VC/FOUNDER SHOWCASE: VC@Maveron, VC@Bullpen & CEO of Lumoid (a YC Company)
At times we promote or sponsor events that we feel are valuable to our members and the startup community. This event below is organized and managed by Procopio Law. Founders Floor is a sponsor of the event.
Dinner and refreshments (beer and wine) will be provided.
Our event is open to: investors, startup founders, startup executives, entrepreneurs, innovators and developers.
PLEASE NOTE: A “YES” RSVP on our meetup site does not confirm your reservation.
Agenda
6:00pm – 6:45pm – Dinner and networking, demo/sponsor tables
6:45pm – 7:00pm – Intros, demo/sponsor tables mentions
7:00pm – 8:30pm – Speakers program and Q&A
8:30pm – 9:00pm – Meet the speaker, networking
Event Starts In
Day(s)
:
Hour(s)
:
Minute(s)
:
Second(s)
Date:
Monday, 09/28/2015
Time:
6:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.
Location:
Founders Floor
2 North 1st St., 5th Floor
San Jose, CA 95113
COWORKING ACCELERATOR
Interested in taking your startup to the next level?
Discussion Topics
• Rebecca Kaden, a partner at Maveron Capital (investors in Zulily, ebay, Groupon, Shutterfly, General Assembly),
• Duncan Davidson, a serial entrepreneur and Managing Partner of Bullpen Capital (investors in Marketo, Tanium, FanDuel, Zynga, ipsy, Life360), and
• Aarthi Ramamurthy, a serial entrepreneur and CEO of LUMOID, a hot YCombinator startup that is disrupting traditional retail by letting you rent equipment and gear of all sorts and kinds, and if you like what you rent, you can purchase it!
In this interactive, audience led discussion, Rebecca, Aarthi and Duncan will discuss:
• why Lumoid is disruptive, and how Aarthi figured this out;
• how founders should view their ideas, and how disruptivethey may be;
• how VCs react to such deals, and how to position to them;
• the most efficient and effective ways to raise capital in today’s environment, from an investors' and founder's perspective, what investors are looking for and how to reach them; and,
• what entrepreneurs need to do (and not do) to get a meeting and raise a successful round.
Entrepreneurs will gain a practical perspective and insight into the the way in which they fundamentally think about their ideas and how to position them to investors.
Other topics included:
- How to raise funding from corporate VCs
- How to partner with corporate VCs and big companies
- Landmines to avoid that can be disastrous for startups and other VCs involved
- How to position your startup to be acquired by a large corporation
- How corporations can use venture capital to access startup innovation, a steady pipeline of partnerships, investments and ultimately M&A opportunities
- And much more...
Speaker
Rebecca Kaden
Entrepreneur
Rebecca Kaden joined Maveron when she was earning her MBA at Stanford, and is now a partner. In 2015, Forbes named Rebecca to its annual list of top “30 under 30” in venture capital, and Craig Newmark named Rebecca one of “5 Women Investors You Need to Know.”
In her role at Maveron, Rebecca identifies emerging consumer-focused entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, Southern California, and her hometown of New York City. She also plays a leading role in Maveron's seed program, where Maveron partners with emerging consumer companies at their earliest stages. She’s a Board Observer at August, Darby Smart, Dolls Kill, Eargo, Earnest and General Assembly.
In a prior life, Rebecca was a journalist—for the Economist in London and as special projects editor at Narrative, an online literary platform devoted to bringing great literature into the digital age. At Narrative, in her addition to her editorial responsibilities, she was in charge of driving revenue and scaling the user base. Now she brings her skills and passion for understanding how stories come together to looking at the potential of breakout consumer brands.
Rebecca earned her undergraduate degree from Harvard.
Maveron is a consumer-only venture capital firm. Founded in 1998 by Dan Levitan and Howard Schultz (Starbucks), the firm has offices in Seattle and San Francisco. -Some of Maveron's current and former portfolio companies include:
Aarthi Ramamurthy
Product manager
Aarthi Ramamurthy was a product manager at Netflix, worked on the Visual Studio, CLR and Xbox LIVE teams at Microsoft, was an EIR at Battery Ventures and co-created bubblegum - voted one of the top Windows Phone apps of 2011, before starting Lumoid.
Buying gadgets used to be a thrill, but now it’s a drag. There are so many to consider, that the choices become overwhelming, and then it seems they’re obsolete five minutes after you buy them.
Lumoid thinks there’s a better way, which may disrupt the way we think about owning electronics: Stop buying your gadgets, and rent them! Lumoid undermines the very idea of owning, and hopes to do for electronics what Uber and Zipcar have done for cars, Spotify and Pandora have done for music andAirbnb has done for vacation homes: replace ownership with access.
Lumoid’s model allows you to rent equipment and gear of all sorts and kinds, from camera lenses to wearables, to apple watches, drones, gaming systems and 3D printers. If you like what you rent, you can purchase it with a portion of the rental cost credited toward the purchase price.
Duncan Davidson
Serial Entrepreneur
Duncan Davidson is a serial entrepreneur who most notably founded Covad Communications (the leading independent DSL provider, went public and reached a marketvalue of $9B) and Sky Pilot Networks (developer of outdoor wireless mesh systems, acquired by Trillium in 2009 for connectivity to smart meters).
He served as the SVP of Business Development at InterTrust and led the IPO in 1999 and the secondary in 2000 (InterTrust reached a $9B market value in 2000). He spent four years as a managing director at VantagePoint Venture Partners where he focused on digital media and telecom investments including Widevine (acquired by Google) and Livescribe.
Prior to Bullpen, he co-founded one of the first mobile social app companies, Xumii, later sold to Myriad Group and now powering over 20M users in the developing world. At Bullpen he focuses on mobile and consumer Internet investments, and sits on the boards of DoubleDutch, SendHub, and Proformative. Key investments include Byliner, PaidPiper and Twenty20. He received a Sc.B. in physics/math from Brown University, with Honors, and a J.D. magna cum laude from Michigan Law School, where he was Order of the Coif and a member of the Law Review.
Bullpen is the leader in post-seed, pre Series A funding of companies that have achieved market fit and that have an operational plan to hit big milestones within 12 months. Some of Bullpen's current and former portfolio companies include: 
Free street parking
Free parking garage
Public transportation
Refund Policy
You may request a refund up to 48 hours before the event. Unfortunately, any refunds requested less than 48 hours before the event cannot be honored. Thank you for your understanding.
Disclaimer
By participating in this Founders Floor Event, you agree to this liability disclaimer: www.foundersfloor.com/disclaimer