Thursdays at Abnormal Returns are all about startup and venture capital links. You can check out last week’s links including a look at the outsized importance of seed round returns to overall venture returns.
Quote of the Day
"When you add up all the time spent on budgeting across all the organizations on the planet (including government), the human species wastes an enormous amount of time on a thing we don’t do very well."
(Brad Feld)
Location
- How Culver City, CA became a hotbed for startups and Big Tech alike. (marker.medium.com)
- Brooklyn is booming as a startup hub, but is running into roadblocks. (wsj.com)
Venture
- Corporate VC only works if it is structured like traditional VC. (wsj.com)
- A list of the five most influential VCs of the past decade. (hunterwalk.com)
- The stories from inside Softbank are coming out and they are not good. (bloomberg.com)
Fintech
- Affirm is leading the pack of point-of-sale lenders. (secondmeasure.com)
- Online will maker Trust & Will just raised a Series A. (news.crunchbase.com)
- WeFunder has raised a new round, but equity crowdfunding has not taken off. (news.crunchbase.com)
Companies
- Why Superhuman is the breakout company of 2019. (haystack.vc)
- Can a venture-backed “family experience store” boost toy sales? (nytimes.com)
- Startups are now focusing on the male side of the infertility puzzle. (ft.com)
Startups
- Jeff Carter, "Entrepreneurship is not flash in the pan. It’s a grind, uphill, in deep snow. It’s lonely. It takes grit and resilience. You better be ready to compete. There are no excuses, and entrepreneurship doesn’t look kindly on victims and whiners." (pointsandfigures.com)
- One of the hardest things for startups to get right is pricing. (pointsandfigures.com)
- Why 'click to purchase' is going to become ubiquitous. (a16z.com)
- How much turnover should a startup expect in its sales team? (tomtunguz.com)
- What a scientist had to unlearn to become an entrepreneur. (fastcompany.com)