Tag Archives: angel investor

The Next 36 showcases top ventures from Canada’s preeminent young entrepreneurs | Backbone Magazine

Posted on August 16, 2012 | Leave a comment

I have seen two cohorts of Next 36 companies so far and been impressed with both. Congratulations to them all!

The Next 36 showcases top ventures from Canada’s preeminent young entrepreneurs | Backbone Magazine.

Investors and business elite from across North America flock to annual Venture Day

TORONTO, Aug. 15, 2012 /CNW/ – Many of Canada’s biggest names in venture capital and angel investing met the young co-founders of 7 new ventures launched this year by The Next 36. These businesses pitched solutions to major challenges in healthcare, human resources, retail and education.

Supported by more than 50 Canadian business leaders – including Galen Weston, Paul Desmarais Sr. and Jim Pattison as founding patrons - The Next 36 aims to transform the country’s most promising undergraduates into high-impact entrepreneurs and nation builders.

Venture Day also featured keynote remarks from high profile technology entrepreneurs including, Graham Weston, chairman & co-founder of Rackspace (a NYSE listed company with a $7.5B market cap), an in-kind sponsor of The Next 36 ventures, and Razor Suleman, chairman & founding CEO of Achievers. “Research shows that all net new jobs come from companies less than 5 years old, so a country’s prosperity depends on its ability to generate high impact entrepreneurs.” said Weston. “The Next 36 provides a magical combination of capital, mentorship and education to young Canadian entrepreneurs, unlike anything I have ever seen in the US or anywhere else.”

Tuesday’s graduation ceremony was capped by the presentation of three highly-coveted awards: The 2012 Valedictorian is Jane Wu, a commerce graduate from Queen’s University.  Wu’s venture PenyoPal, teaches kids how to speak Mandarin through interactive mobile games. In June, it was selected the Best Overall 1.0 Startup at the Launch Conference in Mountain View, CA.  It was one of eight stealth ventures, selected from over 300, and the only Canadian start-up given the opportunity to compete. “The Next 36 is transformational because of the people that support it.” says Wu. “In 8 months, I have built a lifetime’s worth of relationships with world class entrepreneurs, CEOs and like-minded young leaders.” Rafal Dittwald, also a co-founder of PenyoPal and an engineering science graduate from The University of Toronto, was chosen by the program’s co-founders as winner of the Satchu Prize, named in honour of Founding Chair, Reza Satchu.  The recipient of the Outstanding Venture Award was Kira, an online platform that accelerates the interview process using video. Kira’s co-founders come from the University of Waterloo and University of Windsor.

As the newest alumni of The Next 36 forge ahead with their businesses, the program is gearing up to welcome its next wave of students. The application process is open with early applications accepted until September 18, 2012.

About The Next 36

For more information, please visit: www.thenext36.ca

The goal of The Next 36 is to increase Canadian prosperity by developing Canada’s next generation of high impact entrepreneurs. Started by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, The Next 36 provides a series of life changing experiences and relationships to young Canadians with the potential to build and lead great organizations. Each year, 36 promising undergraduates are selected from a variety of academic disciplines, and from across Canada, through a rigorous national selection process. The young entrepreneurs build a business in the mobile or tablet space together in teams.  For eight months they are provided mentorship from some of Canada’s top business leaders, up to $80,000 cash from top venture capitalists, and academic instruction from some of the world’s top faculty. The program is spearheaded by a founding group of 50 high-profile business leaders, entrepreneurs, and academics. Its Founding Patrons are Paul Desmarais, Sr., W. Galen Weston and Jimmy Pattison.

SOURCE: The Next 36

For further information:

For further details or to speak to a participating student, please contact:
Jon French
Director, Marketing & Events
The Next 36
jon@thenext36.ca

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What Are Angel Investors Looking For?

Posted on May 2, 2010 | Leave a comment

As Executive Director of the National Angel Capital Organization, I am constantly asked what business angel investors are looking for by entrepreneurs.

There is no one-size-fits-all answer. Entrepreneurs must always remember that angels, acting alone or in groups, are all individuals, with their own motivations for and interests in investing.

Some angels will only invest in one industry. Some angels will invest in many industries. Some angels will be extremely hands on – even taking senior roles within their investee company – mentoring the company and leveraging their network and expertise to help insure its success. Some angels will invest in a company and leave it to other investors to help ensure the company’s success. No one size or set of motivations describes all angels.

That said, there are a few things that all investors will look for in their potential investments; or at least should be looking for. I usually sum these things up as the “3 T’s” – being Team, Traction and Technology (Read more about the 3 T’s and their relationship to the failure modes of investee companies here.).

The Wall Street Journal in an interview with Susan Preston on April 25th, How to Win Angel Funding, did an excellent job of rounding out the investment criteria of angels. Every entrepreneur seeking capital should review this article to ensure their opportunity, at the very least, meets all of the criteria set out in the article. These include:

  • A solid potential for return.
  • A good plan for the cash.
  • A winning attitude.
  • A seasoned team.
  • A competitive edge.
  • A well-defined exit strategy.

    • With a market for private investment capital characterised by extreme scarcity, demand far exceeding supply, an entrepreneur cannot afford to approach investors without having satisfied all of these criteria. If you have not met these, I would suggest that you will have an exceptionally hard time securing capital as, in a market such as ours today, even companies that have met and far exceeded these base criteria are having a difficult time securing capital.

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    Approaching Investors: Executive Summary or Slide Deck

    Posted on February 12, 2010 | Leave a comment

    Reposted from the NACO blog – 2009/05/07.

