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Over the years I’ve heard and read a lot of advice on how to get a technical co-founder. Having a mostly non-technical background myself, I’ve been facing the issues of having a “great” startup idea without having the technical chops to build it myself. 
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Everything you need to know about Startup Product Metrics.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
I've seen many decks on startup metrics including Dave Mc Clure's very rough but great 'startup metrics for pirates' but this deck by Andreas Klinger is juts awesome. It is comprehensive, precise and actionable. Plus there are tons of great benchmarks in there. Read it and I'm sure you'll find at least a couple of things you'll want to immediately experiment with to make your startup product better.
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From zero to $19B of business value in five years; WhatsApp's sale to Facebook is an important moment in the history of the consumer web. The deal proves distribution, reach and large user bases aren't the competitive moats they once were. Apple's App Store and Google Play have leveled the playing field to such an extent that a startup can command 10% of the market cap from a $200B company.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Interesting point of view of Tomasz Tunguz on what the AppStore model had to do in WhatsApp's massive valuation. I'm not sure I agree with everything he writes though. Yes, the AppStore is very competitive and the old tricks don't work there. Yes, increased competitions and a short-tail distribution means higher outcomes and rewards for those who make it. But I'm not sure the model is that virtuous: - first, I'm not sure it favors innovation that much: web sites are optimized on a daily basis (or actually often multiple changes per day) while Apps need to go through approval processes and tests, etc... - second, as Andrew Chen pointed out, this hit or miss market the AppStore is means that mobile startups are failing without a second chance to iterate and come out with the right product.
Guillaume Decugis's curator insight,
February 24, 2014 9:52 PM
Interesting point of view of Tomasz Tunguz on what the AppStore model had to do in WhatsApp's massive valuation. I'm not sure I agree with everything he writes though. Yes, the AppStore is very competitive and the old tricks don't work there. Yes, increased competitions and a short-tail distribution means higher outcomes and rewards for those who make it. But I'm not sure the model is that virtuous: - first, I'm not sure it favors innovation that much: web sites are optimized on a daily basis (or actually often multiple changes per day) while Apps need to go through approval processes and tests, etc... - second, as Andrew Chen pointed out, this hit or miss market the AppStore is means that mobile startups are failing without a second chance to iterate and come out with the right product.
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Primer on raising seed capital for first time and experienced startup founders and employees.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Lots of very useful insights in that must-see very detailed slideshare by Steve Schlafman from RRE Ventures. I wish it described a little more the conditions that a startup need to reach to become interesting for VCs. To build on slides 58-60, I would add: 1. Team: there's little hope in seeing seed VC's with the hope they'll help you complete it. 2. Growth model: traction is cool but mean different things to different people. I'd rather talk about a growth model that explains how the company will grow fast and that is backed by min 8-12 weeks of solid data. 3. Market ambition: while business plans are mostly useless at seed stage, it's important in my opinion to show there are adressable markets within reach if #2 works well to justify raising from VC's and providing them with a return.
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We’re now eight months into building Medium, having started in earnest in February of this year (...) We haven’t opened up, tried to grow, or, certainly, proven we have product/market fit (...) Still, it’s been educational. Here are some of my observations this time around.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Are you guaranteed success when you have unlimited resources and luxuries from being one of the most successful startup founders of these past 10 years? No. These insights are a great answer to all those who think that they key to success is just getting funded or having a track record.
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From
500
I know, it’s a bold request to ask a startup to focus on anything other than their product and growth. I know, I’m a startup founder myself. I know that time is our most limited resource and that you have to say no to a lot of things in order to maintain your focus, and sanity. So why am I writing a post telling you to focus on community? Because I’ve seen first hand, and in the example of many other startups, the power that community can wield even at the earliest stages of your growth.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Excellent post by David Spinks who's the founder of Feast and former community manager of LeWeb. Startups are not just about products - they're about people around them too. If you're not convinced yet, here are 7 good reasons to include community management as part of your early marketing strategy (and yes you need one).
Terrence Bristol's curator insight,
March 14, 2014 1:22 PM
I think this should apply to any business especially when in early phases of starting. A community helps you get over those rough spot when your doubts are high and confidence is low.
