NCET presents this special panel of experts who covers the why, what, when and how of startup financing. You'll hear from industry experts and startup investors who share insights on how to build and fund a successful business. Panelists include Doug Erwin, Kathie Priebe, Craig Macy and Kevin Lyon.

2. Doug Erwin
EDAWN
Kevin Lyon
Governance Sciences Group
Craig Macy
Fennemore Craig
Kathie Priebe
Reno Angels, Sierra Angels

3. Representative Funded Startup Details
Kevin Lyons 2016
Investment
Stage
Representative
Investors
Investment
Round Amount
Typical Stage Revenue
Status
Valuation
Bootstrapping Founders $1k to Any Idea to
Specifications
(or Any)
Pre-product
to Any
Any
Friends and
Family
$25k Pre-
Accelerators
$10k to $100k Specifications
to Thing
Pre-revenue $100k
to $1M
Pre-Seed Lead/Startup
Angels, $125k
Accelerators
$100k to $250k Thing to
Product
ARR $1+ or
Enterprise
Beta Users
$1M to
$5M
Seed (First) Micro VCs,
Generalist Angel
Groups
$500k to $1.5M Product to
Business
ARR $10k to
$100k+, clear
path to $1M
$6M to
$10M
Series A VCs $3M to $7M Business to
Growth
ARR $1M+ $15M to
$20M
• Minimum for outside funding is Specifications (“talk to 20 customers before any coding”)
• Founders have to know that they are making something people want

4. What Do Startups Need To Do Next?
• No Idea
• Why do you want to be an entrepreneur? (Its really hard…)
• Idea
• Pretotyping: What are the specifics of something people really want?
• Specifications
• Prototyping: Can I make the thing that people really want?
• Thing
• Selling: Can I sell something to some customers?
• Product
• Unit Sale Economics: Can I sell something profitably to customers?
• Business
• Scaling: Can I sell the same thing profitably to many customers?
• Scalable Business
• You made it! Now… can you grow even faster?
Kevin Lyons 2016

5. Startup Resources
• General
• YC Resources (read all) https://www.ycombinator.com/resources/
• YC Startup Playbook http://playbook.samaltman.com/
• Traction/Growth
• “the way to make your startup grow is to make something that users really love,
and then tell them about it” – Paul Graham
• Show that you can grow 5% to 7% a week
• Startup Basics
• http://genius.com/Paul-graham-lecture-3-counterintuitive-parts-of-startups-and-
how-to-have-ideas-annotated
• Full Overview (YC Curriculum for CS183B)
• http://genius.com/albums/Sam-altman/How-to-start-a-startup-cs183b
• Read a Classic
• http://web.stanford.edu/group/e145/cgi-
bin/winter/drupal/upload/handouts/Four_Steps.pdf
• Your Story
• http://bryce.vc/post/4085241146/the-anatomy-of-a-y-combinator-demo-day-pitch
Kevin Lyons 2016

6. Startup Investing Made Simple
• A startup is either
• Figuring out what people want
• Figuring out how to make what it knows people really want
• Making and selling something people really want
• Wasting everyone’s time
• Making something people may or may not want
• The core startup evaluation
• Will they figure out what people really want? (Team)
• Will they be able to make what they know people want? (Team)
• Will they be able to profitably make and sell what people want?
(Business Model/Traction)
• Will there be lots of people who (will) want it? (Raving
Customers/Market Size)
Kevin Lyons 2016

7. Simple Startup Investability Scorecard
• Use probabilities to score 1-7 from “No way” to “Already Have”
• Will they be able to figure out something people really want?
• No Way, Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Maybe, Likely, Very Likely, Already Have
• Will they be able to make what people really want?
• No Way, Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Maybe, Likely, Very Likely, Already Have
• Will they be able to sell what people want?
• No Way, Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Maybe, Likely, Very Likely, Already Have
• Will they be able to profitably sell what people want?
• No Way, Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Maybe, Likely, Very Likely, Already Have
• Will they be able to profitably sell lots of what people want?
• No Way, Very Unlikely, Unlikely, Maybe, Likely, Very Likely, Already Have
Kevin Lyons 2016

8. Resources
• Core
• “How to be an angel investor” (2009) http://www.paulgraham.com/angelinvesting.html
• “How to be an angel investor, Part 2” (2009) http://venturehacks.com/articles/angel
• “How to be an angel investor, Part 3” (2014) http://venturehacks.com/articles/angel-3
• Sam Altman (YC) Podcast: http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2014/07/sam_altman_on_s.html
• Questions to Ask
• http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/27/be-concise-the-top-questions-asked-at-a-y-combinator-interview/
• Financing
• SAAS Valuation http://codingvc.com/an-algorithm-for-seed-round-valuations
• General Startup Valuation http://codingvc.com/how-do-investors-value-pre-revenue-companies
• Terms http://www.feld.com/archives/2008/06/revisiting-the-term-sheet.html
• Product/Market Fit Metrics
• Zero to Traction http://andrewchen.co/zero-to-productmarket-fit-presentation/
• Team
• http://www.businessinsider.com/how-naval-ravikant-decides-what-to-invest-in-2015-8
• Comps
• SaaS Comps http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/2015-infographic/
• Saas Details http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/2015-saas-survey-part-1/ and part 2
Kevin Lyons 2016

9. Atlantis Casino Resort Spa
Sierra Innovations
Proposed Panelists