Time. 'Ecosystem' #28
A weekly guide on tech news and early stage fundraising. Aiming to open access to venture capital for less networked founders and junior VCs.
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Hello and welcome to issue #28!
Time. There’s a 80% chance you are time poor. Yes, four out of five adults report the N of tasks they have to do > the time to do them. Time poverty is dangerous as it’s linked to lower physical/mental health and productivity (read more on the topic in this HBS working paper). Global wealth has risen over the last decade but material affluence has not translated into time affluence.
‘We have more time for leisure than we did fifty years ago. But leisure has never been less relaxing.’ - Ashley Whillans (Assistant Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School)
Technology saves us time, but it also takes it away. The author of the above whitepaper refers to this concept as ‘time confetti’ - little bits of seconds and minutes lost to unproductive multitasking; which also fragments our leisure time. Stress spurs busyness, which creates stress, which spurs busyness.
‘To get a sense of how you shred your time, consider this simple calculation. You have one hour of leisure at 7 p.m. During that hour, you receive two emails, check both, and respond to one; four Twitter notifications about useless pontificating or terrible people saying terrible things, and you thumb through the replies for one of them; three Slack notifications from colleagues asking you questions or a favor, of which you answer one and ignore two; one alarm reminding you to call your mother tomorrow on her birthday; and four texts from a friend trying to make plans for next weekend, all four of which you reply to.’
We all have the same 24 hours in a day. How to we move from a state of being ‘time poor’ to ‘time affluent’ according to Ashley?
Be proactive about putting blocks of time into your calendar (‘focus time’) to limit external distractions
Proactively seek opportunities to ‘fund time’ - use money to outsource unpleasant activities (ie in personal life, household chores)
Be deliberate with your time. Minimize time spent on meaningless activities you can easily control (ie doomscrolling on social media)
‘No matter what time affluence looks like for you, the happiest and most time affluent among us are deliberate with their free time, intentionally carving out more meaningful moments each day.’
Time is a perishable commodity and the ability to use time wisely is one of the most valuable skills anyone (regardless of their role but especially those working in high-pressure environments) can have in their productivity arsenal. What is your relationship with time?
‘A busy mind accelerates the perceived passage of time. Buy more time by cultivating peace of mind… So I have no time for short-term things: dinners with people I won’t see again, tedious ceremonies to please tedious people, traveling to places that I wouldn’t go to on vacation.’ - Naval Ravikant, Co-Founder, AngelList
In light of everything above, taking a moment to share how much I appreciate you are choosing to spend valuable moments of your day reading this newsletter!
Enjoy the weekend and until next week! 👋
#EcosystemGiants
It is a pleasure to welcome Tessy Antony de Nassau (formerly Princess Tessy of Luxembourg), Co-Founder, Human Highness & Philanthropist as the next #EcosystemGiants guest! A conversation about the challenges female entrepreneurs face, building a network, competition between women (especially in male-dominated industries!) and growing an impact business. Tune in at 5pm GMT (6pm CET) on Tuesday 2 February 2021. RSVP here.
Supported by community partners:
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Innovation Ecosystem Updates
Whether you are an investor, a founder, an operator, a corporate or a friend. The top news stories this week you may find of interest.
Trending. What is going on on the stock market? Does the game ever stop? A summary 👇
“Hedge funds have scaled back the size of their bets in the stock market in recent days after volatility caused by groups of amateur traders pushed up shares in companies such as GameStop and inflicted heavy losses on some high-profile firms.”
Hedge funds retreated in face of day-trader onslaught (FT) Robinhood blocked retail investors from purchasing stock (Vice). (Twitter) drama (NPR). Robinhood’s CEO Vlad Tenev spoke up to deny the trading platform is facing liquidity issues (Reuters), claiming it limited buying in GameStop to ‘protect the firm and protect our customers’ (CNN video). The saga continued as Robinhood raised an emergency infusion of more than $1BN in a matter of hours to help meet surging cash demands stemming from frenzied trading (WSJ). GameStop (GME) ended the week up 400% (Bloomberg). And in the meantime Robinhood bans expanded to include restrictions on 50 stocks (InvestorPlace) Can you keep up? A roundup on how a video game chain was dragged into the war on Wall Street (FT). Why is it significant and what it means for the investment landscape going forward? ‘The GameStop story is pushback against Wall Street establishment’ - as discussed by Chamath Palihapitiya (CEO of Social Capital) via CNBC.
How Europe fell behind on vaccines (Politico). Is a vaccine trade war brewing? (Unherd) Instagram no longer an optional marketing tool for restaurants to reach customers (Eater).
