Venture Studio (14): Bo Peabody: Entrepreneur, Venture Capitalist, Author, Restaurateur

This is Episode (14) of Venture Studio

Welcome to this week's conversation with the multi-talented Bo Peabody, founder or co-founder of Tripod (acq. by Lycos/Terra), Everyday Health, VoodooVox, HealthGuru, UplayMe, Village Ventures, (a NYC-based $135m venture fund focused on both the media and financial services sectors), author of the book, Lucky or Smart, and owner of the hospitality company Mezze, Inc. which operates three award-winning restaurants he started. (Yes- I can personally confirm that Mezze Bistro up in Williamstown, MA is a great spot if you're ever in the area for the summer theater festival or just passing through).

We caught up with Bo in NYC recently, and in the interest of time focused our conversation on his against-the-grain habit of founding and investing in content companies- which he has been doing for years with great success.

It's no surprise- he's been an iconoclast since I met him some some seventeen years ago when he was a college student launching Tripod in the very early days of the web. Hardly any one knew or understood what the heck he was doing back then- but he did. Enjoy.

:40  -  Why does Bo invest in content when most everyone else runs from it? 

1:41 -  Learn about Everyday Health (largest health property on the web)

4:10 - We discuss portfolio companies: Health Guru, Tech Media Network, Babble, Daily Makeover, Travel Ad Network, Trefis

6:57 - Who is Bo syndicating with these days?

8:20 - What's the right deal pace for a venture fund?

9:00 - We discuss Lucky or Smart and the recent Business Insider series

11:53 - Bo's take on the Village Ventures and their expansion

                  

               

Venture Studio (12): Matt Harris, Co-Founder of Village Ventures

This is Episode (12) of Venture Studio

Welcome to this week's conversation with Matt Harris, co-founder and Managing General Partner of Village Ventures, a NYC-based $135m venture fund focused on both the media and financial services sectors. Matt founded Village Ventures with his college roommate Bo Peabody approximately eleven years ago and together they've grown their network of partner funds to 15 in size across the United States and Europe.

Matt is the partner in his fund who invests exclusively in financial services companies sitting on the Boards of such companies as iSend, OnDeck Capital, TxVia, BlueTarp Financial and others. As you'll learn in the conversation below, he's extremely bullish on the mobile payments and point-of-sale space. You can also get acquainted with his point of view on things on his blog, aptly named- For The Win.

At the risk of embarassing him it must be said that, (to put it mildly), he's held in great esteem not just by the entrepreneurs in whom he invests but notably by his many peers in the investment community. Enough said.... Enjoy

:20  -  Getting to know Village Ventures- their story 

1:14 -  The Village Ventures network of partner funds

2:05 - The financial services sector & mobile payments in particular

3:17 - The value prop of portfolio company, BankSimple

5:22 - "The linkage between geography & banking has been severed"

6:34 - Portfolio company: OnDeck Capital

7:54 - "Venture is most fun when you are solving a societal problem"

8:04 - Learn about the Village Ventures portfolio

9:24 - What's going on in venture in Europe/UK? 

10:24 -  Matt's thoughts on the Mobile Payments & Point-of-Sale space

 11:17 - I ask Matt about his blog, "For the Win"

Click Here for Venture Studio (13) w/ Jeff Clavier, Founder SoftTech VC

                  

               

Venture Studio (11): Jonathan Glick, CEO of Sulia

This is Episode (11) of Venture Studio

Welcome to this week's conversation with entrepreneur Jonathan Glick, founder and CEO of his latest venture, Sulia- which I learned is in many ways the apotheosis of a nearly two decades-long career at the cutting-edge of content-creation on the web.

Jonathan is a true web pioneer having started his career at AOL during its infancy and then at iVillage with a subsequent stint running technology and product development for the New York Times, as CEO of his own venture-backed startup OuterForce, and as Director of Research Operations for the Gerson Lehrman Group.

Learn about Jonathan's rich experiences through those early days of content creation on the web all the way through to the launch of New York-based Sulia, a venture-backed, real-time media company focused on filtering Twitter into high quality content channels. He's amazingly candid and open about his entrepreneurial journey. Enjoy.

:16  -  Developming his "arcane" skills at AOL in "those early days"

:50 -  Meeting and joining the founders of iVillage

1:00 - Joining the NYT & working for visionary, Martin Nisenholtz

1:50 - The genesis & premise of his first startup, OuterForce

3:55 - Funding via Flatiron Ventures (Jerry Colonna & Fred Wilson) 

4:20 - The story of OuterForce & and many lessons learned

8:05 - New adventure with the Gerson Lehrman Group

9:02 - The premise of Sulia...

10:00 - Sulia's business model...

11:17 - Sulia's relationship with Twitter

Click for Venture Studio (12) w/Matt Harris of Village Ventures