Silicon Valley Glossary Flashcards
A/B Test
A strategy startups use to compare two versions of a product to see which one performs better.
eg.) “Let’s do an A/B test to see if changing the coffee to dark roast has an effect on productivity.”
Aqcuihire
Buying out a company for its talented workers as opposed to its products or services.
Angel
An allfuent individual that provides seed-stage funding.
API
Application Program Interface, Specifies a set of routines, protocols, and tools for building software applications that interconnect with each other. The use of APIs allows you to order a Lyft for yourself or your colleagues through Slack.
AR/VR
Stands for “Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality”. In AR, digital elements supplement a user’s normal perception. In VR, users are fully immersed in a digital world. In other words, Pokemon Go is augmented reality because players run through real cities, whereas with virtual reality, you are just looking like an alien wearing goggles.
AU
Active Users.
MAU
Monthly Active Users or Minute Active Users
HAU
Hourly Active User
SAU
Second Active User
AUM
Assets Under Management. The total market value of the financial assets a firm manages on behalf on their clients.
AUM is an investment firm’s equivalent of comparing hand sizes, but the real players measure the return on the pile, not how big the pile is.
Bandwidth
Time and availability to do a project
BDR- Business Development Representative
New, more glamorous term for an old entry-level shit job: telesales
Telesales
The selling of goods or services over the telephone.
Benchmark
Performance goals against which a company’s success metrics are measured.
Big Data
A broad term for data analytics that by putting “big” in front implies massive insights.
To date, Big Data has been closer to Big Foot, rumored to be a force but rarely seen.
Bleeding Edge
More advanced than “cutting edge”
Blockchain
On the surface, it is two bad words that together create a positive and highly disruptive idea. In actuality, it is a technology that allows for the transfer of information through shared record or ledger of events, and removes the need for a third party to intermedaite and validate the transfer.
Bookings
The value that a consumer intends to pay the company for a service. This is usually done in contract.
Bootstrap
Self-financing your startup with savings and credit cards as opposed to receiving investor funding.
“I’m bootstrapping right now, but I should get some seed capital sooner or later.”
Bozo Explosion
Steve Jobs’ lament that when early employees at startups get promoted over time to jobs they arent qualified for an additionally, hire peopl enot as talented as themselves. You wake up one day and realize the company is run by a bunch of idiots. Bozo Explosion often leads bozo implosion
Brain Rape
When an investor or another company tries to mine your company secrets under the pretense of a pitch or other official meetup
Bridge
Raising captial typically between two formal funding rounds. Investors are cautioned to avoid a “bridge to nowhere,” where the prospects of bringing in the next funding are dubious.
Brogrammer
Portmanteau of bro and programmer, a category of employees in the tech world who are typically young, male graduates with a “bro-y” culture.
Bubble
A state of booming economic activity (as in stock market) not sustainable by underlying values that often ends in a sudden collapse.
Burn Rate
The amount of money a startup loses per month, which is typically compared to the amount of cash in the bank.
BYOD
Bring your own device
CAC
Customer Acquisition Cost
A metric used to determine the economic efficiency of bringing in a customer versus the cost of marketing and sales to attract the customers.
Churn Rate
Percentage of subscribers discounting a subscription service.
Rule of Thumb, if the churn rate is above 30% per year, your business model is challenged.
If your customers drop your servicee like a bad habit and don’t renew, trouble like ahead.”
Close
Signing all the legal papers and documents to finalize an investment.
Cloud
A network of remote servers hosted on the internet and used to store, manage, and process data in place of local servers.
“If an investor asks you why it works, just say it’s in the cloud.”
Critical Mass
The point at which a startup scaled to be adequate in size and became viewed as esatblish and now has to worry about being disrupted by another startup;
“Once snapchat reached critical mass, there was a boom in various forms of disappearing communication apps.”
Crowdfunding
Financing an endeavor with funding from many indivical donors and investors through the internet.
eg.) Kickstarter and Angelist
Crowdsourcing
Utilizing the small contributions of many people for some end; “ I wouldn’t be a programmer I am today without the crowdsourcing available in websites like Stack Overflow.”
Deliverable
Something tangible you owe for work: “What deliverables are you working on after this meeting? Let me add another”
Dilution
Percentage of ownership that is decreased when new investors come in: “Dilution should not be confused with delusional, although many founders have delusions about their dilution.”
Disrupt
To address a new market or offer significant advantages to the current status quo of your class of products or services, leaving everyone in the existing market struggling to catch up.
“This product is completely disrupting a trillion-dollar market with a billion users with early adopters like nothing that has ever come here before… ever.”
Disruptive Technology
New technology that changes an industry’s dynamic.
A classic definition of a disruptive technology is if it provides 80% of the value of 20% the cost: “I miss the chauffer James, but Uber is fraction of the cost and doesn’t have to go home and see the fam.”
Distorted Reality Field
A typical symptom of an entrpreneur who see the world as what i can become, not what it is, but believes it already is that way.
“The shirnk says Suzee is crazy, but shes just operating with a distorted reality field.”
Dogfooding
Using and relying on your own product, usually in beta version, to fix the kinks:
Down Round
Raising money at a lower valuation than a previous round, also thought to be worse than a terminal discease.
DRI
Directly Responsible Individual. The process of sucking ordinary people into believing their company is truly extraordinary.
Due Diligence
Research and investigation into a company’s figures, the period when an investor actually wants to see if the product or people exist.
EBITDA
Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation, and Amortixation, used as a general proxy to measure how much cash a company truly generates.
ee-bit-da
Elevator Pitch
A short summary used to quickly and simply define the value proposition of a startup.
Entrepreneur
A person who identifies a need and helps solve it by starting a business.
Escape Velocity
The point at which a startup is on the path for exponential growth.
Evangelist
A person at a company who builds support for a product through fanatical and passionate belief. The job is not to do real work, but to wear a cool t-shirt and have a smile on their face.
Exit
When a startup is acquired or goes public. All exits aren’t created equal.
Feng Shui
The chinese philosophical system of harmonzing everyone with their surrounding environment.
Follow On
A subsequent investment made by an investor who had funded previous rounds. Founders note it’s often a bad sign if your investors don’t want to participate in a follow on financing.
Founder Hounder
A person who pursures hookups with founders of start-ups.
Freemium
A product or service that is free for most consumers to use, but charges a fee for premium features.
