82016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal ALAM, RAE by aur Senn ty Coon sg arn tena lps kell some emg hk saben pacing ono cla tan oy ss Theotrtedby beater {lS Poa tat nec an at tos Ameer Lebbe MRICS,AAIQS,ACIArb, CCA-NACA ‘Alturath Engineering Consultants as Head of Contracts & Quantities Follow MAIN REASONS FOR THE FAILURE OF THE CONSTRUCTION CLAIMS Jan 29, 2016 | 1,395views 3 126 Likes ©) 22 Comments Construction Industry is famous for Claims. First and foremost is, the Word Claim is to be avoided and substituted with the word entitlement. Although there is no definition as such for Claim, the understanding in the construction circles is an Entitlement becomes a Claim only when there is a dispute. That is why pursuing a Claim in full or part or not at all is the management decision as the same has the potential to affect the future relations with the Clients. In Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 113552016 “The Watney Rule for Start.ps—and he Return tothe ‘Ola Normal contrast, pursuing an entitlement is not a management decision and it is part of the Construction professionals’ normal‘duty. Preparation of Entitlements There are no standard procedures for the preparation of entitlements as every entitlement is unique. One has to study the case very carefully and the preparation is for the worst case scenerio.Entitlement preparation for the sake of preparation shall always fail as the Claim specialists usually have a Check list in relation to the Claim before going into details, which usually have load of documentation. The first step in the preparation of Entitlements is to clear the check list and come to a state where there is an acceptance of the entitlement in principle without details. ‘The devil is always in the detail as the final amount cannot be easily resolved. That has to be left to the next stage as management has a role in such situation as certain matters have to be dropped altogether or partly in order to reach some kind of amicable settlement I regularly receive Contractors’ Claim for Extension of Time and Associated Costs for various projects, which incidentally forms around 50% of all global construction Claims. Most if not all are narration of events like stories with loads of documents to substantiate the stories. I also notice that in such situations most of the Contractors are using Preliminaries (General Items) as a base along with formulae for overheads, without realizing that Cost is defined as not only without profit but actual cost involved. This is in line with the principle that the damage to the Employer(This additional was not anticipated at the time of tender) to the barest minimum. The most important aspects of Claim preparation and acceptance by the Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 213552016 “The Watney Rule for Start.ps—and he Return tothe ‘Ola Normal Employer is the efforts and suitable actions that are taken by all parties to mitigate the delays.No Claim has ever succeeded in the past and shall not in the future without mitigation efforts to keep the damage to the barest minimum possible. This Employer concern, which is the spirit of any construction Contract has to be addressed. Narrating the events do not address that concern. Notices Notices, that too at the earliest possible is another factor in the preparation of Entitlements.So much so, that the Entitlements are rejected in certain Conditions of Contract on grounds of non submission of notices.Although, there is no definition as to what constitutes a notice,the spirit of practically all Conditions of Contract is that the Contractor is an experienced one in that field, capable to built for the intent and purpose,expected to keep the damage to the minimum possible, possible alternative solutions etc.comes into play in this aspect of Notice.Just sending a Notice letter is another narrative in the stories as mentioned above.A Notice should be able to play a role in the above said spirit of Contract.Then and only then it becomes a Notice in the context of preparation of entitlement. Construction Auditing Standards. Construction Claim Specialists are very fortunate that there no International Standards in Construction,to the extent that there are no standards as to how a Government funded project to be awarded , let alone others.We have reached this stage because the Construction Professionals have allowed Financial Accountants to continue the auditing of Government funded constructions. That is why we have no Post- Graduate Courses on Construction Auditing,No International Standards for Construction Auditing and no union Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 3652016 “The Watney Rule for Start.ps—and he Return tothe ‘Ola Normal for such auditors to have a process of evolution of such standards. That is why we are having world record losses owing to frauds on Government funded audited constructions,The estimated such loss by Transparency Internationals in 2008 was upwards of US $ 4 Trillion per year,ie. US $ 7.61 million per minute.Only God knows ,how much is now in the light of massive global Government constructions that are taking place. In the absence of such a mechanism,and a few case studies,the Claim specialists reach the stage,where your logic against the other and naturally the person with better logic and presentation wins the race.That is why,I was able to propose 68 nos. Global Construction Standards in my recent book titled “Handbook for Technical Auditors of the Construction Industry”. hope the same shall be useful in the preparation of entitlements. Finer Points of the game There is another aspects which is often overlooked by the Claim Specialists from the Employers’ side is the balance of power which is easily said as the benefits of the doubts goes to the weaker party.This becomes more prominent if the affected party takes the matter to litigation. As the preparation of Entitlements and winning same is usually a battle,the entitlement must be prepared well as mentioned before with barriers to safeguard from rejections.It is usually difficult to get the acceptance even after the best of preparations as at the end of the day,it involves parting with money. Giving an excape route,which is often difficult and sometimes impossible to the Contract Specialist, who checks the Entitlement shall go a long way in the acceptance of the Entitlements. Regards. Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 495ss2016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal A.L.M.Ameer. MRICS,AAIQS, ACIArb, CCA-NACA Author, Chartered Surveyor, Arbitrator & Certified Construction Auditor Books by A.L.M.Ameer Handbook for Technical Auditors of the Construction Industry. Published on 28.09.2015 by Notionpress,India. How To Be Successful At Interviews Published on 06.04.2015 by Notionpress, India. Irregularities,Frauds and The Necessity of Technical Auditing in Construction Industry Published on 17.07.2013 by Authorhouse,United Kingdom How To Win And Manage Construction Projects Published on 11.03.2013 by Authorhouse,United Kingdom Web : www.almameer.com. for details of books & amazon .com and publishers www.authorhouse.com , www.notionpress.com for the purchase of the books. Intpeulwwwlirkedin comipuseaney-rule-statups-eturm-a:normal-josh-kopelman 53582016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal Writen by Sm Ameer Lebbe MRICS,AAIQS,ACIArb, CCANACA | | flow Like Comment 126 likes 22 comments an a Add your comment Popular David Fryer. MRICS, MCICES 205 Head of Commercial Management at HOCHTIEF Solutions Middle East Qatar W.L.L Dear Ameer, Whilst | appreciate your point, | have to say that it is not always feasible to carry out an initial appraisal free of charge. | have handled several claims when entitlement or otherwise has not been apparent until a considerable amount forensic investigation has been completed. Am | supposed to carry that out for free. If I did that, I'm afraid I could not afford to buy your book. | don't mind spending 2 free hours carrying out a quick assessment but that would only throw up an indicative overview. The problem in the Middle East however is that Clients will hold you to that overview so you are really making a rod for your own back and for me, it is a situation best avoided. Like(2) Reply(1) 1 month ago Tushar Raut ICIOB and Rob Horne ge Ameer Lebbe MRICS,AAIQS,ACIArb, CCA- aM NACA AuTHOn 20 Atturath Engineering Consultants as Head of Contracts & Quantities | fully agree with you that no work is done free of charge, that too in the sphere of Claims. | appreciate your statement that substantial work has to be done initially in order to understand the case as you belong to a third part Claims specialist. Before a Claim is passed to a third party the In-house team is to prepare the documentation and should be in position to understand that there is \realistically a Claim before forwarding to the third party. 1 give below a case with box files containing so many documents. . Case One Claim for the Delay by the Employer in the Interim Payments. Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman82016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe Old Normal” | prepared a Check list with Payment, No. Date of Certification, Date of Payment due as per Clause X, payment due as per Breach of Employer as per Clause Y and Actual payment date and requested the Contractor to complete same. In the end, it was found that there were no breach by the Employer as the actual payments were made within the grace period( Clause Y) Therefore no Claim and no need to go through the documents. Uke 1 month ago Show More =~ Search for people, jobs, companies, and more ‘Advanced >.» = Home Profile My Network Jobs: Interests Business Services Goro Lynencom Return to The'Wainéy Rule forsiariips “~*~ Intpeulwa linkedin comipusehaney-rule-startups-eturm-anormal-josh-kopelman 715sans “evan Rte Ser—atteRaete aN —a4nd lo the “UI notte “Old Norma voshifaPaa016 | 57,629views & 337 Likes CG) 22Comments Daily Pulse: US Unemployment is Labotitla