We were pleased to announce in February that NVP led the series B funding round for STELLAService, an independent provider of customer service ratings and analytics for online retailers, big and small. It’s exciting to see the rapid progress the company continues to make, driven heavily by the fact that customer service has increasingly become an important decision factor for the growing number of online shoppers in the U.S.

Just last week, it was announced that Google will license data from STELLAService to help shoppers better understand the service quality of online merchants and make more informed online shopping decisions. STELLAService customer service performance data will be used within Google...

A win-win opportunity for exceptional growth-oriented CEO’s

At Norwest Venture Partners, we have actively been sponsoring two types of “EIR’s.” The first is an Entrepreneur-in-Residence program, which essentially focuses on partnering closely with exceptional entrepreneurs to start and incubate new companies.  The second is possibly lesser known, but just as impactful.  We call this an “Executive-In-Residence” program.  This program is much more focused on partnering with growth-stage CEO’s who will not look to start a company, but join one which is in need of a growth-focused CEO and potentially growth capital.  For NVP, this program is more nascent than the Entrepreneur-in-Residence program, but we have seen exceptio...

This post originally appeared on VentureBeat

There was a time when investors would rush startups to market, but a shift has taken place during the past 20 years where the pace has slowed a bit. Now I find myself increasingly advising entrepreneurs to avoid putting a product to market before it is truly ready.

Seed funding and Series A rounds are intended to help startups tease out their big idea and begin laying the product development groundwork. But it seems best practices for customer validation/product management are being frequently tossed out the window. This is so counter-productive that it will almost certainly place the next funding round at risk and can sink the full enterprise.

Over 30 years of operational and investment experience, I have refined a list of five critical things ent...

Where Are They Now and Why Should We Care?

UPDATE: Thanks for your feedback on my eBay blog post/TechCrunch article. I’ve received so many emails from eBay alumni that I have created a Facebook Group called “eBay 2000-2005.” We already have nearly 800 members so please reach out for an invite to any one of the current members. All eBay alumni who worked at eBay Inc. (in any office) during that period are encouraged join this group.  https://www.facebook.com/groups/391373577637047/

TechCrunch recently published an article I wrote abo...