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Data, data everywhere, but where to focus your attention in order to understand what’s changing in your business day-to-day? Data analysts and data scientists will be part of every team at every type of company. And their jobs will be to help answer key business questions using data. That’s the future of business that Outlier sees and we happen to agree wholeheartedly. Which is why we’re so excited to add to our portfolio of machine learning and artificial intelligence-driven vertical applications by co-leading, with First Round Capital, the seed financing for Outlier.

WHO: Sean Byrnes, CEO, and Mike Kim, CTO, are data nerds in the best sense. As founder of Flurry, Sean helped build one of the earliest mobile analytics platforms and filled several roles at the company prior to a successful sale to Yahoo for $240 million. Mike is a long-time data research scientist, having proven his chops at Aardvark, Google and AltSchool. And in a short period of time they’ve assembled a team of technology and business experts that is proud to call Oakland home. We know that we’re backing a team that can talk the big data talk but also back it up with real computer science.

WHAT: Outlier has created a SaaS product that delivers what the company calls Business Analysis Automation. Outlier frees business analysts and executives from spending time combing through their data looking for what matters. Instead, with Outlier, team members get insights that uncover unexpected behavior about customers and products so that potential problems and opportunities can be addressed quickly. And data analysts and data scientists can focus on answering the questions that are most important. Dashboards and KPIs tell you what is happening in your business based on what you know you want to track. Outlier goes further by helping you understand why your business is changing and flagging things you wouldn’t otherwise notice. As an example, Outlier has been able to help an ecommerce business discover that a third party Facebook campaign was responsible for a traffic spike and that a small homepage code change led to a decrease in traffic to product detail pages. Being alerted to those issues helped the company grow revenue and avoid lost revenue in ways which dashboards and KPIs could never do.

HOW: While machine learning and AI are all the rage now, we’ve been investing in the area for more than two years, focusing on specific applications that help give business users superpowers, not just automate workflow like the first generation of SaaS. And importantly, we’ve invested in teams that have the deep experience and technical expertise to truly deliver on the promise of ML and AI. Outlier is no exception to those principles. Outlier’s product plugs into all of the enterprise applications that collect and aggregate customer data. It then uses its technology to identify the unexpected so that business users are never caught by surprise.

WHY: Outlier is the result of Sean’s prior experience building Flurry. Flurry helped collected user data for mobile applications. The data was so voluminous that he often heard his customers ask for help sifting through and interpreting the data. Hence the genesis of Outlier. Like Sean and Mike, we’re convinced that the next-generation of SaaS tools will help people be both more productive AND smarter.

Sign up for Outlier’s daily email newsletter, The Data Driven Daily, to learn more about working with data. And if you’re inundated with data and a simple way to interpret it, reach out to Outlier to get a demo.

data.world has founded with the idea that data is too fragmented, not machine-readable and not easily accessible for analysis and collaboration. In just a year, the company has established itself as the network for open sharing of data. Data collaborations with the The White House Opportunity Project, The Anti-Defamation League and The World Bank are just a few of the thousands of examples of transparency and access that data.world is enabling. That momentum led a stellar group of new and existing investors to provide the company with another $19 million in financing. Homebrew is proud to play a small part in supporting data.world’s worthy mission. If you have any interest in open data, visit data.world to dive into a world of data in health, finance, education and a number of other categories or to contribute your own data.

It’s been about 6 months since we published Compensation at Startups and Diversity at Startups. As “living documents,” we’ll periodically update them with new articles and information. And so we just published our first updates for 2017. We welcome your feedback and thoughts. If you have anything to add or questions about the guides, just let us know. Thanks!

As a follow-up to our Compensation at Startups resource document, we wanted to provide some thoughts on another critical issues related to your people, your most important asset. When your company gets to around 20 people, engaging and rewarding employees becomes a growing challenge. So implementing a good performance management system is a high value investment. Homebrew works closely with our companies to think through how to retain, manage and reward talent. We’ve documented some of those basic guidelines in Performance Management at Startups.

This document includes tips on giving and receiving feedback and how to choose the right performance management tools for your company. If you have thoughts on this topic or feedback on this document, please contact Beth Scheer, Homebrew’s Head of Talent. We look forward to hearing your perspectives. As with the Compensation and Thoughts on Diversity resources, this is a living document that we will update as we get feedback and develop new perspectives.

