Conclusion: North’s 10 Rules For Breaking Through

As we’ve outlined on this blog over the last few weeks, the system for raising early stage capital today is fundamentally flawed. Even though the road to success for entrepreneurs trying to kickstart their visions is littered with potholes and deceptive directions, it can all be corrected with a little teamwork. If change is going [...]

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Can Data-Driven Analysis Predict The Next NBA MVP?

I ran across this interesting article today from John Hollinger of ESPN.com, where he took his Player Efficiency Rating stat (PER) one step further (PER is Hollinger’s overall rating of a player’s per-minute statistical production).
He came up with a new acronym: VA. It stands for “Value Added.” The idea behind VA is to take the [...]

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DIY or Farm It Out?

Entrepreneurs are an interesting bunch. While nearly all of them have an “I can do it myself” attitude, which is crucial to get the ball moving, that same attitude usually ends up preventing the company from scaling. The truth is there are some situations where you simply can’t be the most effective person for the [...]

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Be Forewarned About Those 4 Wheels

The following excerpt is taken from Breaking Through The Broken: The Transparent Guide To Overcoming The Inefficiencies In Early Stage Venture Capital.

Buying a used car is an exciting process, but coming home with buyer’s remorse is easy if you don’t do your homework. To avoid a financial disaster, not to mention having a two-ton paperweight [...]

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Are They Ready For Prime Time?

Professional sports franchises spend thousands of dollars on scouting, background checks, and running draft prospects through a series of mental and physical tests before they decide to invest millions of dollars. General Managers look at everything before risking their pick on an expensive draft pick. This is even truer when it comes to making a [...]

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Love The Location, But How’s The Roof?

Now ask yourself, would you buy a new home on a gut feeling or simply because the guy selling it says it’s a great deal? Probably not. A sensible real estate investor would probably evaluate every aspect of the property; from the foundation to the roof, the plumbing, the electrical, the lot size, the appliances, [...]

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Due Diligence: A Brief History

Smart, wealthy, and very successful men and women lose billions of dollars every year investing in new ventures. Why? Recent research shows investors are often investing without first conducting their own thorough due diligence. Just how powerful is the connection between due diligence and investor returns? A recent three-year study of 539 Angel led investments [...]

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