal and vertical resolution.

Also iOs is incredibly smooth - Android 4.0 might be an improvement however on the UI and usability iOs is much better.

Java better as a language.. Widgets are here to stay.. Just glance at your phone screen and see all meetings at once - no icons to click.. push versus pull.

MacBook Air and HTC fan.
Sharky.

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

Garethdthomas — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:25:07 -0000

Do you have a map of windows fragmentation handy..?

Re: 50 Questions: How does a VC evaluate a company’s product?

Sharky Rechinas — Wed, 16 May 2012 11:19:06 -0000

6 months for Facebook from first 500k to next 12.5 million I think. They moved really fast. Difficult to play "catch me if you can".

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

brisbourne — Wed, 16 May 2012 10:17:56 -0000

Interesting. Thanks.

Re: 50 Questions: How does a VC evaluate a company’s product?

brisbourne — Wed, 16 May 2012 10:17:26 -0000

Hi Sharky – lots of questions! Keep reading (and commenting!) and I will try to answer them over time. Here’s one now – nobody cloned Facebook until it was too late because it was a novel model and they didn’t believe in it. This is true of many of the most successful startups. Google was the same.

Re: Android fragmentation – it’s looking pretty ugly

Chris Puttick — Wed, 16 May 2012 10:14:54 -0000

Although an experienced Android developer told me it was reasonably trivial to code around the OS differences. Screen resolution differences are of course not new to mobile, web developers have been working with that for two decades...

Re: 50 Questions: How does a VC evaluate a company’s product?

Sharky Rechinas — Wed, 16 May 2012 04:49:30 -0000

Maybe add some "unofficial experts" which are the VCs kids - especially in Social Media and Games :-). Finished reading thank you.

What are your thoughts about entrepreneurship life evolved in the last 100 years? Would Ford/Porsche/Ferrari/UHaul, Disney still have fun today starting a business?

How about future - you need less and less money for infrastructure, less and less money for marketing etc.
What do you think of crowdfunding?

How serious is the "competition VC Threat" - someone has first mover advantage, start having traction then a competitor (new or existing) recieves 10x more cash even if they have less traction. Is this a real word threat ?

Why do you think when Facebook received their first 500k investment we did not see a big VC throwing 20 million to a competitor "clone" or similar product - it would have been very easy to replicate and even get more initial users .

Can a clone win the war or it is very unlikelly to catch up on invovation (they lost in Star Wars) ?

Thank you,
Sharky.
We shall see.

Re: 50 Questions: If I raise venture capital what differences will it make to how I have to run my business?

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 20:18:07 -0000

Related question.. Simple one.
So the entrepreneur (generally) does entrepreneurship because he wants to make a difference - wants to change something. or at least that's what is in the pitch. Now.. after raising VC money the VC comes and explains that he wants to get really rich and have at least a 10x return - show me the money. Then if the entrepreneur has suddenly changed his mind and he wants to get stinky rich too everyone is aligned. However if the entrepreneur keeps to is original vision (for example saving lots of lives because of a new vaccine or whatever) and the VC/investors considers value creation only from a cash perspective you have an issue. you can save 1 million lives and make 10 million dollars or you can save 10 million lives and make 1 million dollars.

Excellent posts it is really great that you take your time to blog and answer questions. And yes I think a book would be usefull and would be a top 3 VC book. Easy to read, concise and straight to the point. Throw in some standard templates/contracts for inspiration/comparison it's even better.
I heard it is really easy (and recommended) to self publish using Amazon nowadays.

Re: 50 Questions: How can I tell when a VC won’t invest when they aren’t saying ‘no’?

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 19:58:24 -0000

Do usually best deals find their way to the best VC's ?

When things go bad with the VC is it mainly because of missing milestones or because there was not a good match with the VC in the first place ?

What makes a "good VC" anyway? Entrepreneurial exposure, keeping his head cool under pressure from his investors - hence a constructive aproach ?

Re: 50 Questions: What are the different types of instruments VCs use to invest?

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:11:47 -0000

☺ you can guess what I’m thinking now….

Re: How does a VC value a business?

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:07:10 -0000

Thanks Sharky – lots of comments!

Most VC partnerships are consensus driven, but typically some partners are more able to drive consensus than others ☺

Re: 50 Questions: How does a VC evaluate management teams?

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:05:06 -0000

Thanks Sharky – you hit on the main reason why having a technical founder is important.

Re: 50 Questions: What are the different types of instruments VCs use to invest?

L Cedric — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:58:03 -0000

except if you are in France...

Re: Why discounted cash flow analysis isn’t appropriate for startups

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:56:50 -0000

Real options can work, but allocating percentages between different scenarios is very arbitrary making the end result suspect.

Re: Raise enough money to get you 6-9 months past the next milestone

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:53:41 -0000

Some EU companies do get funding from US investors – e.g. Huddle, but you are right, not too many. That is largely because VCs know that they generally do better with companies that are closer to home where it is easier to build relationships with the management team and physical meetings can happen more frequently.

Re: 50 Questions: What are the different types of instruments VCs use to invest?

brisbourne — Tue, 15 May 2012 12:44:20 -0000

Tax isn’t a big driver for most VC investors.

Re: 50 Questions: What are the different types of instruments VCs use to invest?

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 05:25:30 -0000

From a tax perspective which is better for the VC investors? (Uk vs USA) ?

Re: 50 QUESTIONS: SHOULD I SEEK A STRATEGIC INVESTOR? (OR 5 REASONS YOU SHOULD AVOID A STRATEGIC INVESTOR)

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 05:12:19 -0000

Link broken?
Takes me to
50 questions: What does a VC care about?
which is an older post.

Re: Raise enough money to get you 6-9 months past the next milestone

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 04:41:45 -0000

Why can't someone from EU get US funding then?
Need to move to NY or San Francisco with your family and dog and the other employees families and dogs ?

Re: The things to say when pitching a VC

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 04:35:42 -0000

I think a good VC makes up his mind in the first 2 minutes. Same as hiring.

Re: 50 Questions: What is the best way to approach a VC?

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 03:53:58 -0000

Any VC who knows how to connect dots?
Or those would prefer entrepreneurship - or Angel Investing ?
A line is still good.
I heard of companies who needed a full blown color motion picture and still didn't get it.

As usual,
My two Sharky teeth.

Re: Why discounted cash flow analysis isn’t appropriate for startups

Sharky Rechinas — Tue, 15 May 2012 03:41:34 -0000

Real Options ?