“This is where I started Klout,” he said, and pointed to what basically looked like a storage locker in the middle of a Los Angeles courtyard. “My buddy owns this so I put a desk in here and started working with a bunch of developers in Singapore.” Both of us met Joe Fernandez, Klout’s CEO, early in that company’s history. But we hadn’t known just how humble its beginnings were. Now Joe and team are back in Los Angeles to start their next endeavor, Joymode, and taking the same judicious approach. And Homebrew is thrilled to have led their seed round, alongside other great funds and individuals.

WHO: Joe, Waynn and Keith came together around a vision of how technology could help people enjoy the real world, not just a screen in front of them. Having started multiple companies between them, as well as working in larger organizations such as Google, the three treat their company as their product and have emphasized building a diverse team of LA-based design, marketing and operations pros.

WHAT: Joymode is a membership-based service that gives you access to experience packages meant to be enjoyed as a family, as a couple or with friends or coworkers. For example, Backyard Movie Night delivers a projector, movie screen, lawnchairs, blankets and more (popcorn machine is optional, but highly recommended) right to your door. Each of the packages is picked up and dropped off, along with any instructions you need. The cost of membership and packages are a fraction of what you’d spend to buy all of the items included. So whether you’re tight on storage, don’t want to own as much, or want to try before you buy, Joymode is for you.

HOW: Available in Los Angeles to start, Joymode has a lot of moving parts. Merchandising to make sure there’s a mix of great evergreen experiences plus new seasonal or special offers. A marketplace that helps add special touches, such a photographer to your event. Backend operations to manage the flow of inventory around the city. And financial models to track utilization, depreciation and other key metrics. It’s not for the faint of heart, and it’s hard to duplicate. Which is one of the many reasons we love it.

WHY: Joymode’s origin stems from many years back when Joe was sharing a New York City apartment with his then girlfriend (now wife). Space and budget were tight, but they wished they could do more stuff without having to own it all. Years later (plus a marriage, a baby and a house!), Joe believed more than ever that the combination of shifting demographics, consumer purchase trends and mobile technology meant the time was right for Joymode. We believe as well, and their hundreds of beta members agree, too. Thousands of experience reservations have already been made using Joymode. Check out Joymode in LA, and soon in a city near you.

Becoming a parent changes everything. You soon realize that in addition to showing the world to your children, you also need to understand it through their eyes. And at Homebrew, we believe that technology can help make the lives of parents and caregivers easier while providing them with the satisfaction of knowing they’re doing a great job for their kids. The team at Winnie believes this as well and recently announced the completion of their seed financing.

WHO: We previously detailed the reasons behind our support of Sara and Anne. In the first few months of working together, their tenacity and thoughtfulness has become even more apparent as they build out their directory of family-friendly places. Since Winnie’s founding, they’ve also hired other talented engineers away from great companies to join their team. Being able to attract passive job seekers because of your reputation and mission is a great leading indicator.

WHAT: A product to help parents navigate the world around them with their children. Accessible via an iOS app and the web ( with Android coming soon), Winnie now covers over 1 million locations across 100 cities.

HOW: Winnie’s place directory is unlike any other geographic list available today. It blends data collected via various technical methods with community-augmented inputs. The team’s experience at Quora, Twitter, Google, Reddit and elsewhere, provides a great background in combining machines and humans.

WHY: “Millennials do ___ differently” is an overused explanation for real generational changes driven by technology. Fact is, we see a variety of product opportunities arising from a shift in consumer expectations. theSkimm for news. Chime for banking. Joymode for experiences. And now, Winnie for parenting.

So if you have a child in your life, as a parent, relative, or just friend, we recommend you check out Winnie.

Homebrew believes that software democratizes industries, helping practitioners rethink what’s possible and providing consumers with previously inaccessible products and services. Perlara founder, Ethan Perlstein, wouldn’t just agree with that statement, he’s built his company based upon it. Last week’s announcement of a partnership with Novartis put Perlara into the spotlight, but we’ve been fortunate enough to work with Ethan since our supporting investment earlier this year.

Perlara works with drug companies to push forward research into diseases previously believed to be too rare to cure (in other words, previously the costs to cure would outstrip the commercial value of a cure). Ethan’s double bottom line approach to business also motivated him to organize Perlara as a Public Benefit Corporation. We’re excited to watch Perlara build a business with both value and merit.

Congrats Ethan and Perlara!

When evaluating an investment, we don’t just ask ourselves about putting dollars behind the founders. We also challenge ourselves as to whether the team’s vision of the world is one that we want to put sweat and reputation behind. In Cardiogram, that question was answered easily. Using sensor data coming off Apple Watches and other fitness hardware, Cardiogram uses deep learning tech to help identify markers of chronic conditions and create positive habits across fitness, sleep and stress management.

