Venture Capital Funding Opportunities
We are a seed stage investor in technology companies through our private syndicate fund. We believe seed stage companies need more than just venture capital funding to be successful. The unique challenges that seed stage founders experience are very different from later stage startups and require specialized advice and mentorship. Our goal is to be a trusted partner and resource for our portfolio companies, providing the right amount of advice, mentorship and introductions at inflection points of the company’s growth.
Partner VCs within our network understand the unique insight we have with our seed stage portfolio companies, which is why our introductions are seen as quality deal-flow for them. For larger seed rounds we regularly introduce our portfolio companies to in-network seed stage VC’s for co-investment opportunities, while later stage VCs are introduced to our portfolio companies who are raising a Series A round. Ultimately, our portfolio companies benefit with access to capital for their continued high growth. Below are a few of the many VCs within our network.
Venture Capital Network
Have Questions? We Have Answers.
What funding stage do you invest in?
We invest in the Seed stage. We ourselves are founders and builders, with skillsets that are best able to help startups in this early stage of creation and growth.
What sectors do you invest in?
We invest in technology companies, mostly software companies but some hardware when there is a significant software component, such as with IoT or similar. We like to keep an open mind to whatever sectors exceptional founders are building promising companies within. Having said that, our areas of interest are, but not limited to: SaaS (software-as-a-service), FinTech (financial technology), IoT (Internet of Things) and connected devices, health tech, artificial intelligence, big data analytics, machine learning, among others. We like business-to-business or business-to-consumer companies with a strong network effect.
Do you invest in startups who have not participated in your accelerator program or are not members of your startup coworking space?
Yes! Our goal is to invest in the best seed stage tech startups, no matter if they have or have not graduated from our accelerator program or are a member of our Founders Floor coworking space for tech startups. Having said that, getting to know the founders, their thought process, how they make decisions and how well they execute under stress, are very important for us to know and be comfortable with. One of the advantages of having the startup coworking space and accelerator program is that we can get to know the founders better and help them in a more meaningful way...more than just money.
Do you sign confidentiality agreements and/or NDAs?
No. We do not sign NDA’s and nor do other VCs and professional investors. It has nothing to do with ego or arrogance, but rather in practicality, time allocation and legal risk exposure. Well known VC Brad Feld from Foundry Group sums it up best in this blog post http://www.feld.com/archives/2006/02/why-most-vcs-dont-sign-ndas.html . Our reputation and how we are perceived by the startup community and perspective founders is very important to us. So be assured that we do not share confidential information.
Do you lead an investment round?
As a seed stage investor, we are typically the first VC investor in a company, with many companies having previously raised an angel round from “Friends and Family”. For larger seed rounds with multiple investors we prefer not to lead but rather co-invest with other high-quality seed stage VCs and angels.