FUS Partners Resources for Entrepreneurs
This collection of resources for entrepreneurs is a living document which we will update over time. We hope you find it helpful.
Funding a Focused Ultrasound Product
In this video blog titled “Funding a Focused Ultrasound Product,” the Foundation’s Commercial Initiatives and Strategy Director, Cindy Clark, provides a high-level overview of the entire product development and the fundraising process. The vlog is geared toward entrepreneurs considering starting their own company, existing company leaders, and those seeking more information on the challenges companies in this field face.
Entrepreneur’s Guide to Fundraising Decks
A fundraising pitch deck is unique to a company and to where that company is in its lifecycle. Even so, there are common elements to successful pitch decks. The FUS Partners team has compiled a slide-by-slide guide to creating effective pitch decks. For each slide type, there are suggestions about what kinds of content should be on it and why as well as illustrative examples, some from real-world use cases.
See the “Entrepreneur’s Guide to Fundraising Decks”
Books
- Why the Lean Start-Up Changes Everything by Steve Blank (published in the Harvard Business Review)
- Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers by Alexander Osterwalder
- The Startup Owner’s Manual: The Step-by-Step Guide for Building a Great Company by Steve Blank
- Biodesign: The Process of Innovating Medical Technologies by Paul Yock
- Talking to Humans: Success starts with understanding your customers by Giff Constable
- The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses by Eric Ries
- Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel
- The Four Steps to the Epiphany by Steve Blank
- The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz
- Secrets of Sand Hill Road: Venture Capital and How to Get It by Scott Kupor
Blogs
LifeSciVC by Bruce Booth.
Booth is a partner at Atlas Venture, a biotech-focused early stage venture capital firm, where he focuses on helping start and fund emerging therapeutics companies.
AVC by Fred Wilson
Wilson is a legendary VC at Union Square Ventures. He invested in companies like Zynga, Etsy, Tumblr, Twitter and Kickstarter. He’s one of the first VC’s to start blogging daily and covers startups, technology and also personal stuff – it’s a great mix and comes highly recommended.
Both Sides of the Table by Mark Suster
Suster is a 2x entrepreneur turned VC. He joined Upfront Ventures in 2007 as a General Partner after selling his company to Salesforce.com. Now, he writes about startups and offers his viewpoint from both perspectives: founders and investors (as he is both).
Paul Graham
Graham is one of the most influential thinkers in tech space. As a founder and former president of Y Combinator, his impact on the startup world is immense. Y Combinator made companies like Airbnb and Dropbox possible, but it also inspired the ‘accelerator’ model replicated all over the world. In addition, Paul writes some of the most helpful essays for entrepreneurs out there.
Elad Blog by Elad Gil
Gill is a serial entrepreneur obsessed with technology and startups. His last startup Mixer Labs was acquired by Twitter and is now working on something new.
Tomasz Tunguz
Tunguz is a principal at Red Point Ventures. He blogs daily, and writes data-driven blog posts about key questions startups face including how to raise, startup benchmarks, management best practices and team building.
Podcasts
Andreessen Horowitz Podcast
The a16z Podcast discusses tech and culture trends, news, and the future — especially as ‘software eats the world’. It features industry experts, business leaders, and other interesting thinkers and voices from around the world. Multiple episodes are released every week.
The Twenty Minute VC
Harry Stebbings made headlines recently by becoming one of the VC world’s youngest players. Inspired by the Facebook movie, The Social Network, Stebbings started podcasting unceasingly about the world of venture capital. Grasping early the startup world’s need for brevity, Stebbings limited his interviews with VCs to just 20 minutes.
Particular Topics
Spinning out of an Academic Research Institution
- Spinout Playbook by Fifty Years
Business Planning
- 10 Med Device Regulatory & Commercialization Traps That Kill Valuation by Janet Vargo
- Starting A Medical Device Company: Everything You Need To Know by Rogene Evans
- Private Company Stock Option Grants: A Founder’s Guide To Who Gets What, When by Cisco Palao-Ricketts
Choosing an Investor
- How to Understand and Choose an Investor (an a16z Podcast with Scott Kupor and Frank Chen)
Raising Capital
- How To Raise Money from a Venture Investor (an a16z Podcast with Scott Kupor and Frank Chen)
- A Ridiculously Detailed Fundraising Guide (Founder Collective)
- For YC Companies Raising Seed Rounds (Elad Blog by Elad Gil)
- Fenwick & West Quarterly Venture Capital Survey – for current terms
- SAFE Financing Documents (Y Combinator)
- SAFE Notes: Everything You Need to Know (Upcounsel)
- Model Legal Documents (National Venture Capital Association)
Working with a Board of Directors
- How to Get the Most from Your Board (an a16z Podcast with Scott Kupor and Frank Chen)
Understanding Venture Capital and the Money Behind It
- VC Math (Hackernoon)
- The Meeting That Showed Me The Truth About VCs by Tomer Dean
Regulatory Matters
- Pathways to a FDA Approved or Cleared Medical Device by Alexandra Reid
- The challenges of a MedTech startup in the land of scattered Regulatory Information by Heikki Pitkänen
- Medical Device Startups: Here’s How You Handle Regulatory And Reimbursement by Bill Betten
- Regulatory Barriers to Innovation for Startups by Tifany Desprez, PhD