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We all know about the perfect pivot, but what about participating in a "pivot" round?
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Not all startups or startup teams are meant to pivot. I went through a pivot myself and I found this list of criteria pretty insightful.
Marshall Van Fleet's curator insight,
January 19, 2014 3:12 PM
Good Advice For The Start-up Entrepreneur As Well
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Just when Hollywood thought it had Netflix figured out that red envelope company flipped the script creating a playbook for any business that aspires...
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Great read for any entrepreneur who's thinking about disrupting an industry. The way Netflix is beating Hollywood at its own game and hen changing hose rules is impressive. Of course, this is the doing of a large established startup but even earlier stage startups can learn from that story.
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Evernote has never been sexy, almost ran out of money, and doesn’t benefit from the network effects that drive many of today’s successful companies. Via Mounia RKHA
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
The idea of having a growth engine is essential to startups. Yet, I often see entrepreneurs thinking they can only rely on a great product - or sometimes not even as much: a great idea. Value for startups only come from growth and some great product will simply not make it because they lack a growth engine. There are various types of growth engines, including: - virality (your current users' actions bring your next users) - stickiness / increased value over time (your users don't do much beyond simple word-of-mouth but as they never leave this ends up in growing usage) - ad-funded user acquisition (you make enough advertising/premium money from current users to acquire the next users through advertising) - sales-funded revenue (you make enough sales from current customers to recruit more sales people or fund distribution channels to get the next customers). What's not a growth engine? - word-of-mouth - PR These are typically not enough to get accelerating growth/traction. In short, if you don't have a growth engine, you don't have a startup.
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There is additional encouraging news for aspiring entrepreneurs on many fronts, just in case you are thinking about joining the existing ranks.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Martin Zwilling makes a good case on Forbes on how conditions for being an entrepreneur have never been so great. He's right: lots of things are better now than they used to be. Both in the US and Europe. However I can't help wondering as well: with that much competition it's likely to also be the time where a record number of entrepreneurs will be disappointed. Because no matter how easy and great it is to start companies, there are not so many which can become successful at any given point in time. I happenned to become an entrepreneur right after the 2000 bubble burst and I don't envy the bubble startups: yes going was tough but for those who survived, the results were spectacular. Remember the 90's?
Sabra Kay's curator insight,
March 3, 2014 6:16 PM
I wholeheartedly agree, and adding to that, I think now is a great time to start something small. To work for yourself, in any niche you choose and to make something of it. It doesn't have to be a high-tech, VC funded startup, it can just be your "thing." If there was ever a time to do it, it's now.
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Perhaps it’s the new ”American dream” of scaling like Zuckerberg or selling like Systrom, but every entrepreneur seems to think that if they’re going to make it big, they have to raise money asap.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
I'd say this is debatable as raising early can also give you a lot of options. Sometimes though you don't have that luxury and this post is worth reading for the signs it describes that your startup might not be VC-ready. If that's the case, hyper focusing in fundraising is a sure way to fail. Money can come from customers too...
Lori Wilk's curator insight,
December 15, 2013 11:50 AM
As we launch, we want to build on a structure and a solid foundation, most of us have lots to learn.
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After 13 years at startups—the last four at Twitter—I’ve made the transition into venture capital as a partner at Redpoint Ventures. It has been just over a month since I began spending my days on Sand Hill Road and in that short time, I’ve learned quickly about working in a tight, seasoned partnership as well as having listened to some of the smartest, most interesting startup pitches.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
A candid list of lessons learned from Ryan Sarver that gives interesting insights on how VCs will look at an investment opportunity. Useful to craft the perfect pitch.
Lori Wilk's curator insight,
December 23, 2013 10:30 AM
It's great to learn from what others have tried and experienced so that you can be better prepared.
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Could $100,000 and the right developer skills make you an overnight billionaire? How much does it really take to build a product like Twitter or Instagram? With mobile development ...
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Very questionable analysis but which makes one point clear: web consumer startups are not technology challenges anymore.
