27 Sep, 2010
angel investment Greylock Partners Linkedin seedfund Taggle TechCrunch
Greylock today announced a new $20 million seed fund. This announcement was made by Reid Hoffman a founder of Linkedin and partner with Venture capital firm Greylock Partners. It was announced by him in TechCrunch Disrupt a annual Startup event conducted by TechCrunch.
This fund is affiliated with Greylock for small scale investment into startups. It comes from the $575 million fund and each partner can invest small portions of it as they see fit without committee approval.
Good news for Indian startups is this fund will cater to them also since Greylock partners operate in India and Arvin Babu is partner overseeing the investments in India. Indian startups can look up to him for granting the seedfund. Recently in India Greylock Partner invested in Taggle, a group discount portal.
Four companies have been funded by the seed project so far, though recipient companies wish to remain secretive.
-Hitesh, vcBytes.com
5 Aug, 2010
marketing launch PR campaigns Product Launch Startups Taggle
Most of the startups i came across recently are confused about the product launch and marketing launch, They assume product launch and marketing launch is one and the same.
In simple words product launch is making your product available to the customers in the public, no alpha/beta customers while marketing launch is announcing a product, start the PR activities and kick off marketing activities.
Company adopt the launch strategy which suits their business and fits well in their business plan. For example Taggle internet ventures started off with PR campaigns and marketing activities before launching the product. Their objective was to build the sales pipeline before launching the product.
When to go for marketing launch
A marketing launch establishes startup positioning. If you are confused or don’t know what the right positioning is for your startup, do not launch. When you launch with the wrong positioning, you have to spend extra effort and money later cleaning it up
Startups have to know their business model. Most startups launch before they figured out what business they are in. Always pay attention to your fundamental driver of growth. If the product needs to be tweaked for better conversion rate, do it before the launch.
Startup should know what the success metrics are for the launch. If you are confident on your strategy you will definitely know the success metrics.
-Hitesh, vcBytes.com
28 Jun, 2010
Battery Ventures Grabbon Greylock Partners group discount Groupon Snapdeal Taggle
Some amount of consolidation taking place in group discount space after emerging in mushroom fashion 7-8 months back. Snapdeal, a group discount site promoted by Delhi based Jasper Infotech has acquired Bangalore based Grabbon, deal value has not been disclosed and it is termed as strategic acquisition by both Snapdeal and Grabbon.
Interestingly Grabbon is the 1st Groupon clone to hit the Indian market and founded by Tony Navin, Jackson Fernandez and Balamurugan all XLRI graduates. Few weeks back i interviewed Jackson, you may check here.
Benefit for Snapdeal from this acquisition- :
- Seasoned management guys who know the nitty gritty of discount space and have executed this model quite diligently.
- Getting Bangalore as a market where Snapdeal has no presence and being tech savvy metro, this model brings lot of value and readymade market for them by acquiring Grabbon.
Whats up for Grabbon in this deal -
- Getting an umbrella company in Snapdeal which is financially well off and it can steer them well.
- Can able to address and access the Snapdeal market through this acquisition
Group discount space is really heating up with merger and acquisitions, Taggle has secured a mammoth funding of above $8M from Greylock partners and Battery Ventures. Prominent players who remains in this space are Mydala and Koovs.
-Hitesh, vcBytes.com
26 Jun, 2010
Battery Ventures Greylock Partners Groupon Taggle
Taggle Internet Ventures, an internet company which launched its online group buying initiative, taggle.com has received $8.75 million from Battery Ventures and Greylock Partners. The taggle.com promises to provide both the consumers and merchants a win-win platform.
Taggle has decided to use this funding for improvement in technology, marketing to drive traffic and increase its service performance. Taggle works with a variety of business partners from wellness to beauty, travel, adventure sports, fast food and fine-dining.
At present Bangalore is the base for Taggle’s “test market” which would be later introduced in “10 internet strong cities.” John Kuruvilla, Founder and CEO of Taggle said, “We spent about four months understanding the markets, what customers want and issues faced by the trade.” He added that customers want simple propositions and not the complicated ones with fine prints and asterisk.
Most of the people do not wish to transact over the internet, as 20-25 percent of the people get affected by the payment gateway. To solve such problems Taggle has come up with a contact center and Taggle Prepaid. The Taggle Prepaid works like a mobile prepaid recharge and earns a two percent bonus from it. Thus it does not require the customer to go through the payment gateway again.
Marketing through SMS is also an option as customers will be able to call the Taggle contact center on receiving the offer and pay via credit card. To protect the merchants from fraud, a security hologram has been created based on the coupons.
Arvin Babu, Partner, Greylock Partners, which has invested in companies like Facebook and Linkedin, said, in a statement, “India is definitely one of the world’s fastest growing markets and we see great potential in the concept of Group Buying in India. The business proposition of Taggle is certainly promising and we are sure it will take the market by storm.”
-Hitesh, vcBytes.com
