Disrupting disruption with disruptive disruptions since 2010.
A group of users who started in the same time period, tracked to see how many stick around. The cruel truth about how fast people abandon your product.
Equity allocated to former employees, advisors, or early team members who are no longer contributing to the company but still own shares. It's the corporate equivalent of paying rent for a ghost tenant.
When a company buys a failing startup primarily for its talent, with the product being immediately shut down. A face-saving exit that's really just an expensive recruiting strategy with better PR.
The sadistic waiting period before any of your stock options actually belong to you, typically one year. It's designed to prevent you from taking the job and immediately quitting, essentially holding your compensation hostage for good behavior.
A literal plot of dirt prepped for seeds, or metaphorically, any environment ripe for nurturing nascent ideas—like Silicon Valley for startups or your uncle's garage for questionable business ventures. In startup parlance, it's where brilliant innovations and terrible ideas alike take root before anyone can tell which is which. The key difference from an incubator? Seedbeds are cheaper and smell more like actual dirt.
A funding round where a company raises money at a lower valuation than the previous round, which is the startup equivalent of your house being appraised for less than you paid for it, except everyone on Twitter knows about it. Morale is measured in tears per employee.
An entrepreneur driven primarily by solving a problem or advancing a cause rather than financial gain. They're the idealists who actually believe their mission statement.
The venture capital strategy of seeking only investments with potential to return the entire fund, requiring massive exits. A portfolio approach that ignores solid doubles and triples in favor of swinging for nonexistent fences.
The terrifying state of having mere weeks of cash remaining, when every expense is scrutinized and founders start drafting layoff announcements. The financial equivalent of flying on empty while the engine sputters.
A single slide in a pitch deck, often discussing one specific aspect of the business in vague, aspirational terms.
Any exchange of goods, services, or money, elevated to sound more important when preceded by 'business' or followed by 'cost.' In startup world, it's the holy grail metric that proves people are actually using your product for its intended purpose rather than just kicking the tires. VCs obsess over transaction volume, transaction value, and transaction frequency as if counting exchanges of value will somehow predict the future.
The speed at which a venture fund moves through its investment cycle, from raising capital to deploying it to returning capital to LPs. Faster isn't always better—ask anyone who inhaled their food and got heartburn.
When a startup's revenue covers basic operating expenses (ramen-level salaries), allowing it to survive without external funding.
The process of narrowing your target market to a smaller, more specific segment rather than trying to serve everyone. What pivoting looks like when you finally accept your TAM assumptions were delusional.
Keeping multiple strategic paths open while committing to none, often praised as strategic flexibility or criticized as inability to make decisions. The business equivalent of dating multiple people because you're 'keeping your options open.'
A company that's neither thriving nor dying—generating just enough revenue to shuffle forward indefinitely but lacking the growth to succeed or the decency to fail completely. The undead of the startup ecosystem.
An anti-dilution mechanism that adjusts an investor's equity stake if the company raises money at a lower valuation, protecting them from down rounds. Full ratchet is brutal; weighted average is gentler.
The percentage of transaction value a platform extracts as revenue, revealing how much you're actually taxing your users for the privilege of using your service. Too high and users revolt; too low and investors revolt.
A fund agreement clause that allows GPs to reinvest early returns back into new deals rather than distributing them to LPs, extending the fund's effective deployment capacity. A controversial provision that LPs love to scrutinize because it delays their returns.
A marketing term VCs use to describe their approach, supposedly indicating fair terms and supportive behavior. In practice, it often means 'we won't screw you quite as hard as the other guys.'
Customer Acquisition Cost—how much you spend in sales and marketing to land one customer. VCs compare this to lifetime value to determine if your business model is actually viable or just an expensive hobby.
The return of capital to limited partners when a fund exits an investment, either as cash or occasionally as stock, representing the magical moment when paper gains become real money. The VC equivalent of actually getting your lottery winnings instead of just holding a ticket.
A contractual restriction preventing insiders from selling shares after an IPO, typically 90-180 days. Because letting founders dump all their stock on day one would be honest but catastrophic for stock price.
When a startup raises funding from institutional VCs after initially bootstrapping or taking only angel money. It's like moving from community college to the Ivy League, complete with higher expectations.