Lance Owide

I don't go in for 'building in public' in general, but every now and then I think it's worth sharing what I'm seeing in the market. The below graph shows the average time to close a deal over time at EmergeOne and you can see that this has been creeping up since last year (adjusted for seasonality) and is currently close to 3 months to close a deal. So what's happening? Well, I was recently at an CFO event where we got a bit of a data driven view into the state of private markets. Some key points that came out: 🏷️ Median post money at Series A has dropped from 80m USD in 21/22 to 65m USD in 2024. This is still up from 40m from circa 2020. ％ Top quartile is significantly over at 107m. 📈 Series B median post money is $137m, top quartile $287m USD, but bottom quartile significantly struggling. 🚀 Deal velocity has slowed but started recovering. 💰 Lots of deals are happening but not priced - bridges abound. So how does this therefore relate to what we're seeing in terms of time to close? Firstly, we are a consultancy providing fractional CFO support to venture backed tech startups typically post Seed and pre Series A so this data reflects what we are generally seeing in the market as well. But the two main issues that are seemingly impacting our numbers are around deal velocity and bridge financing. There are simply fewer deals being done and they are taking longer to close, so the volume of potential clients we can target has dropped significantly. This does, however, mean that the quality of deals we're working on is significantly higher this year. Secondly, as companies struggle to raise priced rounds, they are raising lower amounts of capital on convertibles. This impacts us as CFOs are only truly valuable when there is a significant balance sheet to manage, less capital = less need for CFOs and hence the decision as to when to bring us in gets pushed out. But equally, that insecurity over funds means that founders are much more hesitant to make significant hiring decisions, prioritising hires that can directly influence revenue / traction in the near term. But they also know that they need the support so are often waiting for the 'magic moment' where they hit an inflection point that gives them confidence to pull the trigger. Outside of the deal data, we are also seeing venture indexing towards more R&D heavy businesses (life science, hardware etc.) and these sort of companies are often not commercialising for several years. They have security over spend and regard finance as a future problem. We are seeing a lot of companies approaching Series B without anyone in finance, deferring that decision till they close. But we are also seeing leads come through from a multitude of sources proving there is appetite for strong commercially minded CFOs to support and grow these scaling businesses. So as the market stabilises, I would expect to see these numbers come back. Business wouldn't be any fun if it was all easy, would it?!

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Voodoo didn’t buy BeReal for €500MM. Per reporting, the cash consideration in Voodoo’s acquisition of BeReal is €166MM, with the remainder of the €500MM “valuation” being paid out if performance targets are met in an earn-out. I don’t think that Voodoo’s acquisition of BeReal is motivated by cross promotion. Voodoo states that BeReal features 40MM “active users,” which is vague. I’d estimate BeReal has MAU in the 5-10MM range, with the 40MM number representing a longer timeline. This isn’t enough MAU to justify the price solely on the basis of cross promotion, especially given that BeReal’s MAU is likely stagnant. Further, Voodoo’s own social media app, Wizz, is growing faster than BeReal in the US: it sits at Top Downloaded rank #17 in the Social Networking category vs. 27 for BeReal. The CEO of Wizz, Voodoo’s social media app, will become the CEO of BeReal. My sense is that Voodoo may integrate the functionality of BeReal into Wizz at some point to accommodate BeReal’s core demographic and serve a larger TAM. If cross promotion does factor into the equation, it’s likely from games into the social media properties. Voodoo is a much more valuable company with a scaled social media property than an operator of a hybridcasual gaming portfolio, the titles in which are volatile from a growth perspective (see the chart below). BeReal was something of a gimmick, and it may work better as a feature than a standalone app. If Voodoo can use BeReal’s core mechanic to grow Wizz into a scaled social media property, with strong retention and long-term engagement, it can pair its existing advertising infrastructure with Wizz to service ads not just in its social media footprint but against an audience network across its published titles. But in the meantime, I’d expect traffic to move from Voodoo’s games to Wizz as it scales that property.

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This year is all about survival. I've seen enough data to call it. Multiple reports are showing Flat -> No growth. Wayflyer/Iris Finance report had Q1 overall growth at +4% YoY. Common Thread Collective Index has same store sales flat YoY. What does this mean? This year is about survival. The industry as a whole isn’t growing. We can blame this on whatever we want. But the outcome remains the same. Instead of obsessing about your topline growth. (Which is a steep mountain to climb.) Focusing on growing your bottom line. In a low topline growth year, spend time becoming more profitable. 100% YoY growth doesn’t do you any good if you’re out of biz in 2 years. The goal needs to be surviving to 2025. #shopify

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Most GTM pros we meet have very little saved in their pension. (Especially when this is compared against their total earnings in recent years). Why? Default contribution= a small % of basic salary. Most Ent. AEs today have a £200k OTE (£100k base). Let's assume you pay in 5% of your basic + employer pays 5%. That's £10k / year. But you consistently hit your number and overachieve. Last few years - £200k, £250k, £220k etc. Every year, you've only paid in £10k (10% of your basic). Imagine this over 10, 15, 20 years. We often find very successful, senior ICs and leaders with only a £200k - £300k in their pensions. Never enough to retire on. Focus early. Less tax. Save more.