    Mark MacLeod, writer of StartupCFO, conducted a poll recently with interesting results.

    “Following up on a comment to my earlier post today about executive summaries, I decided to do a quick twtpoll of investors to see what they preferred: a short written summary or a short presentation?

    Between the poll and several e-mails we have a small but statistically relevant sample that is overwhelmingly in favour of presentations (25 out of 32 responses). One anecdotal observation: angels seems to prefer one pagers. Every VC who wrote me preferred the presentation.”

    In my experience, I’d say that this poll accurately sums up the preferences of both groups. Angel groups in Canada (and indeed globally) are now almost all using Angelsoft, an Angel group deal flow management tool and community. The first step in using signing up on this platform for any angel group is the filling out of a form which generates a one-page executive summary.

    The first step in The catch, of course, is that to produce either document, a one page executive summary or a slide deck, of any quality an entrepreneur really must work through all the logic involved in preparing a full business plan and the financials that accompany it.

    My recommendation to entrepreneurs: Remember that they are engaged in a sales activity when they are raising financing. You are selling your company. Slides, executive summaries, business plans, your web site, etc. are all part of the collateral you need to help you close the sale. Take time when completing your executive summary to be sure you put your best foot forward.

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    Batten Down The Hatches: Company CEO Advice

    Posted on October 13, 2008 | Leave a comment

    Over the past week I have seen a flurry of notes from Angels and VCs to their portfolio companies commenting on the recent economic instability.

    The message echoed by all: Batten down the hatches! Review your budgets. Make the cuts you need to. You may not get another round of financing in the near future.

    Two such groups that have sent out messages advising their portfolio CEOs of some of the steps they might take to weather the economic storm they are going to face for what many have estimated will be at least the next 18 months, are Sequoia Capital and angel investor Ron Conway.

    Ron noted, in an article with TechCrunch, that the current situation is much like that in 2000. So much so, that he simply dug out the e-mails he sent then and circulated them again. The advice:

    The down draft in the stock market sends us some obvious “signals” and we can’t help but mention them.

    1. If you are in a funding cycle, you should raise your funding as soon as possible and raise as much as possible.
    2. Many companies are ignoring certain VC leads we’ve provided in order to concentrate on the top tier only. While we have preached that in the past, this is no longer the case. Currently, top-tier VC bandwidth constraints, coupled with the market down draft, make it very important to take meetings with any VCs where you can get their attention. We have been working hard to open up this new bandwidth.
    3. You must aggressively examine and pursue M&A opportunities (unless you have over 12 months of cash reserves!) ro insure you have critical mass (including funding, customers, rolodex power, market share, cash, synergy, etc.).
    4. Be realistic on valuations – they will fall so be ready and willing to co-operate.
    5. Look for corporate partners to invest so you can raise more money. You should also consider a sale of your company to your corporate partners.
    6. If you are entering a funding cycle start raising money sooner rather than later.
    7. While it’s safe to say entrepreneurs have had negotiating leverage with the “down draft” in the market, the VC community will start exercising their leverage.

    I highly advise you to read the full TechCrunch article that goes into much greater detail.

    The second group whose advice I think it important to convey is Sequoia Capital. They sent around the slide deck that you can find at: Sequoia Capital on startups and the economic downturn

    The most important piece of advice here, I think, is manage what you can control, including your spending, your growth assumptions, and your earnings assumptions.

    Companies everywhere have a hard path ahead of them over the coming months (years?). Only those that can create real value, and reach breakeven by stretching their pennies razor thin will flourish in an environment such as this. Can do this? If not, it is time to learn quickly or risk being left in the ‘valley of death’.

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    Entrepreneurs as Artists: A Comment

    Posted on June 22, 2008 | Leave a comment

    I very much like the comparison Mike McDerment, CEO of FreshBooks, made recently between entrepreneurs and artists.

    As a fan of Romantic Realism, a term that usually refers to a type of art that deals with the themes of volition and value while also acknowledging objective reality and the importance of technique, to me, Mike’s is an very fitting comparison.

    An entrepreneur, like an artist, must:

    1. Choose to shape/reshape/create something new he thinks will be of value to the market based on, hopefully, objective information he has gathered; and
    2. Produce something that:
      • Works for the customer and meets their needs (Technology – 10% of the failure of early-stage companies);
      • Satisfies a market need, is accessible to the market (they understand it!) and acts according to the realities of the market (Market – 30% of the reason for failure of early stage companies); and
      • His/her team’s personal competencies can deliver (Team – 60% of the reason for failure of early stage companies).

    The comparison could continue but I think Mike did a great job of it!

    I would say one thing, in addition to Mike’s comments, about starving artists: Entrepreneurs, like artists, Starving Artistmust produce something of value to their customers.

    If an artist or entrepreneur engages in an exercise that only focuses on the product and not ensuring it garners traction in the marketplace they deserve to starve if, after labouring for years they find out that the market doesn’t have a use for it. Someone paying for your art/product is the true litmus test of your art/product’s worth, not to mention your company’s worth when trying to find investors!

    Starvation may mean two things:

    • The market signalling that your product is not relevant to it, that it is not understood, that it is priced outside what the market will bear, or that you are doing something else wrong in conveying it’s value;
    • That you are making the conscious choice to ‘starve’ and push all profits back into the venture to grow it.

    Entrepreneurs in the latter category, Angels are waiting to hear from you!

    On another note much delayed note, I would like to add Freshbooks to the Tech Tools section of my blog. They have created an amazing suite of tools that I use to keep my invoicing and books clean! An example, perhaps, of a company providing a much needed product to their market? Absolutly!

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