'venture capital' Category
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Musings on VC internships in France
December 2, 2014Last Friday at the office we held the pôt de départ (farewell party) of one of our interns. Although this young man was not working directly with me, I know that my colleague greatly appreciated this intern’s contribution for six months. This was my colleague’s first experience of recruiting a VC intern in France, and he’s […]
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The billion dollar startup club
November 25, 2014The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones VentureSource recently started publishing a list of companies that are valued at $1 billion or more by venture-capital firms. Here it is in graphical format (credit to J.Peng). The qualification criteria for the club are: privately held companies that have at least VC firm in the capital and […]
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Is investing in gaming like betting on Hollywood?
November 18, 2014On a recent trip to Tokyo, I met with a handful of business partners and investors in the mobile gaming sector, one of my investment themes over the past few years centering on European endeavors in this space. A familiar debate comes up every time: Is mobile gaming as a sector still investable? Has mobile […]
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Why Asian startups should prioritize Europe
November 17, 2014In my travels for work I’ve had the honor to meet hundreds of inspiring entrepreneurs from all over the world. Setting aside China, and in a gross over-simplification, domestic markets in East Asia could be characterized as either i) mature or ii) emerging (Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, in the former; the rest of Southeast […]
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Here’s hoping the ISR trend does not become Corporate Greenwashing 2.0
November 4, 2014Socially responsible investment practices, or ISR in French (investissement socialement responsable), has been catching on among fund management companies in France lately. The notion of SRI in modern portfolio management began gaining momentum in the late 1990s, mainly in the US and UK. The first sell-side brokerage in the world to offer SRI research was […]
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What I think about when I think about mobile gaming
October 21, 2014When people inquire about my investment strategy, I explain that I try to structure my investment thinking around themes or theses. Readers of this blog will recognize that one of my favorite investment themes over the past few years has centered on the value chain of mobile gaming. Often, I visualize aspects of a theme […]
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Musings on shaving, child actors, and business models
September 30, 2014Anyone exposed to American television in the early 80s might remember the hit series Different Strokes. The sitcom portrayed a story of two African American boys from Harlem (played by Gary Coleman and Todd Bridges) who were taken in by a rich white Park Avenue businessman and widower named Phillip Drummond (Conrad Bain) and his […]
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Should I hire a fundraising agent for my startup?
September 23, 2014Within the span of a week this August came two excellent opinion pieces from VCs about whether entrepreneurs should mandate an intermediary to help them raise their early stage financing. The first is from Hunter Walk of Homebrew (Don’t Send a Banker to Do a Founder’s Job). Then John Henderson of White Star Capital wrote […]
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Alibaba valuation: the comparables method
September 17, 2014The valuation analysis I released on the Facebook IPO two years ago proved popular, so I figure why not do it again for the hottest tech IPO planned this month: Alibaba. Please refer to my earlier piece on this topic for an explanation of the various valuation methodologies. Also, please note that my objective in […]
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Reliability is a USP in France
September 16, 2014This past weekend, Rude Baguette held its Startup Job Fair, third in the series. By all accounts, the fair proved a rousing success, and I commend the Rude Baguette organizers for their heroics. From what I understand of this event, it in many ways encapsulated the current state of affairs of the French tech ecosystem, […]
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Employee equity grants in French startups (aka, did the tax authority poach my spreadsheet?)
September 9, 2014One major inconvenience in VC investing in French startups which consistently raises its ugly head is the complexity to incentivize key personnel with equity. I’m not referring to the employees who eschew the upside potential afforded by equity in favor of fixed pay with high job security. While certainly understandable at certain positions in a […]
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Five French startups best positioned for Asia
September 2, 2014When someone from Journal du Net contacted me about my piece last year on 5 French Startups I Can’t Live Without, apparently they liked it so much that they decided to ride with the theme (hey, imitation is the best form of flattery, I suppose). JDN interviewed a handful of France’s first-rate VCs to each […]