yeutea gt alMished a quarterly letter to our limited partners—in ChCP We Ralked about the risk that the “..industry as a whole will see a 3x decrease in returns...” and commented on some of the irrational behavior we Sirwegeseainginthemarkel Specifically, we focused on the changes to entry and a Queries —and how the sharp increase in entry prices over the last several years might impact returns for the venture asset class. How true Digital Equality can maRecently.there’s been a marked change in market sentiment—which has begurto impact startup valuations at every stage. Investors are beginning to realize that picking the right entry price makes the difference Dahebween'y! pleking #ereat company and generating great on Slack, Brazil Goes Nuts, C investment returns, And the market is waking up to the fact that many investors may have invested in great companies at inflated prices. Wheivén the sasiis 2h 0@lSation that’s occurring about the health of the market model ; right now, we thought it would be helpful to publish our latest letter to our limited partners—and we do so here, completely unedited. While we don’t Tp@aticipate making most future LP communications public, we did want to continue to publicly participate in this important discussion. February 25, 2016 Dear Limited Partner, We recently attended a board meeting of a First Round company that is Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman52016 “The Watney Rule for Start.ps—and he Return tothe ‘Ola Normal experiencing strong growth (while burning a lot of cash). During the meeting, there was a conversation about the rapidly changing funding landscape. And one of the company’s (bullish) later stage investors warned the founder that the company should no longer rely on raising additional follow-on financing, saying, “We need to act like we're Mark Watney in the Martian. We can’t assume we will get a shipment of new potatoes to save us.” The Watney Rule For Startups With a hat tip to Mitch Kapor, it’s clear that The Watney Rule for startups is rapidly becoming a new reality in the boardroom. Founders are realizing the need to rethink prior assumptions about prioritizing growth above all else, and are increasingly focusing on burn rate, profitability and the path toward self- sufficiency. Just ten months ago, in our quarterly LP letter we talked about the risk that the “...industry as a whole will see a 3x decrease in returns...” and commented on some of the irrational behavior we were seeing in the market, saying that we “worry that many investors (both VCs and LPs) are still sitting down at the metaphorical blackjack table—and they actually haven’t figured out (or been told) that the math has changed. And that’s a recipe for a bad night at the casino.” We even took the unprecedented step of publishing that letter—to share our concerns with the broader industry. While we are not about to join the experts who have been trying to call top on the market since 2004, it is clear that many VCs (and LPs) have begun to rethink their math in the attempt to avoid that “bad night at the casino.” There has been a marked shift in the capital markets surrounding technology startups. According to the Wall Street Journal, “Investors funded fewer U.S. startups in the fourth quarter than any period in more than four years. Since November, at least a dozen tech companies, which combined raised well over Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 3682016 ‘The Watney Rue fer Startups —are the Retr tthe ‘Old Neral $2 billion in venture funding, have announced layoffs, letting go hundreds of people that in most cases represented at least 15% of their staffs.” Recode reported on a recent report from CB insights: e Inthe third quarter of 2015, there were 72 $100 million equity funding rounds for VC-backed companies. In Q4, there were only 39 of those gigantic growth equity rounds. e There were only nine new unicorns birthed in the fourth quarter, versus 23 in Q3. e Deal-making activity in general fell to its lowest levels since the first quarter of 2013. We also see the shift reflected in founder sentiment about the availability of capital. In our recent State of Startups survey, we found that 95% of Series Seed, 97% of Series A and a whopping 99% of later stage founders feel that fundraising will get harder in 2016. And while 63% of founders surveyed felt that entrepreneurs had previously held the power in deal negotiations, only 46% felt that would still be the case over the next few years. The Bet That Founders Made The data shows a change in the market and calls into question the implicit bet that many founders have made over the past few years. Founders (and their investors) have assumed that their ability to access follow-on funding will remain fairly consistent and that the sole metric that matters is growth. Fundamentally, the venture model is simple. A startup raises venture capital to accelerate growth —with their VC's investment subsidizing short-term losses so that the company can focus on value creation