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Venture capitalist and television commentator Paul Kedrosky asks a tantalizing question in his post about whether or not the strange things that a few successful startup companies (Zynga, Twitter and Yelp) have been doing lately are a harbinger of a tech IPO boom in 2010.  He could be right, since the stranger things have happened:

Read the post here

Cheers,

Don Jones

VentureDeal

Good post from an entrepreneur who became a venture capitalist on one aspect of what makes a good entrepreneur:

Tenacity

Cheers,

Don Jones

VentureDeal

After a few quarters of a significant reduction in venture capital funding activity and fund closings, it looks like activity is beginning to pick up again.

During Q2 and Q3, there were an average of 5-7 daily funding announcements.  During Q4, the average has bumped up to 8-10.  Even after allowing for seasonal variations, the increase in activity is unmistakable.

We are also seeing more venture capital firms actually get their fund-raising closed so that they can begin to make investments in new companies.  For the previous few quarters, there were a number of VCs that had received commitments of approximately half of their target, but had not closed.  Now we are seeing more venture capital firms close those funds.

Lastly, M&A activity is picking up as well, with some of the large acquirers such as Google and Cisco stepping up their acquisition deal volume.  Deal quality still remains spotty, with a number of asset purchases interspersed with operating company acquisitions, but the trend is definitely improving.

Cheers,

Don Jones

VentureDeal

Short but good post from one of the partners at First Round Capital, a prominent Internet venture capital firm.  The post basically says that they view marketing as a central and strategic aspect of any company they consider investing in, not as a "bolt on" afterthought.

Read article here

Cheers,

Don Jones

VentureDeal