thedealvideo's videos

Jones Day's Simon on EBOs, seller paper, higher rollovers

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Despite yawning gaps in bid/ask prices and tight credit, private equity firms are getting deals done. In this edition of Inside the Deal, Jones Day partner Brette Simon says they are employing a handful of innovative deal structures to do so.

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Tags : Brette, Day, Jones, Private, Simone, busienss, equity

Harris Williams' Harris on middle market deals

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Middle market M&A dealflow is poised for a rebound in the second half of the year, says Harris Williams co-founder Hiter Harris in this edition of Inside The Deal. Harris explains to The Deal's middle market editor Nathaniel E. Baker, how a convergence of factors (a pent-up supply of deals along with strong demand from strategic and--particularly--financial buyers) have his firm believing the second half of 2009 will be vastly different from the first. See the video above or download this video at iTunes.

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Tags : &, Co, Harris, Hiter, M&A, Williams, business, equity, market, middle, private

Waiting for IPO: SecondMarket in the meantime

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In this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show, Barry Silbert, the CEO of SecondMarket, talks about how his company helps venture capitalists, early employees and other holders of private company stock achieve pre-IPO liquidity for their investments.

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Tags : Association, Capital, FirstMark, IPO, National, SecondMarket, SharesPost, Venture, market, venture-backed

Vanterra's Shad Azimi on PE's evolution

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The lack of credit and overall economic malaise are forcing changes in how private equity firms invest. In this edition of Inside the Deal, Shad Azimi, a managing partner with Vanterra Capital, says for one, PE firms are more often reaching the investment term limits of their mandates and in some cases, asking for extensions. In addition, he says, more firms are looking to create value through operational improvements, and are investing in management to make that happen. - Suzanne Stevens

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Tags : Azimi, Capital, M&A, Shad, Vanterra, business, equity, private

Dealflow declines, says Intel Capital's Sodhani

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Arvind Sodhani, who heads up Intel Capital, the computer chipmaker's venture capital arm, reports that fewer companies are seeking venture capital in the recession in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show. VCs are willing to invest, says Sodhani, but at lower valuations than many startups are willing to accept. Sodhani also discusses the effect that the until-recently nonexistent IPO market has had on Intel Capital's portfolio and on how recent innovations, such as SecondMarket's Private Company Market, may help investors get some liquidity from pre-IPO companies.

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Tags : Arvind, Capital, Intel, SecondMarket, Sodhani, business, capital, dealflow, startups, technology, valuations, venture

Apture helps media, one link at a time

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In this episode our Behind the Money online video show, Tristan Harris, co-founder and CEO of Apture Inc., tells The Deal how informal chats with fellow students at Stanford University, who happened to be world-class journalists, led to the birth of his San Mateo, Calif., startup. Apture, which has developed a clever technique for adding relevant links to Web pages and has attracted an impressive roster of customers, including the Washington Post Co., Reuters and the BBC, recently raised a $4.1 million Series A round led by early-stage venture capital firm Clearstone Venture Partners. Harris was introduced to the partners at Clearstone by JT Batson, head of business development for the Rubicon Project, a Los Angeles startup in Clearstone's portfolio. Click here for a Q&A with Clearstone partner David Stern on why the firm is backing Apture. The startup was seeded in the summer of 2007 with $500,000 from individual investors, including VMware Inc. (NYSE:VMW) CEO Paul Martiz, former Boston Globe executive vice president Steve Taylor and former Warburg Pincus managing director Beau Vrolyk. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can learn more about Apture and its funding here.) In the video, Tristan (pictured) says that Apture was hatched over informal conversations with Pam Maples, assistant managing editor of The Dallas Morning News, and Martin Turner, Americas bureau chief of the British Broadcasting Corp., both of whom were Stanford University Knight Fellows in 2006 when Harris was a Mayfield Fellow with the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. Watch the video below or download it on iTunes.

