FundersClub Weekly Newsletter - May 18, 2017
FundersClub Portfolio News
FundersClub is hiring for a Summer 2017 Venture Intern.
Nymi announces that they have closed a $15 million Series B round, which will provide them with the necessary resources to enter the next phase of scaled deployments in "Nymi™ Raises $15M Series B Financing."
Unocoin is listed as one of the top 4 Bitcoin exchanges in India where you can buy, sell, transfer and invest in "Top 4 Bitcoin Exchanges where you could invest."
Plato officially launches with a mission to help engineers become better engineering leaders, by matching tech managers to highly experienced engineering leaders from top tech companies to help resolve challenging management situations as they arise in "We’re launching Plato."
TerrAvion, a Cloud-based aerial imaging and data analytics service, moves into the Mid-South to offer producers aerial images of their crops in "New imaging service, options available to Mid-South."
Labdoor announces that their new ranking of 37 probiotic supplements has been published, measured by effective ingredients and safety in "New Laboratory Testing On Top-Selling Probiotics."
Investor Thoughts
Ajay Kamat of Pear VC shares a lesson learned with Alex Mittal of FundersClub during a FundersClub Live event that founders should be highly skeptical of what they're producing, and offers more advice for founders in "Founders Should Be Skeptical Of Their Own Products Early On: Pear VC’s Ajay Kamat."
Andreessen Horowitz builds on their Primer on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and creates a microsite that is intended to help newcomers (both non-technical and technical) begin exploring what is possible with AI in "AI Playbook."
Fred Wilson of Union Square Ventures makes an appearance on Bloomberg TV and discusses the VC Market, Twitter, Snap and Uber in "Bloomberg TV Appearance."
Mark Suster of Upfront Ventures details why a founder can know their startup is successful when giant incumbents start to threaten their business in "The Surest Sign You’re Winning is When Goliath Takes a Swing at You."
Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint Ventures explains the importance of booking capacity in growth planning and why to achieve next year’s numbers, you’ll likely need to hire today in "Hiring For Bookings Capacity In Sales."
Jalak Jobanputra of The Barefoot VC outlines how decentralized technology is the next generation of what we saw develop with the internet "My Talk at MIT: Beyond Finance, Considering Business and Social Impact of Blockchains."
Lee Hower of NextView Ventures hosts an AMA and also covers what it was like to work with Elon Musk & Reid Hoffman, his take on the history of innovation, and how to get a job in VC in "Lee Hower: Medium."
Kyle Poyar of OpenView Partners puts together a 10 minute survey to help measure and benchmark the metrics most vital to a SaaS company's success in "SaaS Metric Survey."
Founder and Operator Thoughts
Ryan Petersen of Flexport (FC Portfolio) is interviewed by Gavin van Marle of Loadstar and discusses the unique composition of his teams, how carriers and shippers gain from the vast data sets Flexport has accumulated and more in "PODCAST: Behind the Flexport phenomenon; Ryan Petersen interviewed."
Kevin Indig of Atlassian (acquired FC Portfolio company, StatusPage) explains how SEO rankings can be a leading indicator of a company’s performance and its stock price in "An Investigation Into The Relationship Between SEO And Stock Price."
Peter Kazanjy of TalentBin (FC Portfolio, acquired by Monster Worldwide) shares the steps any startup can use to build its own, robust Customer Advisory Board, from how to recruit members to ultimately how to turn advisors into paying customers and advocates in "Start Up on the Right Foot — Build a Customer Advisory Board."
Harvard Business Review looks at the differences in language that VCs use to describe male and female entrepreneurs, and outlines the consequences these differences have for those seeking funding and for society in general in " We Recorded VCs’ Conversations and Analyzed How Differently They Talk About Female Entrepreneurs."
Wojciech Zaremba of OpenAI gives an overview of artificial intelligence, defines machine learning vs deep learning, offers suggestions for people wanting to get involved with AI and more in "An AI Primer with Wojciech Zaremba."
Courtney Buchanan of Mattermark shares three ways salespeople should connect with the end user to ultimately secure exec buy-in in "How a Bottom-up Approach Can Help You Sell to the Big Guys."
Jason Rowley of Crunchbase News conducts a massive data-crunching project that shows what portion of U.S. seed-funded startups survive long enough to secure venture funding or an exit in "Here’s How Likely Your Startup Is To Get Acquired At Any Stage."
Adam Naor of Pennybox lists some important insights to be learned from history's innovators in "Lessons from history’s great innovators that you should never forget."
Anmol Madan of Ginger.io describes how once founders understand what they're going through, they can build the positive mental habits and skills needed to overcome roadblocks in "The Skills You Need to Succeed Start in Your Head."
In Other News
Twitter Inc. and Facebook Inc. may face a new tax in the UK as a law targeting social-media companies and communication service providers could be passed, with the goal of making the internet safer for young people in "U.K.'s May Opens Door to Facebook Tax in Push for Safer Web."
Amazon.com Inc. has started development of an air-traffic control system to manage its fleet as the drones fly from warehouses to customers’ doors, and has created a new research and development team near Paris in "Why Amazon’s Delivery-Drone Team Is Obsessed With Geese."
Did You Know?
Did you know that on average it takes 30 to 45 minutes for your rods in your eyes to be fully dark adapted to night vision?
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