for the long term. Implicit in this model are two core assumptions: Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 1035ss2016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal 1. That future investors care far more about growth than profits/burn 2. That if they grow fast, the company can rely on raising additional funding rounds—at a low cost of capital. For the last several years, these assumptions have been a fairly safe bet. Many founders have been able to raise venture capital, increase their burn rates to fuel growth, and then raise future financings at a higher valuation as a result of that growth. Over the course of the fourth quarter, we have seen signs that the core assumptions driving the late-stage funding market are starting to shift. We're seeing later-stage investors place far more focus on burn rate and profitability (or at least decreasing loss rates and a clear path to profitability) —and, as a result, it’s getting meaningfully harder (and more expensive) for many companies that have high-growth plans that entail big losses to access later-stage capital. We've seen several companies achieve ambitious growth plans, yet still find it challenging to raise follow-on capital due to concerns about high burn and the fundamental unit economics of the business. Obviously, there are many exceptions here. Some companies have grown so large, so fast (like Airbnb and Uber) that their ability to raise additional capital has not been impacted to date. Enterprise and consumer companies have different characteristics when it comes to cash profiles and funding needs.. But in general, we’re encouraging our later-stage companies to review their assumptions around their burn rates and their ability to access additional capital in the near-term. Many private companies are pursuing operating plans that are predicated on old assumptions —and we've encouraged them to review their plans under new market assumptions, and make changes where appropriate. Some might believe these changes represent a temporary “blip” in the capital Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 1198ss2016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal markets—and that valuations and funding will quickly bounce back. We do not. The Public / Private Market Dislocation For the last several years, there has been a massive dislocation between valuations of public companies and valuations of private companies. When Facebook went public and its stock dropped by 50%, Twitter's value actually increased in the private markets. When the public stock price of marketplace lenders (like LendingClub and OnDeck Capital) dropped, it somehow (magically) had little effect on the valuations of private marketplace lenders. This was a new—and scary phenomenon. It was as if promising baseball players in the minor leagues were suddenly able to earn a higher salary than veteran all-star players in the major leagues. Perhaps this was partially driven by the limited supply of promising high growth companies—which created an auction-type dynamic in which Greater Fool Theory drove prices. Or perhaps it was due to the fact that public companies trade every day (on good news and bad news), whereas private companies control when they trade (so they were able to have far more control of their valuation by only trading on good news). This temporary dislocation is rapidly being corrected. According to the WSJ, of the 48 venture-funded U.S. tech companies that went public since 2014, 35 now trade below their initial public offering prices. And as public tech SaaS companies experience multiple-compression, we are finally beginning to see impact valuation expectations for private companies. As Redpoint’s Tomasz Tunguz put it, “Fundraising is a train and the public markets are the locomotive. It can take a while for the public market's impact to be felt in the private markets, but there’s no denying the locomotive has halved its speed by more in 24 months.” While we haven't seen a meaningful drop in the number of seed stage companies raising capital (our Q4 was busier than our Q3, for example), we (and others) have seen a meaningful drop in founders’ valuation Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 135ss2016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal expectations—both at the seed stage and at the later-stage. We believe that starting in 2016, private and public companies will (once- again) begin to be valued in an increasingly consistent fashion. This change can (and will) be painful for many private companies. Companies that need to raise additional capital will have to price-test in the capital markets—and many will raise at lower prices than they previously did. And we worry that many private companies may unfortunately find that there is no market- clearing price at which they can obtain additional investment. While some founders are responding aggressively to the market changes, many are not. Entrepreneurs, by nature, are optimists—it’s why they are successful. But unchecked