FundersClub Weekly Newsletter - June 8, 2017

FundersClub Portfolio News

Jerrod Engelberg of FundersClub will host a Q&A on FC Live with Adam Draper of Boost VC on June 13th. Submit questions and RSVP for the event here: Q&A with Adam Draper of Boost VC — FundersClub Live Series.

Le Tote announces the launch of Olivia Culpo x Le Tote, a summer capsule collection that marks a milestone for Culpo as the debut of her first-ever collection in "Olivia Culpo and Le Tote Launch Exclusive Design Collaboration."

Bellabeat is set to release a smart water bottle, Spring, to ensure you provide your body with the optimum level of hydration based on your activity levels, sleep, sensitivity to stress, and monthly cycle in "Stay hydrated with Bellabeat’s new smart water bottle."

Suiteness, the only place where members easily get online access to the most exclusive and luxurious hotel suites, is used by InStyle Magazine on the 10th Anniversary of Gossip Girl to book a suite at Lotte New York Palace to experience the life of Serena van der Woodsen for one night in "I Lived Like Serena van der Woodsen for One Night; Here’s What Happened."

SeamlessMD’s mobile patient engagement and care management system is now being used by the Montreal Heart Institute (MHI), Canada’s largest cardiac center, and it is the first cardiac center in North America to use the technology in "Montreal Heart Institute deploys patient engagement tools from SeamlessMD."

TerrAvion integrates with The Climate Corporation, a subsidiary of Monsanto Company, to deliver valuable, high-resolution imagery to farmers through their digital agriculture platform in "The Climate Corporation Partners with Advanced Aerial Imagery Providers to Deliver Deeper Crop Analysis Tools for Farmers."

Oohlala focuses on helping students feel connected to their institutions, peers and professors through a user-friendly app that unifies and centralizes university information, events, resources and more in "Montreal tech company Oohlala Mobile tackles college-dropout problem."

Waggl joins forces with the University of Phoenix® RedFlint™ experience center in downtown Las Vegas to incorporate its pulse survey technology in connection with RedFlint's workshops in "Waggl Joins Forces with University of Phoenix® RedFlint™ Experience Center."

Investor Thoughts

Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint Ventures dives into how figuring out how to become an apprentice is key to developing great judgement in "Apprenticeship."

Albert Wenger of Union Square Ventures uses probability laws to make the argument that if you want to assume maximum uncertainty, you should assume that the price is equally likely to go up as it is to go down, using bitcoin as an example in "Uncertainty Wednesday: Entropy (Cont’d)."

Anthony Pompliano of Full Tilt Capital chats with Harry Stebbings of The 20 Minute VC about why check size and follow on decision-making does not matter, why intelligence is overrated, and why you should do everything you can to make other people successful in "20VC with Anthony Pompliano, Founding Partner @ Full Tilt Capital."

Brad Feld of Foundry Group connects walking lightly with non-attachment, and shares a related quote from Island by Aldous Huxley in "Learn To Do Everything Lightly."

Dustin Rosen of Wonder Ventures shares three key elements of micro-traction that founders can demonstrate to create funding momentum before meaningful revenue or customer growth in "What to Do When “Seed” Investors Ask to See More Traction."

Jeremy Liew of Lightspeed Ventures introduces the show “Planet of the Apps” that debuts this week on Apple Music in "That time I went on screen with Jessica Alba and Gwyneth Paltrow…"

Ross Baird and Bidisha Bhattacharyya of Village Capital share their framework, called the VIRAL (Venture Investment-Readiness and Awareness Levels) Pathway, that helps entrepreneurs and investors use the same language at the top of the funnel in "Why Most Entrepreneurs Hate Fundraising — And How to Fix It."

Founder and Operator Thoughts

Brian Armstrong of Coinbase (FC Portfolio) outlines their long-term strategy for accelerating the world’s shift to an open financial system in "What is Coinbase’s strategy?"

Kyle Killion of Suiteness (FC Portfolio) analyzes how hotels can compete in the new accommodation economy where the likes of Airbnb and HomeAway have been chipping away at the hospitality sector’s total addressable market in "How hotels can compete in the new accommodation economy."

Erik Voorhees of ShapeShift.io (FC Portfolio) chats with P. H. Madore of Hacked about their new venture, Prism, which is a trustless means of holding multiple assets, and also the blocksize debate in "Podcast #1: Erik Voorhees from ShapeShift.io Talks About New Trustless Asset Portfolio Prism."

Andrew Chen of Uber highlights how your growth strategy changes from being a small startup versus becoming a larger company in "Startups and big cos should approach growth differently (Video)."

Ogi Kavazovic of Flatiron Health identifies the two most common ways B2B product orgs get stuck and explains why enterprise software PMs need to let go of what they’ve been taught to build more successful teams in "Dear PMs, It's Time to Rethink Agile at Enterprise Startups."

Jason Lemkin of SaaStr draws upon his experience closing what are now 10+ year customers to share some key take-aways he has learned in "The 10+ Year Customer."

CB Insights analyzes the explosion of activity in the auto tech space and lists some of the highlights in "The Road Ahead: 6 Trends Shaping The Future of Auto Tech."

Ryan Ridley of Rick and Morty talks about the sci-fi elements of the show, their new VR game Virtual Rick-ality, and his advice for creators in "Rick and Morty Writer: Ryan Ridley."

Jessica Baker of Achieve Unite shares some considerations to take to get you off the starting block and headed in the right direction the first time using a channel strategy in "Getting Your Business Ready for the Channel."

In Other News

Yahoo Inc. shareholders today approved the company's pending sale of its core internet business to Verizon Communications Inc. for $4.48 billion, with an expected close of the deal on June 13th in "Yahoo shareholders approve sale of core business to Verizon."

Snap Inc. is the most-shorted tech IPO of the year, as more traders are betting the stock will fall, and investors are skeptical that the company can grow quickly enough to justify its valuation (now at about $22 billion) in "Snap Is Year's Most-Shorted Tech IPO Before Lockup Ends."

Did You Know?

Did you know that ants can lift 20 times their own body weight?

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