Tristan Pollock built and sold two companies - SocialEarth and Storefront and in this episode we focus on this - how to approach fundraising, how to get first contacts, how the life in the accelerator looks like and what happens after the demo day. Because Tristan was also a partner of 500 Startups for a few years, we touched onto that subject as well.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio the guest speaker is Mitzi Krockover, managing director, Co-Chair of the Health Sector Committee and the Founding Member of Golden Seeds' Arizona chapter. And in this episode we are primarily focused on discussing the work of the Golden Seeds - angel group that primarily invests in female-founded startups. We also touched onto the differences between the different chapters of Golden Seeds and about differences in different regions of the US in terms of fundraising for startups.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio our guest speaker is Stacey Feinberg the Founder of 33 Capital and a Managing Director at Golden Seeds. Stacey explains what the major mistakes are that she sees in the pitch decks and during the presentations. She also talked about reaching out to investors and her personal investing preferences.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Gay Gaddis the founder of T3 explained how she ran a company for 30 years until acquisition without raising any money. As bootstrapping becomes more and more popular during COVID-19 this episode could be very helpful to many founders who are considering this alternative to the standard Silicon Valley path.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Anton Fedorov, Investment Director at Flashpoint Venture Capital explained why Israel is such a popular place for venture investing in Europe and also talked about non-US based companies making 50%+ of their revenue from the US customers. This episode will be interesting for anyone who plans to work with the US and raise money there eventually.
In this episode we talked about two major subjects: growing your network once you move to a new city/country and how to find new partnerships and the second topic being the fundraising itself. Zenetta Burger explains what she does as a scout for Mucker Capital and how scouts work and can be helpful for startup founders.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio our guest speaker is Chuck Pettid, the CEO, Republic Crowdfunding Platform - one of the largest equity crowdfunding platforms in the US. And he explains how equity crowdfunding works, who should consider it, how is it different from regular crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo. We also talked about the most fundable types of project that should go for equity crowdfunding and at the end of the episode Chuck went over the application process of Republic Crowdfunding Platform.
This episode of Fundraising Radio is very educational and our speaker is Zane Witherspoon, co-founder and CTO at Dispatch acquired by Perlin. And in this episode Zane shares the lessons he learned from raising during the times when there was a hype around crypto and what was his major takeaway from that fundraising (spoiler: raise as much as you can while there is hype to extend your runway). He also talks about the acquisition that Dispatch went through and why it wasn't a great success.
In this episode, Wendy Ryan Managing Director at Golden Seeds explains how GS works, what do they invest in and how to improve the chances of getting funded by an angel group. We also spent some time talking about free resources available to startup founders and Wendy named a lot of them, but here are the major ones:
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Nicola Mattina co-founder and CEO of Stamplay tells about how he raised nearly $1 million in funding from across the world and how his company got acquired by Apple. In this episode we talk a lot about choosing the right physical location for fundraising - different cities focus on different fields in the startup industry and in this episode Nicola explains how to choose the right place for your fundraising.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio we had two guest speakers - Filipp Chebotarev and Polina Chebotareva telling about the differences between the current crisis and the crisis of 2008 and how investing during these times works. We've touched onto multiple subjects, including - how to evaluate your startup, pitching to investors and much more.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Andrew Ly, Founder and CEO at ticktBox explains how he managed to acquire a large customer early on and what effects it had on his company. We also talk about the acquisition of tickBox by ScreenEngine and about acquisitions in general - who should expect them, who should expect an acquisition and what happens after your startup gets acquired.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Jessica Li, investor at Soma Capital talks about fundraising at the earliest stages, how to reach out to the right person and how to establish that connection with the point of contact at a fund. This episode is full of insights into fundraising from VCs at an early stage.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Wally Wang an Angel Investor, Limited Partner at OSS Capital and a Managing Partner at Scale Asia Ventures (sav.vc) tells about the current market situation from the multiple viewpoints that his experience gives him. We covered several different topics the most important being - Wally's recommendations for startup founders to act soon as the fund managers will have to deploy loads of cash that they have been storing for months.
In this episode Emilie Mazzacurati, founder and CEO of Four Twenty Seven talks about working with strategic investors, what are the major benefits of strategic investors and what are the common pitfalls. Emilie also explains how to reach out to early stage investors if you don't have a large network and were to start your fundraising process. Also we talked about the acquisition of Four Twenty Seven by Moody's.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Wesam Mikhail the co-founder and CTO of TradeDash explains how he manages to build and sell his companies so fast - for example TradeDash was acquired in 9 months after its inception by the second largest cryptocurrency exchange in the US! How to accelerate the acquisition process, how to find buyers, how to hire team members faster and much more in this episode!
In this episode, Kim Patel angel investor and scout at Female Funded Club (https://www.femalefoundedclub.com/) in this episode talks about the work of scouts, how founders should reach out to scouts and where should female founders start in their fundraising process. Touched onto many interesting topics, but should be extra interesting for all my female listeners!
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Dan Tamkin - Managing Director at Resurgent Capital Partners tells about the types of the Mergers & Acquisitions that are out there, how to prepare for an acquisition, what is the minimum size of the deal that you can expect and also how to accelerate the process of getting acquired.
Sam Nagar, founder and CEO at Pixeom acquired by Siemens in this episode of Fundraising Radio tells how his company acquired very first large customers, how he managed to grow the company with no VC or angel funding and how he retained largest part of the share of the company even after raising $15 million. This episode has tons of insights and a great CTA from Sam, but the major CTA from me personally is to message Sam! He can give you really good feedback on your project and here is his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samnagar/
John Kao, founder of EdgeMakers that was recently acquired by Coded Minds and who raised $16 million explains how he managed to raise his first round at the idea stage by giving the right pitch to the right person. If you want to get some inspiration - this episode is for you. Generally the content of Fundraising Radio is pretty dark (as several of my listeners complained) but this one is truly inspiring!
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Matt Pru - Managing Partner at Stackmatix, tells about angel investing, the basics of marketing and gives wonderful recommendations on the books to read. If you want to make sure that your marketing is in order before starting raising money - check out this episode. Books recommended:
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Adrian Druzgalski, co-founder and CTO at Radius Intelligence that raised $107.6 million and survived the 2008 financial crisis tells about the role of a CTO in the fundraising process of the startup, explains how he thinks founders should deal with the financial crisis and when is it the time to pivot your company.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio Vivek Kumar, Director at Dolby Laboratories explains how startup founders should work on the technical side of the project - when to switch from contractors to full-time developers, how to outsource your development and who should consider doing this. And of course we talked about fundraising process and specifically angel investing.
In this episode of Fundraising Radio, Ravi Mehta, the ex-CPO at Tinder tells about his experience in working with Gen Z and about building dating apps, he also had experience working for Facebook focusing on acquiring startups that were working with Gen Z users and we touch onto M&A subject here as well. If you plan to work with Gen Z this episode is a must. Ravi's site: https://www.ravi-mehta.com/