Sustainability. Iron Man goes green: Robert Downey Jr. launches ESG-focused VC funds (Fortune). ‘We Have Entered the Climate Decade’ - an excellent essay on why the long boom of climate tech is just getting started by Andrew Beebe (Managing Director, Obvious Ventures)
IPOs and exits. Website building and hosting service Squarespace files to go public (Business Insider). WeWork eyeing public SPAC debut in deal that could be worth $10BN (Business Insider). Another female-led company may be going public - Jessica Alba’s Honest files confidentially for IPO (Bloomberg). UK’s largest domestic IPO since September 2020 - bootmaker Dr. Martens raised $1.8BN in an initial public offering (stock surged 22% on first day of trading) via Bloomberg. And more UK news - online greeting-card retailer Moonpig plans to raise up to $524M in its London IPO (Bloomberg).
HR and finance software provider Workday acquires SaaS employee success platform Peakon, for roughly $700 million in cash (Tech.EU). German software firm SAP is buying Berlin business process automation startup Signavio (deal reportedly worth about $1.2BN) via Techcrunch. Twitter acquires newsletter platform Revue (Digital Information World). The 5-year-old Dutch startup only had 5 employees and previously raised just $318K in funding!
Massive rounds. Brazil-based neobank Nubank raises a blockbuster $400M series G round at a post-money valuation of $25BN (up from $10BN in 2019) via Techcrunch. Cloud-scheduling platform Calendly banks a whopping $350M round (only prior funding to date was a $550K round in 2014!) at a valuation of $3BN+ (Techcrunch). Just a few months after launching its first product, online checkout company Fast secures $102M in new funding led by payments giant Stripe (CNBC). Israeli startup DriveNets lands $208M, and over $1B valuation with an alternative approach to networking software (GeekTime). European news. Finnish food delivery scale-up Wolt gets $530M(Sifted). German Remagine raises €20M to finance high-growth and impact-led startups (Pitchbook).
Wins for women. A SPAC to be founded and funded by women : serial entrepreneur Katherine Power and Dana Settle, founding partner at Greycroft.👏 After a successful public listing, Powered Brands aims to be the next global beauty conglomerate (CNBC). New Walgreens CEO Roz Brewer will be the only Black woman chief executive in Fortune 500 (Fortune). 👏 Joanne Chen became the first woman GP at 26-year old Silicon Valley Venture firm Foundation Capital since founder Kathryn Gould (Techcrunch). 👏 Two new female partners at Sapphire - congrats to Cathy Gao and Laura Thompson 👏 👏 New Enterprise Associates (backers of female-led companies like The Wing and Goop) appoint Ann Bordetsky (experienced tech operator) as a Partner and Sheila Lirio Marcelo (founder of Care.com) as a Venture Partner. 👏 👏
Funder
Reid Hoffman (Partner, Greylock) on building a great startup board - part two. The essay covers how to choose your board members, why startup boards will be more diverse in the future, and insights from the fantastic board members he’s worked with.
Beata Klein, Associate, Creandum shares her advice on what makes a good fundraising financial plan
Kyle Poyar (VP of Growth, OpenView)’s tips on pricing and packaging for SaaS companies (as shared during a portfolio workshop with Lerer Hippeau, OpenView, Primary Venture Partners and Work-Bench). + A very detailed analysis & pricing insights from 2,200 SaaS companies
Founder
How to raise £1M in 20 minutes? Dan Murray-Serter (Co-Founder, Heights) on a record-breaking crowdfund
Phil Libin (Founder, Evernote & Founder and CEO, mmhmm) on building billion-dollar companies, hiring / retaining the best talent and mastering the art of delegation
Chrissy Cowdrey (Founder and CEO, Stagger) provides the blueprint of a cold email that works
Twitter Highlight (s)
Neal Khosla, Co-Founder, Curai and Koko
Startup of the week
Send a gift as easily as a text
Goody is the easiest way to send gifts to the people you care about - no matter the distance (you don’t need to enter their address!). Payment is only processed when the recipient accepts your present. Virtual unwrapping experience included.
Tweet @Goodygifting to share they were featured in ‘Ecosystem’!
I would love to hear from founders working on products/services that advance one or more of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Are you building a purpose-driven startup I should know about?
Startup Go-to Resources
A Guide to B2B Tech Branding - a 'must-read' whitepaper by Battery Ventures
An extensive collection of resources for product builders and leaders - covering product-market fit, metrics and growth, hiring and more (done by Deepka Rana, Investment Manager, Northzone)
From a $550k first raise to a $350M second raise? Pofitability from day one, a simple yet viral product - Tope Awotona on building Calendly
VC 101: The Angel Investor's Guide to Startup Investing How to develop an effective fundraising deck? Invaluable advice by Vinod Khosla (Founder, Khosla Ventures) to help you pitch the way VCs think
Want to break into VC? A step-by-step guide
A list of 30 podcasts to help you on your entrepreneurial journey
Raising Your Round - a useful guide by Sahil Lavingia (Founder, Gumroad)
100+ Fundraising and Development Resources for Black, Latinx, and Women Founders
Thank you for reading another ‘Ecosystem’ newsletter! What feedback do you have for me (likes/dislikes)? I would greatly appreciate if you share this with contacts (founders, tech operators & investors) who may find the content helpful🖤