We know that getting started is the biggest challenge for new businesses.

Accelerator programs exist to squeeze a year or more worth of the startup journey into a 6-12 week timeframe, literally accelerating the business. They help take startups MVP to growth. Some accelerators provide funding for equity.

A wealthy investor who meets certain SEC requirements for net worth and income.

An accredited investor who invests their own money in a startup. They operate solo or in smaller groups (as opposed to larger VCs) and usually focus on early-stage startups.

Defense against dilution: these provisions are designed to protect investors by issuing them additional shares in future funding rounds or by lowering the conversion price for their preferred shares, thus giving them more common shares.

The VC is the management, and they’re sitting on top of a whole pile of money; this is the money that they have available for venture investments.

Starting a business with money and resources from the founders’ own pockets.

An office space setting for remote workers and entrepreneurs to get out of the house and work (also a great place to meet other entrepreneurs and network).

The process of finding who your customers are (and if you have any), demographically, locationally, medium of sale, etc. Face-to-face interviews are preferable and surveys can help guide those interviews.

The rate at which VCs discover new deals. VCs sift through tons of deals (sometimes over 1,000 per year), outright rejecting many of them, eliminating others through research, and finally seriously pursuing about 1% of all deals that cross their desks.

When an innovation transforms an existing market or sector by introducing simplicity, convenience, accessibility, and affordability where complication and high cost are the status quo.

The business equivalent of a full-body search. Founders hand over a business plan, financials, team information, and more.

A succinct and clear description of your business and value proposition, ideally in a minute or less. I.e. a pitch you could give to someone you met in an elevator during the ride you share.

ANYONE with a business, an idea, a product, etc. If you have a business of your own and don’t think of yourself as an entrepreneur - you should!

Sometimes this is a seasoned entrepreneur at a VC who they rely upon to pick winning ideas or companies, other times it can just be a big name that’s associated with a fund for (largely) cosmetic purposes.

Organization that contributes to the creation of entrepreneurial environments where entrepreneurship is supported in both the public and private sectors.

A community of resources and connections existing to help entrepreneurs succeed and grow, all housed under one roof.

Equity investments pay for partial ownership of a company. Stock, essentially.

The sale or exchange of a company ownership for cash, debt, or equity.

The advantage of getting into a market first and getting a big share of the customers.

The process of adding game-like elements (points, perks, power ups, etc.) to other activities to drive engagement.

A partner in a VC firm who is commonly a managing partner and active in the day-to-day operations of the business. They convince limited partners to add their money to the fund and then invest that money for them.

A business incubator is a facility that helps startup companies and individual entrepreneurs to develop their businesses by providing a range of services from programming to venture advising, coaching and mentorship, and networking to access to capital.

The investors who add their money to a VC fund and let General Partners invest that money for them.

A product that must have enough features to attract early-adopter customers and validate a product idea early in the product development cycle. In industries such as software, the MVP can help the product team receive user feedback as quickly as possible to iterate and improve the product.

To get paid for something. If a company offers a free software as a service trial, then converts those users to paid users, they’re now monetized. Things like sponsored tweets or other content also count as monetization.

A formal presentation of your business, often to investors to seek financing.

Digital presentation (often powerpoint) to give a high-level view of the company, usually to be presented alongside a formal pitch.

Sometimes businesses need to change to succeed, pivots can be small or drastic, and are often done in response to feedback from the market.

The value of a company after investment. Technically, this equals pre-money valuation + amount of funding raised.

These are intended for ideas to early-stage companies. They’ll help guide the entrepreneur through business plan development, customer discovery, and MVP development.

The value of a company before investment.

The entrepreneur now has evidence, typically derived from an experiment or pilot project, which demonstrates that a design concept or business proposal is feasible. This exercise is used to identify the product features as the entrepreneur moves from the MVP to a working prototype.

The amount of time until a startup runs out of money (assuming that expenses remain constant). Determined by dividing the current cash position by the burn rate. Ex. if a company’s cash position is $100,000 and it costs $10,000 per month to run the company (that’s the burn rate), then the runway is 10 months.

Money to get a business off the ground. Founders provide the concept and someone else (angel investor, friends and family, etc.—sometimes VCs, too) provides the money.

A company’s first substantial round of funding (even if they’ve raised seed/angel/friends and family, etc.).

Additional rounds of funding that let a company keep raising money to make bigger moves. Companies receiving this level of follow-on capital are hitting key benchmarks (market penetration, revenue, etc.) to prove that they deserve this extra cash.

A software application, hosted centrally, where users are charged a subscription.

The terms a VC will provide when they decide that they’re interested in investing. Its goal is to give both sides of the table a (relatively) short, simple summation of the points that they already agreed on. 

People are buying a company’s product, subscribing to its service, or otherwise engaging with it.

A private, investor-backed company valued at $1B+.

How much a company is worth (or what people think it’s worth).

Pain and solution. The problem that exists in the market and your unique solution to it.

Venture capital is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which have demonstrated high growth.

The lag period between when someone is awarded a stock option and when they can actually exercise it.