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We shipped 20 new product features last quarter at Unify 🚀 That's a new feature every 4 days. I'm insanely proud of what Connor, Hyewon, Solomon, Sam, Fabian, Devin and Noah got done in such a short amount of time. Here's what we shipped. Email deliverability was a focus: 1) Integrate domains and let us monitor DKIM, DMARC, SPF and more  2) Mailbox creation - create new mailboxes in 2 clicks without needing IT  3) Mailbox warming - warm up to 5 inboxes per user 4) IP addresses - we manage your IP infrastructure so you don't need to figure out Sendgrid We made huge improvements to our sequencing product which was bare bones at the beginning of the quarter: 5) Send test emails 6) Email signature management 7) Replies are now visible 8) Write activities to Salesforce when we send emails 9 Added the ability to pause / resume a sequence 10) Real-time email bounce checks - never reach out to someone with an invalid email again 11) Sequence performance metrics Core product improvements: 12) Faster audiences and higher playbook stability by migrating to elastic search  13) Person-level website intent  14) Activity streams - see all intent and activities in one newsfeed-like experience 15) LinkedIn CSV enrichment - upload a list of linkedin profiles and we will find you emails + phone numbers 16) Starring - pin your favorite audiences/playbooks/sequences for easy access 17) Folders to organize your audiences/playbooks/sequences 18) Ignore exclusions if you choose to 19) Export audiences as CSVs 20) Improved Salesforce sync stability At our last board meeting, we shared what we shipped since the board meeting 86 days prior. We do this to keep ourselves accountable. Try Unify for yourself here today: https://lnkd.in/g_qysQSV

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Nice overview of how we're using data to inform how we invest in early-stage founders. We'll be announcing more this summer but we're seeing some really interesting early data. https://lnkd.in/exU_Juf5

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🎯 Having ridden many startup rollercoaster ups and downs, and worked with both phenomenal and , shall we say, “not helpful” VCs, I’ll say the ride or die VCs are the best. 💡For founders nearing end of runway and not seeing the progress needed for a next raise, I’ll add two insights: 1️⃣ Ride or die doesn’t always mean “We’ll support a bridge round.” Sometimes it’s a VC already on your cap table offering you this wise counsel: “Maybe now’s the time to wrap things up with grace.” 2️⃣ Wise counsel from VCs doesn’t always come from those on, or wanting to be on, your cap table. Sometimes it comes from those just wanting to support you as a founder. 🌱 One of the most awesome things I ever heard from a VC was: “I would never invest in this, but I’m a fan of YOU, and I can’t wait to see what you do next. That’s why I took this call.” For me, that VC was Leslie Feinzaig. And that counsel has kept me more motivated that she probably knows. Thank you Leslie for being the OG advocate for female founders! 💐

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Urgency. It’s the most valuable thing any seller wants to create in their pipeline. Unfortunately that means a lot of inexperienced sellers use ‘urgency tactics’ that fall short. Things like ‘pending price rises’. Or ‘we’re running out of stock’. Or ‘we’re so busy now we aren’t sure we can hit your timelines unless you buy from us today’. It often doesn’t work because buyers are smart. Sure if the above is absolutely true, they may work. But the best time to drive urgency is actually through the discovery. Darcy J Smyth taught me a legendary question that actually works. You can check it out here: https://lnkd.in/g4vqiYTg #urgency #salestraining #discoveryquestion

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One of our clients told me that he was at an RIA conference and everyone there was... ... frustrated with their broader stack. Without going through procurement to find the top solutions, here’s what the modern RIA stack looks like: ◉ 1°) Hadrius - Compliance ↳  An all-in-one compliance platform which combines comms review & archiving (1), marketing review (2), firm oversight and Code of Ethics (3), attestation/disclosures (4) & much more - all in one place. ◉ 2°) Nitrogen (Riskalyze) - Risk Assessment ↳ From lead generation to risk tolerance quantification, Nitrogen covers it all and provides portfolio analytics as well. ◉ 3°) Wealthbox - CRM ↳ Wealthbox is a modern CRM for Financial Advisors. It is more convenient than Salesforce or HubSpot and easier to use than traditional financial CRMs. ◉ 4°) Powder - Sales and Onboarding ↳ Powder's AI driven platform makes onboarding new clients easier than ever! ◉ 5°) Slack - Communications ↳ Slack is the perfect communication tool for modern RIAs to talk with your team and also with your clients. ◉ 6°) Zoom - Communications ↳ Zoom has strong recording capabilities to never miss key moments and integrates well with other tools. ◉ 7°) Fireflies.ai - Communications ↳ The perfect tool to summarize each call you have, whether on Zoom or not, and to get an easily searchable, actionable transcript. ------- Ready to take your firm’s compliance up a notch? Send me a DM on LinkedIn & activate the 🔔 for more content like this!

