Tag: case studies

Do you track liquidation scenarios in your startup?

February 1, 2011
Fred Wilson has had a series of posts relating to M&A transactions, generally revolving around case studies. This one on ChiliSoft describes how certain features embedded in the capitalization table (liquidation preferences and floating price warrants), coupled with being acquired...
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Harvesting net operating losses avoids double losses

October 7, 2010
The NYT displayed some confusion about finance realities in this older column about net operating losses, a perennial “favorite” topic of ours. We’ve done some complex planning (aka invent new deal structures) for a corporation and its shareholders that held...
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What do I “do” with due diligence?

August 9, 2010
Here’s a recent post by Rick Colosimo in the Five-Minute General Counsel series on due diligence, with an even shorter short form due diligence request list than our own investor-based due diligence list. One question we haven’t answered here yet...
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Which kind of business are you building?

August 8, 2010
I’ve often thought that there are two kinds of businesses: those that make money from providing more value to customers, and those that make money from providing less value to their customers. This brief article describes 5 grocery store ripoffs....
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How to build your business during slow times

March 27, 2009
(NB: This is a revised repost from Rick’s blog. We realized it might be helpful here.) This recent Seth Godin post was another timely suggestion from him. He seems to really have a finger on the pulse of what is...
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NOLs can be hard to understand

February 23, 2009
Net operating losses, or NOLs, accumulate when a business has tax losses in a given year rather than profits. They are typically carried back to earlier profits but may be accumulated in as carry-forwards for up to 20 years. Sirius,...
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Clear examples of weighted-average analysis

December 9, 2008
When we start discussing our heavy usage of weighted averages with customers, we sometimes get a questioning look, until we make the analysis more concrete for them. People are very familiar with using averages; equity analysts regularly look at numbers...
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