Ideatrotter

Bieber has acquired everything: fame, fortune and networks. He recently turned 18 and is looking for a new challenge. Instead of spending his fortune on blow and alcohol, Bieber has decided to follow the route of other celebrities, that being investing in hot startups. Celebrities are no different than other investors, who have concluded that investing in tech is a gold mine. 

With stakes in Tinychat, Spotify, Stamped and now Viddy, Bieber hopes to foray into the VC world with a portfolio, similar to Kutcher. In an interview with Forbes, the following was disclosed about his investment plan in startups:

In a typical Bieber deal he’ll put in about $250,000 at the favorable pricing generally reserved for smart money—the kind of strategic partners that help a company long term. Braun won’t disclose the size of Bieber’s portfolio but says it’s between 2% and 5% of the singer’s net worth. FORBES puts Bieber’s fortune at about $80 million, which translates to somewhere in the ballpark of $3 million in venture investments.

Great going Bieber - its good to see the newest boy idol not crashing and burning like other teen pop stars.

Quora connects you to everything you want to know about; that is the quoted tagline. It helps you mine and archive answers for all questions and topics of interest. If I maybe bold, it takes WikiAnswers to a new level, with a sharper, more business social media approach. Their startup has peaked the interest of renown investors such as Peter Thiel, who brought in his share during the Series B round of funding. 

So why can’t the Samwer brothers clone Quora? After all, they have cloned every major startup from the US in other markets. Quora has a four fold advantage: 1. They use unique source code; their technology is so complicated, a simple hire/outsource/plug and play development would not work. 2. Their 30 person big team work on unique projects; projects that are neither redundant nor impersonal. 4. The knowledge they aggregate is used for higher causes i.e. they create projects for execution based on knowledge gathered through the content management process. 4. Nothing says strength like vc gurus saying you have a 100 year future. 

The Tech Crunch link provided in the title provides more detail into why Quora is not a “Bora”.

In 2011, Jon Bruner from Forbes had posed the same question with relation to the general industry and whether we were close to a tech bubble. His interview with Hiten Shah, CEO of Kissmetrics, led them to believe that there is no imminent danger that would warrant the birth of a bubble or, atleast, the bubble would not be the size of the 2001 one. They designed a very comprehensive infographic, detailing their research.

Circa 2012, Instagram was acquired; Facebook is on the brink of its IPO and tongues are wagging about Google acquiring Pinterest to counter the Facebook-Instagram acquisition. Y Combinator has fuelled the birth of many young and energetic startups, looking to reach the big leagues. Valuation caps per startup have increased in the 33%-100% range in the past year. In contrast to the industry valuation caps, the YC valuation caps have increased between 375%-500%. 

This led Jason Calacanis to ask the following questions again:

1. Is there a bubble?

2. Is there a YC bubble?

3. Are You Better off Investing in Two Non-YC Startups at 1/2 the Price?

The link provided mentions what he had to say.

Rod Ebrahimi’s startup venture, ReadyForZero, was recently accepted into Y Combinator’s incubator, for its value proposition on offering individuals a portal to manage debt. Rod Ebrahimi and his girlfriend were struggling to manage his girlfriend’s student debt. As he dug deeper into the issue, he realized that more individuals face the same financial dilemmas and web 2.0 could be a way to help people through their problems.

The total US consumer debt in 2011 was $11.4 trillion. The total student loan debt passed $1 trillion in 2011. With national unemployment still in the process of being fixed, debt management and debt escalation mitigation measures are key. Polaris Ventures recognized this when they decided to invest in ReadyForZero, leading a $4.5 million Series A round. Cognizant of its strong management team, solid market and active user engagement level, Polaris believes its investment will not only be able to generate solid revenues, but also deliver a public service. 

Do you want to learn more about the heavy hitters investing in cloud computing ventures? These guys could help fund your idea if you have a qualified venture in that space. 

Naval Ravikant, well known in the startup community, for starting companies such as Vast, Venture Hacks, DotSpots, i/o Ventures and AngelList, writes a concise yet definitive piece on the evolution of recent startups and how founders should bring their startups to market. 

With angels and VCs clamoring at entrepreneurs doors, looking to be part of the next Facebook/ Pinterest, bargaining power lies with the entrepreneurs. Prototyping is no longer the challenge; aligning internal and external expectations while taking your product viral should be the focus. The cookie crumbles when, not only the product, but circumstances do not gel.