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On 22nd Feb, Dan Siroker and I disagreed about funding round dilution on Twitter. In this episode we hash it out 🥊 ❌ Fundraising rules that are BS 🗣️ What VC’s really mean & want 💸 Getting Peter Fenton to invest for less than 10% My key lessons from winning this fight 👇 1. The Importance of Focus I worked on thousands of things at my first company & thought everything was important. In hindsight, there were only 3 or 4 things that made a difference. Founders need to distinguish between which tasks are truly important & focus on them. 2. The Big Secret When An Investor Asks How Much Are You Raising? They are actually asking how much you think you’re worth. Instead of giving a number, say you’re selling a certain percentage & letting the market decide the valuation. This annoys investors because they don’t get what they want. 3. Elad Gil on When and How to Pivot  The things that work tend to work really fast. Sticking it out & being perseverant doesn’t always work. You have to see some glimmer of hope in the early days. 4. Contrarian View on Selling Stock as Employees Founders should let employees sell their stock at any point. I’ve let my employees sell up to 25% when we were oversubscribed in our series A. My theory is more liquidity = more retention. 5. When They Bring up Title It Is a Bad Sign It shows you where their values are. The best people I’ve hired never brought up titles during the interview. They care about the problem & the company. 6. Why Always Be Raising is Total BS You need to have an on & off switch on fundraising. I have all my investor meetings in a week every two quarters. This removes any distractions when I’m building the company. 7. The Best Question Peter Fenton Asks Founders "What will excite you about being at this business in five years?" Great founders need to be perseverant. They have to stay in love with the business in 5, 10, or 20 years. (links in comments) #founder #funding #business #investing #vc #venturecapital #entrepreneur #startup #seed #funding #fundraising

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What do you do? Such a simple question, yet I've struggled to answer it clearly for 5 years. Had another crack at it yesterday morning with a group of fellow founders. The 'fractional' term confuses a lot of people As a CFO, do I sell an outcome? A state of mind? Are the reports I provide the product? Or the conversations? Questions I continue to wrestle with. "Helping people navigate the business growth curve" is the shortest way I explain it currently. It hints at the forward-facing and ambitious nature of most of my conversations. Q: What should I put as the tagline for my new biz cards: a) "Navigate the business growth curve with ease" b) "Clarity on numbers. Clear strategy. Regular accountability. " c) Any other ideas?

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Fundraising? This one metric will significantly impact your valuation 👇 ARR. Annual recurring revenue is the north star. This is why: Valuation is driven by cash flows from profits. Current and future. 1️⃣ Profit does not work for high growth SaaS companies: Nature of a SaaS business model is back-ended. You spend money to acquire a customer upfront, with the margin being recouped over the life-time of the customer. 2️⃣ CAC Payback kills short-term profit: As a growing start up, you are acquiring customers at a rapid pace, resulting in a consistent loss with future cash flows to be recouped. 3️⃣ Proxy for “Future Profits”: ARR is a strong (and more stable) proxy for future profits and thus valuation. How do you calculate your ARR: Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) - Monthly Recurring Revenue Churn (MRR Churn) x 12 months = ARR ********************************** 🤔 Was this helpful? ♻️ Re-share it for a fellow founder that may also be fundraising #VentureCapital #Startups #Fundraising #Investors #StartupFinance

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Valuable insight from a founder turned investor 💡 Give ethan austin a follow - he regularly shares details surrounding fundraising hurtles founders may face and how to overcome them. Timing ⏱️ - the hurdle you may not even know you are facing. #fundraising #venturcapital #founders #startups #vcfunding

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Seed rounds seem hotter than ever, but Series A rounds are getting scarcer and stingier. So what’s going on? My take is that the market has split in two. The NASDAQ and S&P are flying based on AI optimism, but the rest of the market has been pretty sideways. That’s translated into private markets. All the enthusiasm for SaaS has evaporated and been replaced with love for AI. This is disproportionally benefiting earlier companies because more of them fit the AI thesis, and they have nice, clean cap tables. But it’s also creating some idiosyncratic valuation issues. I saw a commentator say that Series A companies need to be hitting 400% annual growth and $4 mm ARR on a 1x Cash conversion score to raise a Series A right now. They might be right, but that only applies to non-AI startups who are struggling to fit into any investor thesis at all. AI startups are raising without metrics that don’t even come close to that. So where does this all end? Well - based on the marketing materials I’ve seen for funds, it seems that almost all the new capital being raised has an AI thesis to it (even in the defense space, which is... controversial and maybe terrifying….). That probably means this dynamic is likely here to stay. But unlike other hype cycles, like sharing economies (which required a whole new business model) and blockchain (which required a totally new code base), LLMs seem relatively easy to incorporate. To the extent that they help solve a customer pain point better, everyone can be an AI startup. So my guess is that AI or not, the buzzy crop of AI startups in YC will go through the same painful process of finding product market fit. It’ll be hard to find customers. It’ll be hard to make a great product. And it’ll be hard to charge the prices they need to. And while they are working through that, some decade old marketing/legal tech company that knows their market really really well is gonna be using AI to roll out the features their customers have been requesting for years - and making good money from it

