Startup One Stop

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor is tomorrow, March 18^th and our guest investor is Wiley Cerilli from First Round Capital. And notice that it’s called First Round Capital. Early stage.

Wiley Cerilli is a Venture Partner at First Round, and was founder of Single Platform, which was acquired two years after its founding by Constant Contact for $100M (What It Feels Like To Wake Up At 32 With Everything You've Ever Wanted). SinglePlatform was initially funded by First Round, and quickly went on to be named one of the Top 10 and 25 "Companies to Watch" by Business Insider, The Next Web and Website Magazine. Wiley has been named as a "Top 25 CEO" in New York, and "Top 10 People to Watch" by Crain’s. He also dropped in and out of school five times, and met his wife on Match.com. More about him below. Read More...

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor is next week, March 18^th and our guest investor is Wiley Cirilli from First Round Capital. And notice that it’s called First Round Capital. Early stage.

Wiley Cerilli is a Venture Partner at First Round, and was founder of Single Platform, which was acquired two years after its founding by Constant Contact for $100M (What It Feels Like To Wake Up At 32 With Everything You've Ever Wanted). SinglePlatform was initially funded by First Round, and quickly went on to be named one of the Top 10 and 25 "Companies to Watch" by Business Insider, The Next Web and Website Magazine. Wiley has been named as a "Top 25 CEO" in New York, and "Top 10 People to Watch" by Crain’s. He also dropped in and out of school five times, and met his wife on Match.com. More about him below. Read More...

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor is March 18^th and our guest investor is Wiley Cirilli from First Round Capital. And notice that it’s called First Round Capital. Early stage.

Wiley Cerilli is a Venture Partner at First Round, and was founder of Single Platform, which was acquired two years after its founding by Constant Contact for $100M (What It Feels Like To Wake Up At 32 With Everything You've Ever Wanted). SinglePlatform was initially funded by First Round, and quickly went on to be named one of the Top 10 and 25 "Companies to Watch" by Business Insider, The Next Web and Website Magazine. Wiley has been named as a "Top 25 CEO" in New York, and "Top 10 People to Watch" by Crain’s. He also dropped in and out of school five times, and met his wife on Match.com. More about him below. Read More...

Good morning, All,

FIrst, our thanks to Alicia Syrett, Founder and CEO of Pantegrion Capital, who spoke at our Breakfast with An Investor last week and made such amazing points that there were several requests for her to write a book. We're working on it.

Our next Breakfast with an Investor is March 18^th and our guest investor is Wiley Cirilli from First Round Capital. And notice that it’s called First Round Capital. Early stage. Read More...

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor is tomorrow, Wednesday, February 18^th,and our guest investor is Alicia Syrett, Founder and CEO of Pantegrion Capital, an angel investment firm that focuses on seed and early stage investments, and a member of several angel networks, including Golden Seeds and NY Angels. She’s a very active investor and startup advisor – and she’s currently looking for NYC-based early stage investments. For the record, because we keep the group small, every investor who has spoken at one of our breakfasts so far has made him or herself available to attendees afterwards, meaning private consultation. RSVP here and hope to see you there!

For some time, we’ve been accused of showing an undue/unnecessarily strong focus on the subject of Internet freedom. FCC Commissioner: Obama Taking Unprecedented Direct Control Over Internet Changes: ‘FCC commissioner Ajit Pai said President Barack Obama is about to succeed in his attempt to take “alarmingly unprecedented direct involvement” into the FCC’s plan to regulate the internet, which he explained will mean “billions of dollars in new taxes,” slower broadband speeds and “less competition.” Read More...

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor will be Wednesday, February 18^th and our guest investor is Alicia Syrett, Founder and CEO of Pantegrion Capital, an angel investment firm that focuses on seed and early stage investments, and a member of several angel networks, including Golden Seeds and NY Angels. She’s a very active investor and startup advisor – and she’s currently looking for NYC-based early stage investments. For the record, because we keep the group small, every investor who has spoken at one of our breakfasts so far has made him or herself available to attendees afterwards, meaning private consultation. RSVP here and hope to see you there!

