28-Year-Old Aims Big With VC Firm

28-Year-Old Aims Big With VC Firm

Written by Kobi Ansong

Follow @_the kobster

Deciding to start a business is the boldest decision a twenty-something can make. Deciding to start a venture capital is plain crazy.

In a Silicon age, young people are making fortunes from technology. The most recent young, tech phenom, 17-year-old Nick D’Alosio, recently sold his news-reading app to Yahoo for upward of 20 million USD.

Mike Rothenberg doesn’t develop social products or software. He’d rather fund them. In January, Rothenberg Ventures launched with 5 million USD, and has since funded 20 startups, ranging from a fashion ecommerce company to a sports mobile app.

So, how did a 28-year-old raise 5 million USD for a venture?  With a great track record and a better network. Rothenberg was making connections that eventually led to key relationships at an early age. "I'm 28, but a lot of my formative venture experience happened between the ages of 19 and 22 at Stanford," he said.

As a Stanford undergraduate, Rothenberg managed the acclaimed Entrepreneurial Thought Leaders seminar that attracted appearances from tech icons like Mark Zuckerberg and Jim Breyer. The recent Harvard Business School graduate has also founded three companies and consulted at Fortune 500 tech companies.

Rothenberg brings a youthful and enthusiastic approach to working with clients. In fact, he doesn’t even consider them clients.  Rothenberg Ventures’ website’s menu bar refers to the startups as “family”. Rothenberg explained that his founders have access to him whenever they want.

The firm also conducts market research and competitive analysis, sets up potential partnerships, and hosts regular founder meetings to ensure clients have a strong support network. "I try to provide as much value as I can even if my checks are small," Rothenberg says.

And he’s right. Most of the founders that Rothenberg deals with are his peers, making the investor/startup dynamic hardly typical. Like the startups he supports, Rothenberg applies a lean and hungry mentality to running his venture.

Ultimately, Rothenberg chose venture because he loves founders. "It’s really inspiring being around founders. They have the courage to say ‘there is a product or service that needs to exist, and I'm going to go build it’,” he says.

When asked about the biggest mistake that founders make, Rothenberg highlights prioritization. "You can't do everything perfectly as a startup because you have to prioritize.  So I'd say the biggest problem for a startup is if they choose the wrong priorities to focus," says Rothenberg.

Proof that an idea is valuable means everything to the young VC. According to Rothenberg, startups should prove that their idea is valuable by tapping into their family, friends, and colleagues in order to bootstrap their vision.  It’s about ideas and execution, not about spending lots of money.

"‘I can’t find $10,000 to pay for the initial product and services that I need’ is not really a good excuse even if you don't have any money,” Rothenberg explained. “You should have met people along your career who believe in you enough to give you a small amount of money to get started."

Fresh from two years at Harvard Business School, Rothenberg plans to relocate to San Francisco next month to establish the Rothenberg Ventures HQ.  We look forward to seeing what Rothenberg Ventures does next.

Follow @rothventures to keep up with Silicon Valley’s newest VC

First appeared in the blog - http://blog.ldn.io/