With another $180 million raised and $230 million on hand, Xero has proved once again that’s it’s smart to raise money well before you need it. But what’s interesting is that the type of investors that Xero is attracting are changing. Don’t focus on Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures, but instead on Matrix Capital Management and …
Continue reading “One more step towards Xero as a mainstream US stock”
I was shocked to see first that Trade Me had appointed an advertising agency, and secondly at their TV campaign. I really can’t bear to watch it so I’ll not embed it. Trade Me has always won by being more end-user centric and easy to use than any alternative, and it has become beloved by New …
I’ve previously discussed how 1200 people lost $6.8 million by investing into an opportunity that was dubious at best. It was the madness, not wisdom, of crowds. But sadly investors are still investing in dubious opportunities, and their experiences will continue to give the whole field of private investing a bad name. Raising Money In most countries …
I’ve received a series of comments from Ken Pedlar on some recent posts, and decided in the end to approve them for publication, removing any personal details such as phone numbers. I’m excerpting from the latest comment below, which was in response to the the post on Xero valuation. I’m doing this and commenting on it to show …
I’ve been asked too many times what I think of Xero’s valuation — whether it’s in the last few months, or in the years gone by. I don’t have much time, so decided to set myself a time and information limit and give it a go. So let’s walk through how to do a valuation: …
Unfortunately we have not managed to achieve the total we require by today, the original close date for Punakaiki Fund. This is hard. We have chosen therefore to both extend the offer period, and to amend the offer in favour of investors, in order to give people more time to consider the offer. The press release …
Continue reading “Press Release: Punakaiki Fund extends offer period and lowers fees”
The government’s advertising for the Meridian Share Offer is remarkable for its blandness: Aside from the pictures and the words underlined in red, all of the advertising is selling a deal. Invest $1 a share now, pay a maximum of $0.60 later and make an ‘implied gross dividend yield of 13.4% in the first twelve …
Continue reading “The High Risks of Investing in Electricty”
Following on from the previous posts on the America’s Cup theme, and how we should be taking advantage, I appeared on TV3′s The Nation this morning, sitting alongside Tim Smyth from Core Builders Composites. The show will eventually be found on The Nation’s on-demand page. We had a good chat before, during and after the show, …
Continue reading “Let’s focus on the prize – the $40 billion prize.”
(I’ve also updated the original post with the below) As expected, Oracle USA stormed home to win the last race and the cup, and well done to them, and to everyone in the regatta. However. A big word that, However it seems that emerging although unverified news is that that Oracle may have been using an …
Continue reading “Did Oracle USA cheat to win? Should our businesses do so as well?”
Hi Lance, $22.5m of angel investment in last 6 months – and that’s just the deals captured by YCF. Throw in Pioneer’s new VIF $150m fund and things aren’t too moribund. That’s a comment I received via email after a comment I made about the poor amount of funding in New Zealand on the Nine …
Continue reading “New Zealand’s annual $2.1 billion funding gap”
Update Saturday 28th I appeared on TV3’s The Nation this morning, sitting alongside Tim Smyth from Core Builders Composites. We had a good chat before, during and after the show, and he had read the post below (not the update) and agreed with the thesis that the greater race is how to step up the …
Today saw the launch of AttitudeLive – a highly professional website by and for people living with disabilities. It’s the brainchild of Robyn Scott-Vincent, who with her team from Attitude TV have already transformed the way media portrays the sector. Attitude TV and AttitudeLive bring the premise that they should be telling stories “for and about …
Working safely, wherever you are, starts with identifying hazards. This is generally just before a job, more formally when planning a larger job or on a safety walk, or, ideally, just part of what you do day to day. Those who have been through the recent earthquakes in Wellington are rapidly adopting, for example, the …
Today’s press release. The Offer Documents are avaialble on the Punakaiki Fund website. They are lodged with the FMA and now visible on the Punakaiki Fund document page on the companies office website. Chris and I are going to be touring the country over the next few weeks – so look out for us. If …
Continue reading “Punakaiki Fund announces IPO, lodges document with FMA”
One of the findings, back in 2001, from McKinsey’s Evergreen study, was that there are a niche of companies that successfully grew through making a series of acquisitions. We called them M&A-led-growth companies. (M&A stands for Mergers and Acquisitions) There were a few caveats. Firstly, the pre-requisite was that the acquiring company was already a …
Lance Wiggs 