Agile VC

My idle thoughts on tech startups

Agile VC: 

My idle thoughts on tech startups

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I’ve been doing some thinking about the future of cars and the impact of the internet.  A large part of this is just some idle thoughts, a small part is driven by my love of cars, and a small part […]

Lee Hower
June 24, 2013 · 5  min.

When we meet with entrepreneurs and ask about their competitive advantage or special sauce, one of the common responses is first mover advantage.  “We’re the first company to do X in an rapidly growing market” or similar. I’ve always felt […]

Lee Hower
May 13, 2013 · 3  min.

It occurred to me that we usually refer to entrepreneurs associated with a startup as being “behind” the company or phenomenon.  As in Mark Zuckerberg, the Harvard drop-out behind Facebook or so-and-so, the folks behind startup X.  Upon further reflection […]

Lee Hower
April 2, 2013 · < 1  min.

Yesterday was Apple’s shareholder meeting and as many of you know, there’s obviously been healthy debate about what they should do with the ~$137 billion in cash they’re sitting on.  I had read somewhere that Apple’s cash pile was equivalent […]

Lee Hower
February 28, 2013 · 5  min.

I’ve been enjoying my iPad Mini for a couple months month now.  I thought seriously about getting a Nexus 7 (in fact gave one to my sister as a gift recently), but because I’m frequently on the go with intermittent […]

Lee Hower
January 31, 2013 · 3  min.

I’ve been using Google’s Chrome browser on my iPad Mini for about a month now.  There are several things I prefer over Apple’s Safari, including the bookmark and search history sync with my other Chrome usage (on laptop) and some […]

Lee Hower
January 3, 2013 · 2  min.

A little more inside baseball from the VC biz… why VC’s rarely make “crossover” investments, with capital from multiple funds the VC firm manages invested in a single startup (see note 1).  I was talking with an entrepreneur recently about […]

Lee Hower
December 6, 2012 · 5  min.

[This also appears as a guest post at PandoDaily] Over the weekend, I read Sarah Lacy’s PandoDaily article that the VC shakeout is taking too long.  It’s rather thoughtful and definitely worth reading if you haven’t had a chance to […]

Lee Hower
November 13, 2012 · 6  min.

The VC industry (both the GP part and the LP part) pays attention to the sector’s returns, but the broader tech ecosystem only occasionally tunes in.  Typically it’s when Cambridge Associates releases their benchmark data on the VC asset class […]

Lee Hower
October 23, 2012 · 4  min.

I had the pleasure of giving a talk on entrepreneurship at UPenn last week, which happens to be my alma mater.  I’m always thrilled to speak with undergraduates who are interested in startups.  One of the most common questions I […]

Lee Hower
October 5, 2012 · 4  min.