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Tags : Apture, City, Clearstone, David, Harris, Media, New, Partners, Startups, Stern, Tristan, Venture, York, media, technology

LLR Partners' Bullitt on private equity deals

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There are a number of opportunities for private equity firms to invest in companies through creative deal structures, Christian Bullitt, a partner at LLR Partners tells The Deal's Suzanne Stevens in this episode of Inside The Deal.

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Tags : Bullitt, Christian, LLR, Partners, business, equity, investing, private

Meredith Corp's John Zieser on PE frenemies

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Two years ago John Zieser rarely heard from private equity or venture capital firms interested in partnering on deals. Now, Zieser, who leads corporate development for the media company Meredith Corp, (NYSE:MDP) says he's having those conversations almost daily on both the traditional and new media side. And those discussion have resulted in deals. Recently Meredith - with holdings in digital, broadcast and print media, including Better Homes and Gardens, Fitness and More magazines - took at 20% stake in Real Girls Media Network alongside PE investors with an exclusive option to acquire the remaining 80%. It also aligned with the PE media fund Veronis Suhler Stevenson on early stage digital marketing and media investments. In this edition of Inside the Deal, Zieser says not only are PE and VC firms seeking strategic partners, they're structuring deals differently. "They are coming to us or other strategic partners and trying to do much more creative deals, which will not be around cost synergies or turnaround. They'll be more strategically structured." - Suzanne Stevens

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Tags : Corp., Deal, Inside, John, M&A, Meredith, Zieser, equity, magazine, media, newspapaer, private, technology, the

Calacanis, Karp on mistakes

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The 10th and final episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video series on Startup 2009 isn't exactly a "gag reel," but the folks interviewed at the competition do own up to some bloopers when they answer our question, "What's the biggest mistake you ever made as an entrepreneur?" Jason Calacanis regrets he didn't sell Silicon Alley Reporter at the peak of the dot-com bubble. Daniel Klaus wishes he understood it was OK to make mistakes back when he was 18 and founding his first record label, Passion Music Group, the catalog of which was bought by BMG Music in 1998. David Pakman, now a partner at venerated venture capital firm Venrock, negotiated a deal with AOL when he was co-founder of Myplay that was not only too expensive but also resulted in Yahoo! Inc.'s (NASDAQ:YHOO) rescinding its $200 million offer for the music startup, which was later bought by Bertelsmann AG for only $30 million. David Karp, the 22-year-old founder of multimedia microblogging service Tumblr Inc., got distracted by all the attention focused on the hot startup before he hired a president and other help. You can watch the video, below, or download it on iTunes. Also below are links to the other nine episodes in The Deal's Behind the Money Startup 2009 series.

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Tags : 2009, Bell, Calacanis, Charlie, Cheryl, Daniel, David, Dina, George, Ingrid, Jason, Kaplan, Karp, Kevin, Klaus, Michaelson, Milone, O'Donnell, Pakman, Ryan, Sounds, Startup, The, entrepreneurs, mistakes

Daniel Klaus knows how to read signals

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When David Pakman, the former CEO of eMusic who recently became a partner at Venrock, told The Deal he believes the best entrepreneurs are those who know how to read signals accurately and make changes accordingly, the first person we thought of was Daniel Klaus, the co-founder of Original Signal Recordings/Music Nation Inc. and our guest in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show. Klaus describes how the online video contest company he founded three years ago evolved into an independent record label that distributes Ingrid Michaelson and The Sounds, among others. Echoing Pakman's thoughts, Klaus says the secret was paying attention to which parts of the business were generating revenue and which weren't. The company's backers seem to like the change of plans. Original Signal recently raised a Series B (amount undisclosed) from Greylock Partners and Point Judith Capital, both of which led the company's $5.5 million Series A in January 2007. The label also signed a distribution and promotion agreement with Universal Motown Records, a division of Universal Music Group. (The Deal Pipeline subscribers can learn more here.) The videos with Klaus and Pakman were taped at Silicon Alley Insider's recent Startup 2009 competition. Watch the Klaus video below, or download it on iTunes. And be sure to watch the whole series (links provided below). - Mary Kathleen Flynn