Health technology needs to be approached with care and responsibility. There’s a cost to getting this wrong. Cardiogram founders Brandon Ballinger and Johnson Hsieh take this seriously, and are exceptional technologists who first worked together at Google. Brandon also participated in the intense HealthCare.gov rescue team and co-founded fraud detection pioneer, Sift Science.

Cardiogram joins several other Homebrew portfolio family members who also leverage machine learning atop previously under-utilized or unavailable data sets to solve real world problems. We’re proud to announce our supporting investment in Cardiogram, alongside A16Z BioFund and prominent angel investors. Get Cardiogram in the App Store today!

We met Jeff Weinstein over two years ago and knew immediately that he and the Wagon team were going to be relentless in achieving their mission of making it easier for teams to collaborate on data analysis. They had felt the pain firsthand and knew exactly what customers like them would need to address the pain. And address that pain they did, with over 1500 companies and several thousand analysts using Wagon regularly. When the opportunity came to apply their skills and insights to solving collaboration problems at a much larger platform, they knew that their mission would be best realized there. Congratulations to Jeff and the entire Wagon team on joining Box! We’re grateful to have been a supporting partner in your journey.

Founder <> Market fit is an especially important criterion of Homebrew’s investment strategy. When we made a supporting investment earlier this year in Jon Steinberg & his over-the-top video network Cheddar, we knew the fit was incredibly strong. And their early growth - in team, in viewership and in quality content - points to a very exciting future. Others see that future as well, as yesterday Cheddar announced its next round of financing, an additional $10 million. Congrats to Cheddar as it builds the financial and lifestyle video network for the millennial generation!

We’re thrilled to continue our support of Honor in their Series B raise. Having known Honor CEO, Seth Sternberg, for many years we made our initial investment confident the company would build not just a successful business but an amazing culture. And they’ve done just that - leading the way on creating great jobs for caregivers, hiring political activists into leadership positions, embracing diversity with gusto, and partnering with leading organizations such as the National Parkinson’s Foundation. As Honor expands beyond the San Francisco and Los Angeles markets, we know their mission of bringing high quality at-home care to seniors will continue to lead the industry. If you also believe in Honor’s mission, they’re hiring.

Like most seed stage VCs, Homebrew spends a lot of time helping our portfolio companies think about how to hire and retain the best talent. This often includes some very tactical conversations about how to pay employees, and more importantly, how to think about overall compensation philosophy. If you have company core values identified (you should!), your compensation philosophy needs to be aligned with those values.

We’ve put together some basic guidelines for startups as you think about “all things compensation.” The guide covers base salary, equity, negotiation, thoughts around compensation philosophy and best practices for closing candidates.

We look forward to hearing your feedback on this document: Compensation at Startups. We try to make these resources available to all entrepreneurs, not just those we’ve backed, in hopes of learning alongside all of you. Like our Thoughts on Diversity, this will be a living document that we’ll edit and update as we learn and get feedback. We look forward to a thoughtful and productive conversation about this topic. Don’t hesitate to contact Beth Scheer, Homebrew’s Head of Talent, if we can help your startup think about these issues.

The amount of data generated, collected, stored and analyzed every single day has reached epic proportions. But many problems in leveraging that data effectively still exist. Finding needed data, combining datasets and collaborating on data are still exceedingly difficult, despite all of the data analysis platforms and tools that have been created in recent years. data.world is building a comprehensive, collaborative and powerful open data platform designed specifically to help more people do more with more data.

We’ve known founding CEO, Brett Hurt, for many years through his prior successful startup, Bazaarvoice, and were not going to miss the chance to partner with him yet again. Brett and the powerhouse co-founding team of Bryon Jacob, Matt Laessig and Jon Loyens are committed to not only building a business of value, but also one of merit. Their vision is for data.world to enable meaningful insights in education, healthcare, finance and many other disciplines. The company’s status as a public benefit corporation is evidence of the team’s desire to transform the data community and help solve global problems. We’re incredibly proud to be amongst the investors supporting data.world in its quest to provide the open infrastructure for finding meaning in data. Visit data.world to get your invitation to the network.

Like many companies, Plaid was born from personal frustration experienced by the startup’s founders. Zach Perret and William Hockey were working on a mobile application that required consumers to share their credit card spending data, but Zach and Will struggled to find a way to easily and reliably access the data that was needed. And so the idea for Plaid was born.

