ex-VC, now building stuff for Founders
France
Joined April 2014
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For sure Gen AI represents a significant technological advance. But would lots of VCs make money out of it?
There are a few skeptics in the Sillicon Valley.
ft.com/content/5671094e-6b09…
Taking listed software companies private is the new cool.
After the $8bn acquisition of Coupa Software by Thoma Bravo in dec 23, Silver Lake and Canadian pension fund bid $12bn for Qualtrics.
ft.com/content/7be0f99a-266d…
▶️ For sereral buyout firms, many public tech companies are trading below their fair value estimates. Companies from the BVP NASDAQ Emerging Cloud Index are currently trading at 5.5x (median) vs 14x+ in early 2021.
▶️ Markets are tougher than in 2021 and some shareholders (founders, investors) are becoming increasingly resigned to accept lower offers.
▶️ PE firms are sitting on upward of $2.5 trillion in dry powder. For example, Thoma Bravo adds record $32 billion in new capital.
Erwan Bernard retweeted
Bain Capital Ventures just announced $1.9B in new funds
8VC just announced a $880M fund
Felicis just announced a $825M fund
SignalFire just announced a $900M fund
GGV is raising $2.5B in new funds
Khosla Ventures is raising $3B in new funds
etc.
This is not 2001.
Erwan Bernard retweeted
FCF is the best indicator of the health of your company....the old expression "Cash in King" has never been more important. Watch #tech's comeback in 2023...it is being led by FCF. Smart words from @GavinSBaker
Interesting thoughts on ChatGPT and why it matters for SaaS startups by @chrija 👇
medium.com/point-nine-news/q…
Erwan Bernard retweeted
Nous espérons que ce contenu que nous avons noté va nous servir de matériaux pour réfléchir et créer, avoir des idées.
David Allen, le pape de l'organisation, disait toujours que le cerveau sert à avoir des idées, pas a les garder. Toute l'économie de la productivité ...
La productivité est remise en cause par les nouvelles plateformes d'IA
Thread intéressant de @tariqkrim 👇
1. L’ère numérique nous a exposé à beaucoup plus de contenus que nous ne sommes capables d’absorber.
L'équivalent de 34 GB de données tous les jours. Bonjour l’indigestion cognitive !
(Ou encore l'équivalent de 174 journaux selon le Guardian)
theguardian.com/media/mediam…
Erwan Bernard retweeted
3/ Cash is now hard to come by; investors are expecting solid unit economics & earlier profitability. Everything is immediately 5-10X harder. As such, survival is now depedent on hard-core, disciplined, top decile business execution, which no one learned in the past 5 years.
Erwan Bernard retweeted
Worried about the burn rate now?
The answer isn't slowing down sales, or your sales team
But there are things you can now that are easy and make a difference
10 Simple Ideas To Lower The Burn: 🔽🔟⬇️
Erwan Bernard retweeted
So what should founders do?
— lengthen runway. Extract max growth for min burn
— focus on biz fundamentals. Negative gross margins & high burn are fatal right now
— adjust expectations. New rule of thumb = 20x ARR not 100x
— run a tight process & go wide when you need to raise.
Erwan Bernard retweeted
I was at Amzn early '00s when we lost 95% of our market cap. Later at FB I negotiated a down-round in '09, and then in '12 our stock dropped 50% post-IPO. I was on the board of a public company that went bankrupt (Borders) and a start-up that went under (Hello). Some lessons:
Erwan Bernard retweeted
Founders you need to hear the truth:
The funding market has changed.
That raise you wanted, you aren’t going to get.
You are raising too much with too little.
You will go out, burn lots of discussions raising too much.
Then come back with smaller request.
Don’t do this
Erwan Bernard retweeted
✍️ Following @team_rooser 's Series A yesterday, @talexgeorge & I spent some time looking at the most recent rounds in B2B marketplaces in order to cook the new "B2B marketplace funding napkin" vintage 2022.
Hope the read insightful to y'all!
medium.com/point-nine-news/t…