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Tags : Capital, Daniel, Greylock, Ingrid, Judith, Klaus, Michaelson, Motown, Music, Nation, Original, Partners, Point, Recordings, Reocrds, Signal, Sounds, The, Universal

AlleyCorp's Kevin Ryan on the NYC startup ecosystem

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Kevin Ryan, one of the most highly respected leaders of the New York technology community, talks about the ecosystem that has grown up since the dot com early days, when he and business partner Dwight Merriman pioneered DoubleClick Inc., in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show. We spoke with Ryan at last week's Startup 2009 competition, which was co-hosted by New York's Silicon Alley Insider and Boston's General Catalyst Partners. Ryan may be best known for serving as CEO of online ad pioneer DoubleClick, which was sold to Hellman and Friedman LLC for $1.1 billion in 2005 and then sold for $3.1 billion to Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) in 2008. Today, Ryan and Merriman run AlleyCorp LLC, a network of affiliated startups that includes Silicon Alley Insider, 10Gen and Gilt Groupe. Click here to see our previous video interview with Kevin Ryan behind the scenes at AlleyCorp. And for more on the role he plays in Silicon Alley, read Gillian Reagan's profile of him in The New York Observer. Watch the new video with Ryan, below, or download it on iTunes. And please check out The Deal's other Startup 2009 videos: Click here to see our conversation with grand prize winner Cheryl Milone, founder of Article One Partners, moments after her victory; with finalist Path101 Inc. co-founder Charlie O'Donnell on why he sometimes wishes he never heard of venture capital; with Tumblr Inc. founder David Karp on how new hires have made him "happier"; with Jason Calacanis on Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales being a "poser," not an entrepreneur; with Blip.tv co-founder Dina Kaplan on the challenges New York's entrepreneurs face; with General Catalyst Partners' George Bell on why the VC firm co-sponsored the Startup 2009 contest; and with Venrock's David Pakman on how crucial it is for founders to read signals accurately. Still to come later this week in The Deal's Startup 2009 video series: our interview with Original Sig

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Tags : 10Gen, 2009, Alley, AlleyCorp, Blodget, Dwight, Gilt, Groupe, Henry, Insider, Kevin, Merriman, Ryan, Silicon, Startup

Mintz Levin's Papernik on closing the bid-ask gap

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The biggest obstacle to getting deals done in the current economic environment is not the lack of financing. It's the difficulty buyers and sellers are having coming together on price. So says says Joel Papernik, a partner with Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo LLP. "Valuation is the biggest factor" in the low levels of M&A we're seeing. That's no surprise to any dealmaker in the market right now. As we reported in our recent feature "Out of kilter," The three basic yardsticks dealmakers and investors have relied on to determine valuation -- comparisons with public company stock prices, comparisons with relevant transactions and a discounted cash flow analysis of the company itself -- simply aren't working well. Still, companies are finding ways to overcome wide gaps in bid-ask prices. In this edition of Inside the Deal, Papernik says some sellers are choosing to sell assets or equity rather than the entire company with the hope they can get a better price for down the road, and some transactions are being structured with price resets attached to outside indexes. - Suzanne Stevens

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Tags : Deal, Inside, Joel, Levin, Mintz, Papernik, the, valuation

Venrock's David Pakman on judging signals

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A founder's ability to "judge signals really well" is one of the most important traits Venrock partner David Pakman looks for when considering whether or not to invest in a startup, he says in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show, taped at Silicon Alley Insider's Startup 2009 contest last week.

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Tags : 2009, David, Pakman, Startup, Venrock, advice, capital, entrepreneurs, for, venture

Bell: Entrepreneurship alive & well in NYC

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"Entrepreneurship is alive and well in New York, as it is up and down the East Coast," General Catalyst Partners managing director George Bell says in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show.