Since then, Plaid has become the data infrastructure that virtually every modern financial application relies upon to connect to bank accounts and to innovate in the financial services industry. We’re extremely happy to continue our support of the company by participating in its $44 million Series B financing led by Goldman Sachs Investment Partners. If you’re excited about democratizing financial services for consumers and businesses, join the incredible team at Plaid.

Before Homebrew makes any investment, we ask ourselves “do we want to put sweat and reputation behind this team every day?” In some ways the wire transfer is the easy part; it’s signing up to go to work on behalf of the founders for a decade or more that really matters. With Winnie, the answer was indisputable. We’re thrilled to partner with this team and lead its pre-seed round.

Our ties to Winnie CEO, Sara Mauskopf, run deep. She worked with Hunter at YouTube and with Satya at Twitter (before also holding a product leadership role at Postmates). We knew firsthand the strength of her experience, breadth of her talents and overall grit. Her CPO cofounder, Anne Halsall, has a similarly impressive background with time spent at Google, Inkling, Quora and Postmates. And we love seeing former coworkers launch new companies together.

And so what is Winnie? Whether you describe it as a “clever new social networking app built specifically for parents,” or an app that “helps find family-friendly places, share their experiences,” Sara and Anne might simply tell you it’s a company designed to build tools that help make parents feel better, not worse, about being moms and dads. And as parents ourselves, we get that.

Homebrew also believes that your first product is your company. The Winnie founders take this to heart. We saw them seek out diverse beta testers and opinions, not just ask 30 parents in tech for feedback. We see them focused on building a team that doesn’t look like the standard tech company. So yeah, it’s easy to get up every day and put sweat and reputation behind Sara, Anne and Winnie.

Check out the Winnie app on iOS.

A brilliant team, fantastic products, a stellar business and a strongly resonating identity. Primary embodies all these qualities and today proudly announces its Series A financing. As the leading new brand for beautiful, simple, everyday clothing that lets kids shine, Primary delivers a powerful combination of quality, value and delight. And it happens to be a high revenue and high margin business delivering growth without gimmicks. We’re so happy to continue our support of Galyn Bernard, Christina Carbonell and the entire Primary team. Find out why so many families have become loyal customers of Primary by using promotion code “homebrew25” for 25% off and free shipping on your order.

Many people once looked at theSkimm and saw *just* a daily newsletter. But founders Carly Zakin and Danielle Weisberg knew they were building an audience company, one which helped its community become smarter while fitting neatly into their daily routines. Increasingly, those daily routines involve video. And with the announcement of the company’s $8 million Series B financing, led by 21st Century Fox, theSkimm is poised to bring its vision to several new platforms. We’re proud to continue as partners of conviction for what is an incredible team and business. Sign up for the newsletter, download the app and join the team. Find out why over 3.5 million people start their days with theSkimm!

We met PRX founding CEO Jake Shapiro several years ago as he was helping start Matter, an incubator and fund focused on the media industry. Jake’s a perpetual motion machine, always thinking about how to help scale content and build technologies to support media and the communities around creators. When Jake shared his plans to found RadioPublic as a standalone company to push non-music audio forward (no, we won’t call it podcasting), there was little doubt that Homebrew wanted to be involved in some way. With this week’s launch announcement, we’re playing a supporting role alongside a stellar group of tech and media investors. We believe in disrupting industries with love, not contempt, and RadioPublic is a perfect example.

Our Bottom Up Economy investment thesis at Homebrew is predicated on the idea that technology is an incredible democratizer, delivering economic value and productivity gains to people and industries that historically haven’t been able to benefit from it. And in no industry is that more true than in financial services. From the beginning, Chime has been focused on the idea that it shouldn’t cost you to spend your own money, and that managing your finances should be simple, fast and rewarding. We’re so pleased to continue our support of Chime in its recent $9 million financing. The team and company are quietly (and successfully) building smarter banking for the mobile generation, helping members save money and lead healthier financial lives. Sign up and see why we believe that Chime is the future of banking.

Even, an Oakland-based startup ambitiously seeking to help hourly workers ‘smoothe’ their wages in order to provide financial stability, quietly raised its $9m Series A recently. Homebrew was proud to invest in this financing, following our earlier supporting investment during the seed round. It’s been especially exciting to see the Even proposition appeal to both workers AND employers. Congratulations to the Even team on this significant milestone.