

Ask HN: Good resources for determining early-stage pre-money valuation - api

I&#x27;m curious about what other databases or resources might be available for getting real-world market data on startup valuations.<p>There&#x27;s this, which is excellent:<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;angel.co&#x2F;valuations<p>... but it&#x27;s missing a parameter to explore by size of funds raised, which makes it of dubious usefulness for determining what the market is paying.
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maaku
Not sure what you're trying to learn? There is basically no intrinsic rhyme or
reason to early-stage valuations. Figure out how much money you need, how much
equity you're willing to give up for it, and find an investor that agrees to
those terms. That's it.

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api
Yeah, I understand all that. If startups could be objectively and reliably
valued at an early stage, there would be no angels or VCs-- banks would just
lend to them. :)

But...

There is a market -- deals close every day. I am curious about whether there's
any good data out there that can be used -- either as an entrepreneur or an
investor -- to gauge the general reasonableness of a proposal. Is it within
the bounds of sanity? Too good, too cheap, etc.?

My guess is that this information is guarded to some extent, since it helps
people like early stage VCs price deals. It's interesting that the angel.co
database doesn't tell you the amount they raised, making the valuation ranges
interesting but ultimately not that informative about what the market is
paying for early stage startup equity/notes.

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maaku
No that's really the point of early-stage investment. There is no metric to go
by, except one's own evaluation of the potential of a team's future worth and
the cost of acquiring a share. This is necessarily very dependent on
circumstances, and data that is not going to be available online.