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Tags : 2009, Alley, Bell, Blodget, Catalyst, Chris, General, George, Henry, Hughes, Insider, Partners, Silicon, Startup, capital, entrepreneurs, venture

Dina Kaplan: real estate prices stymie NYC startups

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Dina Kaplan, co-founder of Blip.tv, is one of a handful of young entrepreneurs who, over the last few years, have nurtured New York's tech community, which was feted this week at Internet Week New York. Kaplan's primary contribution has been Founders Club, an exclusive invite-only roaming party for startup CEOs, the most recent of which was held Thursday night atop a private roofdeck overlooking Rockefeller Center. The rest of us can enjoy the view through photos of last night's event taken by Mahalo.com founder Jason Calacanis, the original chronicler of the New York tech startup scene back in the dot com day when he founded Silicon Alley Reporter. We caught up with Kaplan earlier this week at Silicon Alley Insider's Startup 2009, where she shared a frank assessment of the challenges the tech community faces here, including the high price of real estate. Watch the new video below or download it on iTunes Check out our other Startup 2009 videos: with O'Donnell on why he sometimes wishes he never heard of venture capital; with Tumblr Inc. founder David Karp on how new hires have made him "happier;" with Calacanis on Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales being a "poser," not an entrepreneur and why entrepreneurs shouldn't give up; and with Article One Partners founder Cheryl Milone on winning Startup 2009. We'll have more next week when we publish conversations with Venrock's David Pakman and General Catalyst Partners' George Bell. Special thanks to my colleagues at The Deal for all their hard work producing these videos and stories we've run on Internet Week (in alphabetical order): Neil Buchalter (photo editor, video editor), Tom Groppe (executive producer), Chris Kwieraga (photo editor), Vipal Monga (director; video editor), George White (videographer, video editor, producer), Maria Woehr (audio technician, video editor, producer) and Brennen Wysong (copyeditor). -- Mary Kathleen Flynn

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Tags : 2009, Blip.tv, Club, Dina, Founders, Internet, Kaplan, New, Startup, Week, York, technology, video

Charlie O'Donnell: 'We're always raising money'

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Charlie O'Donnell tells us why he sometimes wishes he'd never heard of venture capital in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show. We spoke with the co-founder of Path101 Inc. soon after he presented at Silicon Alley Insider's Startup 2009 contest, in which his career development site was one of 10 finalists.

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Tags : 2009, Alley, Awards, Brad, Burnham, Charlie, Fred, Inc., O'Donnell, Path101, Silicon, Square, Startup, Union, Ventures, Wilson, capital, technology, venture

Tumblr's David Karp 'happier' since new hires

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"One of the things that has helped me the most, especially recently, is removing myself from the stuff I'm not good at and bringing in people to help," says David Karp, founder and CEO of Tumblr Inc., in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money video show. New hires at Tumblr include John Maloney as president and Jacob Bijani as creative director. "I'm much happier in my day-to-day work," says 22-year-old Karp (pictured). And as for Tumblr, "we're moving a lot faster than we have ever before." We asked Karp to share his experience and offer some advice to help other entrepreneurs just moments after he won the 2009 Silicon Alley Award for Most Loved Product or Service at Wednesday's Startup 2009 event, which was part of Internet Week New York. In the video, he also talks about the toll fundraising can take on a CEO, calling it a "mental sink." Karp recently raised a $4.5 million Series B from New York's Union Square Ventures and Boston's Spark Capital. (Click here to watch an earlier video with us where he talks about that process.) Watch the new video below or download it on iTunes. Also, check out our video with Mahalo.com founder Jason Calacanis, who mentions Karp as a twenty-something entrepreneur he admires, and our video with Cheryl Milone, founder of Article One Partners, which won the grand prize at Startup 2009, a $25,000 investment from Boston VC firm General Catalyst Partners. And stay tuned: We'll be posting several more videos from Startup 2009 Friday and next week, including one with General Catalyst partner George Bell, a judge in Wednesday's competition.