Lori Wilk's curator insight,
December 23, 2013 10:35 AM
As we read this article there is someone out there who has the idea and will make this question their reality. The odds are that we will read their story in the next 24 months to 36 months.
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A common excuse that entrepreneurs make for not being able to innovate is the lack of venture capital in their region. Via Marylene Delbourg-Delphis
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Several good examples that show how dramatically the cost of creating breakthrough innovations has decreased.
Alba Redin's curator insight,
December 1, 2013 7:07 AM
Successful entrepreneurship, who succeed? THose companies who are different, Game changers (they aim to compete on different terms), market entry and tey are in essense guerillas. 
Ranjit Kovilinkal's curator insight,
December 2, 2013 11:08 PM
The culture of big risk taking has to fall in place in India for something really big to emerge! Any comments?
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“Journalists are biased.” “Our PR firm just doesn’t ‘get’ our message.” “We need at least one media hit a week.” Oh, and my personal favorite: “Can we review and edit quotes before the piece is published?”
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
If your startup marketing strategy includes getting press coverage, you should read this. And also this. But I also encourage you to think whether that's actually something you need, how badly you need it and for what reasons. If the answer to the latter is "to get traction and grow my user base", that's probably wrong as I explained here.
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When I was early in my career, I casually mentioned to an older VC that I had yet to lose money on an investment. He replied "that's not good, you aren't taking enough risk." I have gone on to lose...
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Fred Wilson discloses interesting figures about his loss ratio which is close to 40% for his 2004 fund - the most promising one he says. I've seen several entrepreneurs make the mistake of thinking their VCs will do anything to refinance them to avoid making losses. While good ones will definitely put a fight for you, you should also not expect them to fund you beyond reason. After all, some of their portfolio companies will fail and they live with that.
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This is the pitchdeck we used to raise half a million dollars from Angel investors.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Simple is beautiful, less is more: here's a great example of how this can be applied to securing funding for a startup. From Joel and Leo the founders of Buffer - a service we partner with at Scoop.it - and great guys too. Additional comments from Leo here. This is a good complement to LinkedIn Series B deck. A later stage company will have a more complex story but an early stage pitch should focus on a few things including: - the investment thesis - the demonstrable traction - the vision - the team
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Many entrepreneurs, and the venture investors who back them, seek to build billion-dollar companies.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Impression study of the 39 billion dollar software companies that we're created in the US over the past 10 years. What they have in common, who their founders were and whether or not they pivoted to become successful: lots of great data points.
Samu Tuomisto's comment,
November 6, 2013 3:44 PM
Trust on your vision? No pivot made in 90% of One-Billion Dollar Software Startup Companies.
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Blogging is a pain point for many startups and small teams because it takes a lot of time and effort. This presentation by @Arabella DeLucco shows how to solve that.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Startups need to blog, say a lot of people including entrepreneur/VC/blogger Mark Suster in this great piece. But what most entrepreneurs struggle with is how to really make it happen in spite of all the things they already have to do. This was this precise frustration that made us want to start Scoop.it as a way to help many people become media publishers and particularly entrepreneurs.
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“If you think of your board members as working for you, there’s no reason to lie or fudge things to look a certain way or prove your competence. If you do those things, your board can’t help you effectively."
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
While I don't think all of this (long) list of advice is applicable to all companies, I do believe the above quote is fundamental to understand and apply. I've been at board meetings every month or so for more than 10 years (for my own companies and as a board member of others). While we're fortunate to have a great board at Scoop.it, I've seen my share of highly dysfunctional meetings where entrepreneurs are putting their fate (and their companies') in the hands of the board every other meeting. Repeatedly judging a whole company in a couple of hours over and over is not what board meetings should (only) be about. Thinking of your board members as partners who will share your pains and your successes totally changes the dynamics of board meetings. (Above picture is a before and after of Xobni's Jeff Bonforte's board decks whose experience inspired this article.)