We’ve noticed lately that New York has been experiencing unprecedented amounts of funding flowing to startups here – as it has to elsewhere, globally – and while it may pale compared to Silicon Valley, we still can’t ignore the fact that the industry has grown beyond being All Silicon Valley, All the Time. Read More...

Good morning, All,

Our next Breakfast with an Investor will be Wednesday, February 18^th and our guest investor will be Alicia Syrett, Founder and CEO of Pantegrion Capital, an angel investment firm that focuses on seed and early stage investments, and a member of several angel networks, including Golden Seeds and NY Angels. She’s a very active investor and startup advisor – and she’s currently looking for NYC-based early stage investments. For the record, because we keep the group small, every investor who has spoken at one of our breakfasts so far has made him or herself available to attendees afterwards, meaning private consultation. RSVP here and hope to see you there!

For the record, the first so-called New Economy forged by technology was during the Web 1.0 days, when companies raised money from investors and were suddenly ‘successful’ – on paper. Some had to learn the hard way that building a company meant building a business – one that had earnings, profits. That is a measure of success in any economy, not the OPM – Other People’s Money, aka, investor money. Read More...

Good morning, All,

First, a big thank you to Sumeet Shah, Senior Associate at Brand Foundry, who was the guest investor at last week’s Breakfast. And who shared two awesome slide decks on investing and what funds look for, with our attendees. Pays to show up!

Our next Breakfast with an Investor will be Wednesday, February 18^th and our guest investor will be Alicia Syrett, Founder and CEO of Pantegrion Capital, an angel investment firm that focuses on seed and early stage investments, and a member of several angel networks, including Golden Seeds and NY Angels. She’s a very active investor and startup advisor – and she’s currently looking for NYC-based early stage investments. For the record, because we keep the group small, every investor who has spoken at one of our breakfasts so far has made him or herself available to attendees afterwards, meaning private consultation. RSVP here and hope to see you there! Read More...

Good morning, All,

First, our January Breakfast with an Investor is this Thursday, January 22, and it’s a bit different this time, as Sumeet Shah is the Senior Associate at this very active investment firm, and it’s the first time we’re hosting a gatekeeper. Yup, it’s the Senior Associates who vet the deals first, so it will be interesting to hear that perspective on what investors look for, and yes, Brand Foundry Ventures are early stage investors.

Sumeet is responsible for sourcing, executing, and monitoring new opportunities at Brand Foundry Ventures. In other words, he’s the boots on the ground, out there looking for the next investment. So make sure you’re there to hear what he has to say. You will have one-on-one time with him, and we always leave time for networking. RSVP here. Read More...

Good morning, All,

CES was last week and everyone was abuzz about the Internet of Things. We came across an article and we have to agree: Stop calling it the ‘Internet of Things’. The name is just dumb. Almost as dumb as was the term ‘New Media,’ which was ubiquitous in the 90s, in the nascent days of the consumer web. It was a term that got old fast. The writer of the article suggested we call it SmartTech, or Smartech, which we personally believe is just as amorphous. How about Connected Devices? We do realize that they’re not all devices, but we would suggest separating hardware from other internet’s other ‘things.’

It’s too bad there’s such a disconnected between tech and advertising. In advertising, on balance, they know how to name things, or used to, at least. We were an advertisig copywriter at one point in our illustrious career, and part of our job was to name products. True story: back in the day and around the time that the name 'New Media’ was coming into its own, an art director we had once worked with had to come up with a name for a new software. The client meeting was Monday. He had squat and we had tickets to Cirque du Soleil on Saturday. Our friend was worried about the presentation and didn’t particularly want to be pried out of his offic, but we can be very convincing and promised that he could return to work after the show and who couldn’t spare two hours over a weekend, just to take a break and maybe come back with a fresh perspective? The two of us went. The circus did inspire him and we did have dinner afterwards, because during the show, the name for the product had suddenly struck him. Read More...