The Full Ratchet (TFR): Venture Capital and Startup Investing Demystified

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**The Full Ratchet (TFR): Venture Capital and Startup Investing Demystified**

The podcast dedicated to demystifying Venture Capital. Nick Moran and Nate Pierotti interview VC’s & Startup Founders and on how they build great technology startups.

Latest Episodes:

143. Beacon: Modernizing the VC Firm, Part 2 (Chris Farmer) Oct 14, 2017

Show notes

Today we publish part two of the interview with Chris Farmer of Signal Fire Ventures. In this segment we address:

Why he's using Beacon to make VC investments when their are numerous other applications that may have more economic value
How he's created an engaged, active advisor network that are also LPs in the fund
What characteristics the best advisors share
Chris' thoughts on the surge in micros VCs and how that has impacted the asset class
Chris' advice for founders raising initial capital
Wrap-up of Key Takeaways & a Tip of the Week

Guest Links:

Signal Fire Ventures
Chris on Twitter
Signal Fire on Twitter
Techcrunch Article: Watch Out, VCs: Chris Farmer Plans To Massively Disrupt The Industry
Part 1 of the interview w/ Chris

Key Takeaways:

1- Deconstructing Beacon Beacon is a connected platform that starts w/ sourcing but also does monitoring, context, diligence, syndication and most importanty, per Chris, portfolio support. It's a data platform that looks like a Bloomberg terminal for the startup industry. They started building it seven years ago and they employ a full-blown engineering team of data scientists and tech engineers. Beacon tracks a vast array of data on 6M different companies. And Chris started with first principles, asking "what are the KPIs that the management teams of these companies are measuring?"... those are the same elements we should measure with Beacon. It analyzes items including customer behavior, frequency, engagement, CLV, consumer transactions, financial flows, quality of those flows, news sentiment and also team construction and quality, just to name a few. And signal fire's platform isn't just for the investors. There is a UI for advisors and most importantly founders as well. Founders can utilize heir robust SaaS recruiting platform to address the key need of early stage companies... recruiting top talent. With Beacon, Signal Fire has set out to tech enable the entire value chain of a venture firm from end-to-end. Early indications from folks in my network are that it's an impressive platform indeed. 2- The Prepared Mind Signal Fire did not coin the concept of "the prepared mind" but Chris does follow it. The approach that came out of Accel has an emphasis on heavy research on existing domains. The creation of market maps that help visualize the landscape and reveal opportunities. In a previous episode, David Cowan discussed his approach to the Space vertical that leverages this methodology. And in Chris implementation, he is constantly refining the maps. He meets with LP experts and founders to go much deeper and broader than they could do w/ data alone. The result is that Signal Fire is often much less bullish on the en vogue sectors and vice-a-versa. Their investment in pizza making robot company, Zume, certainly illustrates their fresh perspective on an oft-ignored industry. 3- The Common Thread of Success I asked Chris for a common thread that he's noticed across successful startups. And I really enjoyed his response. The common thread in winners are those companies that are doing things full-stack. They are creating an end-to-end solution that is vertically integrated. Where a company can be it's own customer in order to provide a better solution for the end consumer. I discussed this concept w/ Charles Hudson in a previous episode. We talked about finding the place within the vertical supply stack that enforces discipline on the chain and drives the most value. Chris point was compelling in that he looks for startups that own the chain, not just a part of it. Tip of the Week: Tail Wags Dog -- The Affinity Investor

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

142. Beacon: An Engineering Systems Approach to Investing, Part 1 (Chris Farmer) Oct 04, 2017

Show notes

Chris Farmer of Signal Fire Ventures joins Nick to discuss his firm and their platform, Beacon, a robust data engine that reveals the best sector, market and startup investment areas. We address questions including:

Can you start off with the firm's thesis and your main focus at SignalFire?
You talk about the four big founder pain points that you've observed... what are they?.
Number one pain point is Hiring top engineers... Tell us about his Data platform, Beacon, and how it addresses this pain point?
Sourcing and analysis tool that helps show you where to focus?
Can you give me an example of what you see when you look at a sector, sub-sector or even at the company level?
Does this data really exist with very early-stage startups or nascent sectors, before they've really emerged and have traction?
Sources?
I've worked for companies that had a difficult time getting one database to talk to another. Can you really source unstructured data, from limitless sources and structure it in a way where it's streamlined, uniform, single record and can be used to drive insights?
Do you think about data that is empirical and fixed vs. data points that can be influenced... and if you find an strong startup profile that is missing a couple of key elements that can be influenced, will you engage and attempt to address those factors w/ the founder?
I've looked over the consumer and enterprise sector lists where you invest... and it's a pretty broad list. Can you really have a data engine that works well for such a varied and broad landscape?
Essentially a sector by sector sensitivity and regression analyses?

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

Investor Stories 68: My Investing Strategy (Benaich, Kurzweil, Triest & DeMarrais) Sep 28, 2017

Show notes

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet,

the following investors are featured:

Nathan Benaich
Ethan Kurzweil
Jonathon Triest & Brett DeMarrais

Each investor describes their investment thesis and

how they evaluate startups for investment.

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

141. Cram Session, Episodes 87-94 (Nick Moran) Sep 25, 2017

Show notes

Welcome back to TFR for another Cram Session. In these special releases, we have aggregated the takeaways and tips from previous episodes. In this installment, we will be recapping the following episodes:

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

Investor Stories 67: Why I Invested (Nof, Wilkins, Sanwal) Sep 01, 2017

Show notes

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following investors are featured: Jordan Nof Pete Wilkins Anand Sanwal Each investor highlights a situation where they decided to invest in a startup and why they said yes.

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

140. Navigating the Future of IoT (Panel Discussion) Aug 23, 2017

Show notes

UILabs recently hosted a panel of IoT experts to discuss the future roadmap for IoT. I moderated the discussion and the panel included: Ben Forgan, CEO of Hologram Brenna Berman, Executive Director of City Digital, UI Labs Jenny Fielding, Managing Director, Techstars IoT Jim Gagnard, CEO of SmartSignal (acquired by... GE).

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

Investor Stories 66: Why I Passed (Mougayar, Mohnot, Cowan) Aug 18, 2017

Show notes

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following investors are featured:

- William Mougayar

- Sheel Mohnot

- David Cowan

Each investor highlights a situation where they decided not to invest, why they passed, and how it played out.

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

Investor Stories 65: Lessons Learned (Tunguz, Davis, Draper, Eakman) Aug 04, 2017

Show notes

On this special segment of The Full Ratchet, the following investors are featured:

- Tom Tunguz

- Mark Peter Davis

- Adam Draper

- Lindel Eakman

Each investor illustrates a critical lesson learned about startup investing and how it's changed their approach.

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

139. How to Angel Invest like the Best, Part 2 (Jason Calacanis) Jul 25, 2017

Show notes

Jason Calacanis is back for part 2 of the interview to discuss his book and secrets to successful angel investing. We address questions including: His thoughts on the original Sequoia scout program and the many similar programs today How he does such high volume of investments when he insists on spending...

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

138. How to Angel Invest Like the Best, Part 1 (Jason Calacanis) Jul 20, 2017

Show notes

Jason Calacanis joins Nick to discuss his new book and his secrets to successful angel investing. We address questions including:

- Why Jason wrote the book - What drives him to continue angel investing after all his success - His thoughts on angels that make large investments during their first year of angel...

To listen more, please visit http://fullratchet.net/podcast-episodes/ for all of our other episodes.

Also, follow us on twitter @TheFullRatchet for updates and more information.

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