optimism can be a founder’s Achilles heel. There is an entire generation of founders (and funders) who have only experienced one kind of market—the boomtime market of the last eight years. They have never experienced a downturn, and many believe that this is just a temporary blip. Some even believe that the venture capitalists who are blogging and tweeting about the market downturn are doing so in a deliberate attempt to drive valuations down (disregarding, of course, the impact that lower prices will have on that VC’s existing portfolio). We have been working aggressively to help coach our founders on the realities (and consequences) of market cycles. Indeed, at our CEO Summit last October we featured a talk on the ‘lessons learned’ by a founder whose company “hit the wall” in the 2000 dot com crash. A key difference between today and prior tech market corrections is the fact that today’s valuation adjustments often happen in public— whereas before 2010, most private companies valuations were kept private. Indeed, before Facebook, it was extremely rare for a private company to publish their valuation. In the past few years, however, we've seen many private companies Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 1305asc018 ‘The Waey Rule Strtps— al Ren the’ Old Neal announce their valuation as a badge of distinction to help attract customers, press and employees. The fact that these private-company valuations are now shared with the public—combined with mutual-fund investors like Fidelity and T Rowe publishing monthly valuations on these companies —means that any valuation correction will happen in the glaring spotlight of the entire industry, exacerbating the negative impact. A Return to the ‘Old Normal’ We clearly don’t believe that we at First Round are the only people who have noticed these changes. There has been a marked increase in the number of venture capitalists writing insightful blog posts talking about the changes in the market—and warning of a “new normal”. Yet, while we agree with their observations on the market changes —we don’t believe this is the “new” normal. Rather, we think (and hope that) this is a return to the “old normal.” A recognition that the >3x increase in valuations (and the metrics they were based on) over the last few years had gotten ahead of reality. As a result, investors will change their lens from focusing solely on revenues and growth to also look at unit economics and burn rate. Founders will begin to make changes in core operating principles and resource allocation that might impact the lives of hundreds or even thousands of dedicated employees, vendors and customers. And ultimately, stronger companies will result. Don’t get me wrong, evolving from a unicorn into a cockroach will be extremely painful—but just like Mark Watney on Mars, the sooner you realize the situation on the ground has changed, the more time you have to “science the shit out of the problem” and succeed. In each of our quarterly letters for the past several years, we have included a warning that “we are seeing companies raise follow-on financing rounds at much higher prices than we have seen before” and “we expect that several of Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 103852016 “The Watney Rule for Start.ps—and he Return tothe ‘Ola Normal our companies will end up being marked down over time (with many potentially being written off entirely).” We’ve modified this warning (somewhat) in this letter, as market volatility and uncertainty causes the industry to question later-stage valuations. Market prices have a tendency to swing too far at either end of a cycle. We continue to try our best to conservatively value our companies at a price that, we believe, represents their current fair market value—but recognize that this is difficult to do in a rapidly changing market. Our Approach While many in the market might be waking up to the new “math” of venture investing, we have been focused on this for quite some time. So we don’t expect to see any massive change to our investing strategy or pace in the coming quarters. We don’t anticipate sitting out the market. As we said in our Qi 2015 letter, “We believe that great companies emerge during both boom times and bust times —and that sticking to our investment model (and strategy) is especially important during both ends of the cycle... Great companies can be started in any market, and we have tried to remain disciplined (in an undisciplined market) and focused on the two numbers that matter: entry price and exit price.” We continue to deploy capital in new investments, especially as market valuations begin to approach “old-normal” prices. Given our expectation that follow-on financing will be harder to raise, we are paying close attention to the runway and milestones of our new investments—along with the quality of co- investors in our syndicates to ensure adequate capitalization. For follow-on investments, we are tactically shifting to a more defensive posture—being a little more cautious in seeking out opportunities to buy up in companies so we can ensure adequate reserves to protect our core positions should the market continue to deteriorate. Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 1905ss2016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal Fund Performance Attached you will find our fund Scorecards containing Gross and Net fund performance, as well as a summary of the publicly reported quarterly activity in each fund. While we are happy with (most of) our funds’ performances, we want to stress that most of the valuation increases are “unrealized,” and until these companies end up in the “realized” column (through IPO, M&A or secondary sales) the valuations are just paper increases. Our valuation policy requires us to value our portfolio companies based on market prices—and in today’s market we are seeing increased market volatility, resulting in increased uncertainty about appropriate valuations for later-stage companies. Past experience has shown that valuations can change significantly over time—and despite our best efforts,we expect that several of our portfolio companies will continue to be marked down over time (with many potentially being written off entirely). Warm Regards, The First Round Partners Here’s the original version of the letter. Feel free to share or embed: Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 199582016 “The Watney Rule fer Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal 4040 Locust Steat Philadephia PA 19104 vw festround com pets} (CONFIDENTIAL February 25, 2016 Dear First Round Limited Pastner, We recently attended a board meating of a First Round company thats experiencing siong grauth (while ‘burning a lotof cash). During the meatng, thre was a conversation about the rapily changing funding landscape, And ane ofthe company’ (bullish) later stage invastare warned the founder thatthe company ‘should no longer ely on raising additonal folow-on francing, saying "We nood to act ike wee Mark Watney in he Martian, We caritassume we will gota shipment of new potatoes to save us.” ‘The Watney Rule For Startups Wit ahat tip Mich Kapor, i's lear that The Watney Rule for startups is rapidly becoming anew realtyin the boardroom. Founders aro realizing the need to rethink prior assumptions about pririzing grow above all (ls9, and are increasingly focusing on burn rate, profitably and the path toward salt-sulfiioncy Jus on months ago, in our quarterly LP letter we talked about the Ask thatthe “industy as a whole wil soe 2 ‘Sxdecrease in returns.” and commanted on same of the iratianal behavior we were seeing in the market, ‘saying thal we Worry that many investors (both VCs and LPs) are sil siting down atthe metaphorical blackjack table ~ and they actualy haven" figured out (or been tod) thatthe math has changed. And that's recipe fora bad night atthe casio.” We even took the unprecedented stop of publishing that eter —to share ‘ur conceme wih the raader industry While we are not about to join the experts who have been tying fo call on on fhe marke since 2004, iis clear thatmany VCs (and LPs) hava bagum to rethink ther math in fhe atlempt to avoid that bad night the casino.” ‘Thera has been a marked ahi ine capital market suroundng technology stanups, According tothe Wa Stsst Journal, "vests funded fewer U.S. startups inthe fourth quater than any period n mere than four years. Since November atleast a dozentech companies, which combined raised well over $2 ballon in venture funding, have rnounced layafs, ting go hundreds of people that in most cases represented atleast 15% of estat ‘Racode reparted on @reaeat repent rom CB insights ‘Inte thea quarter of 2015, thee wore 72 $100 muon equity funding rounds fr VC-backed companies. Q4, ere were ony 39 of those @gante growth equty rounds + There were only nine new uncom birthed inthe four quarter, veraus 23 3. + Deatmating acivty in general fl ots lowest lavels since the frst quater of 2013, We alsa 2oe the sit reflected in founder sentiment abaultthe avalatlty of capital, In our recent Stale af ‘Starune suvev. we found that 95% of Series Saed. 97% of Series Aand a whomaina 99% of later stage Featured In Barking & Finance, Economy, VC & Private Equity, Editor's Picks, Entrepreneurship Q were =e] Like Comment 337 likes 32 comments Intpeulwwlirkedin comipuseainey-rule-statups-eturmanormal-jsh-kopelman 73582016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal Add your comment Popular ~ Janine Darling Founder & CEO of STASH -The Solution to Data Theft - 2015 Brava Leadership Award - 2016 Tech Company To Watch Common sense by another name. ‘As someone who had the good fortune to learn the brillant Les Wexner model of growth economics at the master's side, (forecast realistically, ‘spend money on what matters, every penny (yes, every. penny.) counts, look at your numbers every single day, trends are evident in days and weeks, not months and years, use your gut, take well- considered risk), and last, most importantly, the gravy train doesn't always make a