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One thing that I've changed my opinion on due to the last 12 months of intense deal hunting: A good banker can make or break an exit - or change the outcome for a founder by more than 30%+++ A lot of founders will say that it comes down to the fundamentals of a business but I disagree after having interacted with 10+ bankers & brokers the past 12 months. A banker has a HUGE say on the outcome. Choose wisely. Do reference calls.

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Maybe the Fed will cut rates this year if we tell them "Don't" ? 😉 Serious note - Retail Sales was way above expectations showing consumer strength. However - we want to see April's number as Easter fell in March this year. And when adjusted for inflation - all numbers show limited to no growth...paying more, not buying more. My old stomping ground, NY, is struggling in manufacturing - numbers remain contractionary #interestrates #mortgage #economy #fedpolicy #retailsales #housing

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Steve from sales wants to buy (insert latest shiny software solution here) confident it will transform his team's performance. Throwing tools at problems is like buying a V12 engine for your Yugo (those born after '95 may have to look that one up). No matter how powerful the engine, it won't transform your clunker into a high-performance machine. The same principle applies to software tools. Too often, tech leaders rush to buy the latest software, hoping it will magically solve their problems. But without a solid foundation of well-designed processes, even the best tools will fail to deliver results. Here are three reasons why you should always optimize your processes before buying new software: 1. "Foundation First" - Establishing Robust Processes Before Integration Without a solid foundation, even the most advanced tools can't perform to their full potential. ✔ Audit Existing Processes: Regularly review current workflows and identify pain points that need addressing before introducing new tools. ✔ Involve Your Team: Gather input from those who are 'on the ground' to understand the practical challenges and needs before deciding on any tool. ✔ Prioritize Adaptability: Opt for processes that are flexible and can easily integrate new tools in the future without major disruptions. 🚫 Gotcha: Don’t over-engineer processes that restrict agility. A too-rigid process can be as damaging as a poor tool. 2. "Process-Driven Purchasing" - Align Tool Acquisition with Established Needs Buying tools should be a decision driven by clearly identified process needs, not the other way around. ✔ Needs Analysis: Clearly define what you need from a tool based on your process deficiencies to avoid impulse buys. ✔ Cost-Benefit Analysis: Assess the potential ROI of a tool based on how well it fits into your existing processes. ✔ Trial Runs: Use demos and trial periods to see how well a new tool can be embedded into your current operations. 🚫 Gotcha: Avoid the allure of features that look good on paper but offer little value to your existing processes. #3 "Cultural Compatibility" - Ensuring Tools Fit the Team’s Workflow check the comments ⤵ As leaders, we're often tempted to collect tools like a child collects rocks—each one more exciting than the last. It's not about having the most or the shiniest rocks, but about choosing the ones that serve a specific function in the collection. By placing process before tools, you make sure each tool serves a purpose and truly improve your team's capabilities. The best leaders don’t just gather tools—they build systems. Let your leadership style be more like crafting a well-oiled machine rather than filling a toolbox.

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Founders, If you're in the fundraising game.... You know there's a phase I like to call 'the gap.' It's that tricky period between getting a verbal nod from an investor and actually seeing the funds hit your account. Verbal commitments are great, but they don't always guarantee a closed deal. Here's how I handle this to keep things moving smoothly: Be Prepared to Act Fast: As soon as you get a verbal commitment, make the next steps as easy as possible for your investor. Any delays on your part can open the door for them to reconsider. Set Clear Deadlines: Make sure your investors know exactly when the round is closing. Setting a firm deadline for contributions helps keep everyone on schedule. Keep the Lines Open: Follow up with your investors regularly. Make sure they have all the information they need and gently remind them of the deadlines. And a little tip for peace of mind. Don't count your chickens before they hatch. Hold off on the celebration until the funds are securely in your bank. That's when you know you've really crossed the finish line. ✌️ #venturecapital #vcfunding #entrepreneurship #familyoffice #raisingcapital #fundraising #growth #startups #startupcommunity #startupecosystem #startupfunding

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