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Tags : 2009, Alley, Awards, David, Inc., Karp, Loved, Most, Product, Service, Silicon, Startup, Tumblr, advice, entrepreneurs, for, or, technology

Calacanis: Wales a 'poser,' not an entrepreneur

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"Jimmy Wales started his search company a year ago, and he was on the cover of Fast Company saying he's going to kill Google, and then he gave up after 11 or 12 months," says provocative serial entrepreneur Jason Calacanis, referring to the co-founder of Wikipedia in this episode of The Deal's Behind the Money video show. "That's not being an entrepreneur. That's being a poser." "I think you have to fight the fight for years and not give up; so I don't have a lot of respect for people who give up," Calacanis (pictured) tells The Deal. "I have a tremendous amount of respect for people who fight and fight and fight and then fail." Calacanis is no stranger to failure. As a teenager, he watched federal marshals show up with shotguns and close his family's bar in Brooklyn after his father failed to pay taxes. "I was 16, and I curled up in a ball and just cried," Calacanis told Silicon Alley Insider co-founder Henry Blodget at Startup 2009 on Wednesday, a few minutes before we interviewed Calacanis. When his media company Silicon Alley Reporter crumbled in 2001 along with the New York dot-coms it chronicled, he watched other founders go on yoga retreats, but he kept his nose to the grindstone. His efforts paid off in 2005 when he sold his pioneering blog network Weblogs Inc. to AOL LLC for $25 million. These days, Calacanis lives in Los Angeles and focuses on his search startup Mahalo.com. He demonstrated a new version of it at the NY Tech Meetup showcase for Internet Week New York on Tuesday evening. "I'm bullish on Silicon Alley, more than ever," he told The Deal, pointing to the mix of seasoned Internet entrepreneurs and talented 20-somethings here, including Kevin Ryan, co-founder of AlleyCorp, and John Borthwick, co-founder of Betaworks, in the first category and David Karp, founder of Tumblr Inc., and Charles Forman, founder of OMGPOP (previously known as Iminlikewithyou) in the second. Watch the video below

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Tags : 2009, Alley, AlleyCorp, Betaworks, Blodget, Borthwick, Calacanis, Charles, David, Forman, Henry, Inc., Insider, Internet, Jason, Jimmy, John, Karp, Kevin, OMGPOP, Ryan, Silicon, Startup, Tumblr, Wales, Week

Article One wins Silicon Alley Insider contest

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Article One Partners won Silicon Alley Insider's Startup 2009 contest, taking home the grand prize of $25,000 in venture capital from General Catalyst Partners and $75,000 in services. Article One founder and CEO Cheryl Milone spoke with The Deal's Mary Kathleen Flynn moments after winning in this special episode of The Deal's Behind the Money online video show. Watch the video interview below or download it at iTunes.

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Tags : 2009, Alley, Article, Business, Catalyst, Cheryl, Competitiion, General, Insider, Milone, One, Partners, Silicon, Startup, technology

GM bankrupcty: Gordian's Kaufman on government intervention

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The federal government's actions in the bankruptcies of Chrysler LLC and General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM) could have far-reaching implications for dealmaking. So says Peter Kaufman, president and head of restructuring and distressed M&A for Gordian Group LLC. According to Kaufman, a core tenet of bankruptcy is that there is "equitable sharing of the pain among the constituencies. Here I think you're going to find a compelling argument that there's been an inequitable sharing of the pain among the unsecured creditors." And that, says Kaufman, could make lenders think twice about providing capital to companies that could be a target of government involvement. See the video below or download it at iTunes.- Suzanne Stevens

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Tags : Chrysler, Detroit, General, Gordian, Group, Kaufman, Motors, Obama, Peter, administration, auto, bankruptcy, industry