20VC: Can Founders Really Trust Their VC & How To Navigate The Acquisition Process Successfully with Josh Felser, Co-Founder @ Freestyle.vc

Josh Felser is a Co-Founder and General Partner at Freestyle, one of SF’s leading early stage seed funds with investments in the likes of About.me, Airtable, Intercom and Patreon just to name a few. As for Josh, prior to being in VC with Freestyle, Josh started two successful Internet companies, Spinner and Grouper/Crackle, which were acquired by AOL Time Warner and Sony for $320 million and $65 million, respectively.

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In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) How Josh made the transition from the world of startups to founding Freestyle?

2.) Can founders really trust their VC? What is the sign that you can and then cannot trust your VC? How does this depend on the differing stages?

3.) When is the right time for founders to throw in the towel and sell? What are the signs? Is it the role of the board member to encourage and push the founder forward?

4.) Josh has said before that ‘companies are sold and not bought’. What does he mean by this? How can founders optimize the acquisition process in terms of the dialogue with the acquirer? How should they approach the topic of valuation? How can they create a sense of urgency? Who are the certain stakeholders they must be talking to?

5.) How has Josh seen himself develop as a board member? What have been the inflection points in his learnings? What are the core components that make up a great board member?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Josh’s Fave Book: Snowcrash

Josh’s Fave Blog: Five Best Ideas of The Day: The Aspen Institute

Josh’s Most Recent Investment: Carbon Robotics

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Josh on Twitter here!

Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC.

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