stop at your station each year, so save some gravy or sometimes go hungry, it is interesting that this inflated valuation trend and subsequent fat rounds of financing continued for so long, The West Coast Investor mentality- ‘grow fast, grow big, = guaranteed success story/revenues later’ vs the East Coast Investor - "how are you getting to black, how fast, and how’ has always been fascinating to me. ‘As an East Coast company, the only thing | am envious about is how much money my company would have made for those Investors that invested humongous amounts of growth capital in companies that always expected more and that proof of the pudding was always a can kick down the road We are a ‘new’ new disruptive innovation with an Executive Team that runs on the "Old Normal" model. Making money by spending money wisely the center of it all; we all make money when the company does, we don't otherwise Seems simple enough. And fair to a fault. Another common sense-ism to close: if it seems too good to be true, it almost always is, Like(5) Reply(1) 6 hours ago Margaret Paton (formerly Jakovac), Kathy Graham, Andy Hawkins, +2 Mark van der Hoek Telecom Design Engineer Ill at Sprint Standing ovation! Like(3) 5 hours ago Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 1935ss2016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal ® Bruce Ryan, Kathy Graham, and Andy Hawkins Show More y *. ( 9 _ Isabelle Roughol Follow a” Memational editor. Linkedin ¢ "Curious by profession!" Daily Pulse: US Unemployment is Low but Fewer People are Changing Jobs, Herbalife Fudged its Numbers, China to Lay Off Millions Mar 4, 2016 | 16,008views 394Likes ©) 29Comments82016 “The Watney Rule for Startups —and the Return tothe ‘Old Normal It must have already been a month since I last wrote this: it's jobs day. The US added 242,000 jobs in February, just above economists’ expectations. Unemployment stayed at its eight-year low of 4.9%. Job market fluidity is on the decline, though — minus 10% to 15% since the 1980s — according to some interesting Fed research, with people more hesitant to leave their jobs and getting fewer outsider offers. That helps explain (partly) why wages aren't budging much. (It also contradicts the image of a Millennial generation eager to switch jobs and more disloyal than its elders...) The decrease in job market fluidity appears correlated to a decrease in trust in our fellow man. Happy Friday. Costco is the latest retailer to raise its minimum wage in a bid to attract and retain talent. Store workers will make at least $13 an hour starting next month, the first across-the-board raise in nine years. Herbalife isn't nearly as popular as it claimed. The company cut its 2015 customer growth report in half, saying a database error had caused its executives to make false statements to shareholders. The stock dropped 7 percent on Thursday. The herbal supplement company has already drawn the Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman82016 ‘The Watney Rue fer Startups —are the Retr tthe ‘Old Neral scrutiny of the FTC and the ire of activist investor Bill Ackman, who calls it a pyramid scheme. #Chart Google searches for the term "move to Canada" this week in the US. We've heard it before but people actually rarely do. Iran has invited Boeing to come by for a visit. Tehran wants help modernizing its commercial aircraft fleet and has already signed deals with Airbus and other manufacturers. That's exactly the kind of opportunities the US envisioned when it agreed to a détente with Iran; if anything comes out of the talks, it'd be the biggest Iran-US business deal in 30 years. The 1.8 million layoffs China announced may be just the tip of the iceberg. Reuters reports that the country could lay off in the next couple years as many as 6 million workers in state-owned enterprises, the backbone of the economy, where the government invested fast and big but which are now at overcapacity. That's 17% of state sector employees. This culling of so- called zombie firms is, Reuters writes, "China's boldest retrenchment program in almost two decades." To lighten its debt, China also intends to bundle billions of dollars in bad loans and sell them to foreign investors. The Financial Times calls it "subprime derivatives on steroids." Intpeulwa linkedin comipuseaney-rule-startups-eturm-a-norma-josh-kopelman 21135asc018 “Tha Watney Ruler Srbes—ie Retin othaOld Namal Cover Art: I doubt many of you noticed (I didn't) but we just celebrated World Wildlife Day. Enjoy an African zebra, pictured yesterday at a zoo in Dehiwala, near the Sri Lankan capital Colombo. (ISHARA KODIKARA/AFP/Getty Images) aasee What you may have missed — and really should read: © Tech is disrupting even Mom-and-Pop pizzerias. e Healthcare systems operate totally in the dark. ¢ How Netflix rewired our brains. Missed the last update? Catch up: Apple Gets Plenty of Tech Support, An Obamacare Milestone, Yahoo Yard Sale We're also on Twitter and Facebook. Follow us. 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