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Browse: Home / Mark Suster

Mark Suster

Mark Suster

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2x startup Founder & CEO who has gone to the Dark Side of VC. His first company, BuildOnline was sold in 2005, his second, Koral was acquired by Salesforce.com and became known as Salesforce Content, while Mark served as VP Product Management. In 2007 Mark joined GRP Partners in 2007 as a General Partner.  He focuses on early-stage technology companies, usually looking at Series A investment, and blogs at the aptly titled Both Sides of the Table.

Be Careful Not to Lose Twice

Be Careful Not to Lose Twice

By Mark Suster on July 5, 2018

There are times to fight. No great startup has been built without getting one’s knuckles bloody at times. This is especially true because incumbents now know how much is at stake when they let a startup get a huge head start in a market. So if you’re in a battle, if you’re right, if you […]

Posted in Featured Posts, Trends & Concepts | Tagged life | 1 Response

What Can You Learn From Ring’s Astounding Success?

What Can You Learn From Ring’s Astounding Success?

By Mark Suster on April 20, 2018

Many people will write the history on why Ring became an enormously successful company and why it became a real-world unicorn in a world when many startups are anointed that merely on paper. Since I had a ringside seat to the company before it really existed all the way through the end I thought I’d […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged Internet of Things, Security

Why We Must Have Zero Tolerance for Sexual Misconduct in Venture Capital

Why We Must Have Zero Tolerance for Sexual Misconduct in Venture Capital

By Mark Suster on December 26, 2017

Time Magazine published its “person of the year” edition  and honored “the silence breakers” for speaking up and forcing our society to confront its position towards men in power exploiting their power for sexual gain. Real change is clearly needed. These brave women who have taken on personal risks and faced doubters to change the […]

Posted in Featured Posts, Trends & Concepts | Tagged feminism

What Happens When Startups Turn from Their Innovation Stage to Operational Excellence?

What Happens When Startups Turn from Their Innovation Stage to Operational Excellence?

By Mark Suster on November 15, 2017

Nearly every successful tech startup I’ve observed over the past 20 years has gone through a similar growth pattern: Innovate, systematize then scale operations. An alternate outcome that I also unfortunately observer in some cases are companies who had extreme early success with an initial product adoption but failed in key areas that limited the […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged startup

One Small Change I Made That Improved My Daily Mental State

One Small Change I Made That Improved My Daily Mental State

By Mark Suster on November 2, 2017

We all have a pretty good idea about things that drag down our productivity or suck up time that would be better spent on more fulfilling activities. Two years ago I made a commitment to stop bringing my mobile phone into my bedroom and with like a 95% compliance rate this made a big improvement. […]

Posted in Application Software, Featured Posts, Trends & Concepts | Tagged social media

Why the Former President of Nickelodeon Joined mitú as CEO.

Why the Former President of Nickelodeon Joined mitú as CEO.

By Mark Suster on September 20, 2017

I am beyond excited to announce the Herb Scannell has agreed to move from NYC to Los Angeles to take on the role of CEO at mitú, the fast growing Latino digital media company, serving more than 100 million monthly unique viewers. Herb is a Puerto-Rican American media executive who was previously the President of […]

Posted in Business | Tagged latinos

Want to Really Understand What all the Hype of Cryptocurrency is About?

Want to Really Understand What all the Hype of Cryptocurrency is About?

By Mark Suster on September 19, 2017

If you read the headlines you may well think cryptocurrencies are a either a radically new way of paying that is our savior from ossified, corrupt governments or on the other side that they are speculative Ponzi schemes. The reality of course is that cryptocurrencies can be both and can be liberating and corrupting at […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts, Technology | Tagged bitcoin

What Do Boards Actually Do?

What Do Boards Actually Do?

By Mark Suster on August 29, 2017

There’s a lot of mystique about what happens at board meetings and a lot of imagined board-room drama. I read commentary or Twitter or blogs and realize that there are also strongly held convictions that there are these evil VCs who do terrible things to mostly altruistic founders. The image of boards and of investors […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged startup

Details of Upfront Ventures New $400 Million Fund

Details of Upfront Ventures New $400 Million Fund

By Mark Suster on July 6, 2017

I am so proud and humbled to be able to formally announce that Upfront Ventures has raised its 6th venture capital fund in the past 21 years. Upfront VI is our latest core fund and is $400 million to invest in early stage entrepreneurs. This brings our combined funds under management to nearly $2 billion. […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged venture capital

What is the Right Burn Rate for your Startup?

What is the Right Burn Rate for your Startup?

By Mark Suster on June 30, 2017

One of the hardest decisions entrepreneurs make when they start a company and raise outside capital is figuring out what an acceptable “burn rate” is. That is, how much should your company be willing to lose in cash every month as you make investments in staff and equipment that funds technology, sales, marketing and management. […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged startup

Should Startups Care About Profitability?

Should Startups Care About Profitability?

By Mark Suster on June 26, 2017

There are certain topics that even some of the smartest people I talk with who aren’t startup oriented can’t fully grok. One of them is whether profitability matters. It’s common cocktail party chatter to hear people confidently pronounce that some well known startup is sure to blow up because, “How could they succeed when they’re […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged startup

Getting Your Head in the Game for Fund Raising

Getting Your Head in the Game for Fund Raising

By Mark Suster on May 5, 2017

When you run a startup you’re always on borrowed time. You have cash in the bank, a monthly burn rate and a “cash out” date that few in the company truly comprehend. I’ve never met a founder who wasn’t acutely aware of his or her ticking time bomb and the sense that failure and humiliation […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged startup, venture capital

How MakeSpace Recently Closed $30 million in New Funding

How MakeSpace Recently Closed $30 million in New Funding

By Mark Suster on May 4, 2017

Just over a year ago I wrote about how MakeSpace had raised $17.5 million in capital to build out its operations in 4 cities: New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington D.C. I pointed out that the storage market in the US alone is ~$30 billion / year and there is no dominant provider — the […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged on-demand, startup

How Glenn Beck Won the Audience Over at the Upfront Summit

How Glenn Beck Won the Audience Over at the Upfront Summit

By Mark Suster on February 6, 2017

  If you asked me a year ago when we were hosting the 2016 Upfront Summit the odds of Glenn Beck speaking at the next Summit I would have emphatically said ZERO. The first sign that there might be more to Glenn Beck than the impressions I had had from occasionally watching a clip from […]

Posted in Featured Posts, Trends & Concepts | Tagged 2016-election, politics

Let Me Point out to you How Ridiculous the Trump Tech Meeting Was

Let Me Point out to you How Ridiculous the Trump Tech Meeting Was

By Mark Suster on December 14, 2016

A room full of some of the top tech leaders in our country: Apple, Facebook, Cisco, Intel, Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, Amazon, Tesla and so forth. It’s a breath of fresh air to see that Marc Benioff, who has become a beacon for protecting the rights of our most vulnerable citizens, is not in attendance. But […]

Posted in Business, Featured Posts | Tagged donald-trump, politics

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