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At Greylock, my partners and I are driven by one guiding mission: always help entrepreneurs.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
People, this is gold. Reid Hoffman made public the deck he and the LinkedIn team used to raise their Series B back in 2004. Of course this is huge because LinkedIn became LinkedIn but more importantly, Hoffman added precious insights and advice on what he would do differently now. Key point to me is how to artciulate the investment thesis. To elaborate on that, solving a problem is not the investment thesis. Of course, it's needed b ut on top of that you also need to show how that problem can be worth enough to your customers so that it can become a big business. Hoffman says he didn't articulate this well enough opening with a slide that simply put the value proposition forward but failing to artculate how value would be created and defended on the long run by delivering it. There are a ton of other valuable points on how to pitch by analogy, how to deal with risks, how to look at explaining business model and revenue streams, etc... A must-read for anyone willing to pitch VC's.
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In 2007, before YCombinator and AngelList had changed the industry, I worked in a nondescript office park in the heart of the venture capital industry off Sand Hill Road. Amid the leafy sprawl of buildings next to 280 and Stanford University, billions of dollars were and are invested out of the fancy offices of VC/PE firms you’ve never heard of. The whole industry has been shrouded in opaqueness since it was created decades ago, built on relationships from business schools, professional networks, and investor referrals.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
The VC model is changing and while a lot has been said on AngelList, micro-VC funds and incubators such as Y Combinators, Andrew Chen explains why this is not incompatible with the rise of bigger and bigger VC's.
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If you are an entrepreneur, you have probably heard some crusty old CEO or investor say something like “cash is king.”
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Ben Horowitz explains what you should understand by that. He makes a good point and a nice read - quoting Kayne West as only he would.
GreatBusinessContent's curator insight,
October 9, 2013 5:51 PM
Cash flow equals freedom. If you have cash flow you can decide the direction your company moves. Without cash flow you are very limited in options and anyone who has helped you finance can begin calling the shots. If you're bootstrapping you will just slowly fade away.
This is a very well written account of how a high tech startup began working for cashflow.
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There were several factors that contributed to YouTube becoming the #1 video sharing service on the web. But a lot of initial adoption was driven by the fact that it had pirated content hosted on it. If you wanted to watch the latest episode of Lost for free, YouTube was your best bet: no queued downloading through torrents, just stream it from the server.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
How to solve the chicken and egg issues hat marketplace services have. Faking it before making it can work. And can actually prove necessary not only to get traction but to give the right culture or identity to a service. Of course this form of bootstrapping doesn't scale but we know it doesn't matter: http://sco.lt/6n1fhh
Ally Greer's curator insight,
September 29, 2013 6:52 PM
From Guillaume: " Of course this form of bootstrapping doesn't scale but we know it doesn't matter: http://sco.lt/6n1fhh "
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I can't tell you how many times we've met with early-stage companies, and they start by telling us their big vision. They say, 'This is what we're about and what we want to change.' But when we ask them what they actually do, they can’t tell us. If you can’t answer that question, don’t do anything else until you can. Nothing else matters.
Guillaume Decugis's insight:
Long but worth reading series of advice from Brooke Hammerling on how to handle PR as a startup founder. She starts by a candid and fresh observation that most startups don't need any PR help when early stage and that a common mistake is to try to get coverage too soon when not ready either at the product or the messaging level. So this is an interesting piece if you're wondering when and how PR can help and what you can do about it?
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Curated by Guillaume Decugis
Tech entrepreneur (4x exits, Linkfluence, Scoop.it, Musiwave…) turned VC @ Serena Data Ventures | Focused on early-stage, deep tech startups. Rock singer. Freeride skier.
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This is an interesting response to Elizabeth Yin's post on why you can't find a technical co-founder that she wrote on Andrew Chen's blog.
She claimed your best chance was to learn to code and build your MVP on your own: this will not only ensure your MVP will be an MVP but also that you learn from it and in the process be more credible to and respected by your future CTO. Thomas Kjemperud doesn't disagree with the second part but claims there's no need to learn to code to do so: with all the open API's and existing tools out there, you should be able to build something semi-automated without even having to learn to code.
He's got a good point: to get 50 users to really love your service or product, do you really need a completely automated piece of software? Or do you need tools that let you deliver the value prop and makes sure it makes those 50 people happy?
It probably depends but the important thing is that you have to learn from these 50 before you do anything else anyway.