The Twenty Minute Vc: Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

Samir Kaji is the Managing Director @ First Republic Bank, a leading private bank and wealth management company on Sand Hill Road. Samir, has 13 years of banking experience, working with venture capital and private equity clients in Silicon Valley. Prior to joining First Republic, Kaji worked for Silicon Valley Bank. Samir writes an awesome blog on the VC, investing and startup scene at (http://pevcbanker.com). All the data and research mentioned in today's show is provided by the kind team at Mattermark, check them out here! In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Samir made his way into the wonderful world of venture and technology? 2.) We often hear the term, Micro VC bandied around, are there any common characteristics and criteria that discern Micro VCs from traditional VCs? 3.) Why has there has been this massive growth of the seed stage funding environment? What is driving this end of the funding cycle? Is it being damaged with the rise of AngelList syndicates? 4.) What trends and emerging themes ha

Ed Sim, Founding Partner @ Boldstart Ventures, Ed truly has had the most astonishing career in early stage SaaS having led first round investments in todays market leaders, LivePerson (now on Nasdaq) and GoToMeeting (acquired by Citrix). Over the 19 years in early stage SaaS he has also helped a number of entrepreneurs scale from seed to market leader with his portfolio companies being acquired by the likes of Google, Linkedin and Salesforce, and I would like to say that all the data and information presented in today's show is provided by the kind folks at Mattermark, check then out at www.mattermark.com In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Ed made his way into the wonderful world of venture? 2.) Why did Ed start a seed stage SaaS fund? Where did he see the market opportunity?How was the fundraising process for Ed? Were there any surprises? 3.) How does Ed view the current seed stage funding environment, is there too much money chasing too few deals? 4.) Ed backed cloud companies in 2000. What is diffe

Nikos Moraitakis is the Founder & CEO @ Workable, one of Balderton Capital's latest additions to their portfolio. Workable is the affordable and usable hiring software that which replaces email and spreadsheets with an applicant tracking system that your team will actually enjoy using. Prior to founding Workable, Nikos was a Senior VP of Business Development at Upstream where he played a key role in the company's growth from startup into one of the world’s top marketing technology companies, where he was actively involved in enterprise sales across 40 countries in 4 continents. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Nikos made his way into the world of startups and tech and founded Workable? What was the a-ha moment? 2.) What was it like starting a company in Greece? Were there sufficient levels of engineers? Why did Workable decide to move some operations to the US? 3.) Why does Nikos think the enterprise SaaS space has become so hot? What has changed? Has this upturn in interest made it easier with

Daniel Waterhouse is a General Partner @ Balderton Capital, which he joined in 2013 and he currently sits on the boards of Top10, ROLI, Lovecrafts, TrademarkNow, Tictail, Achica, Thread and Workable. Prior to Balderton, Daniel spent 5 years as a partner at Wellington Partners and invested in a number of fast-growing companies including EyeEm, Hailo, YPlan, Bookatable (also a Balderton portfolio company), SumAll, Readmill (sold to Dropbox) and Qype (sold to Yelp). Before Wellington, Daniel was a sector partner at 3i where he worked on all of their venture and private equity investments in the internet sector in North America and Europe. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Daniel made his way into the wonderful world of VC? 2.) How has Daniel's mathematics background impacted his investing style? 3.) At Balderton 50% of the partners have very operational backgrounds and 50% are much more investment rooted. What has Daniel gained and missed as an investor from having a outside view of the startup world? 4

Suranga Chandratillake is a General Partner @ Balderton Capital. He was previously an entrepreneur and engineer having founded blinkx, the intelligent search engine for video and audio content in Cambridge in 2004. He then lead the company for eight years as CEO through its journey of moving to San Francisco, building a profitable business and going public in London where it achieved a peak market capitalisation in excess of $1Bn. Before founding blinkx, Suranga was an early employee at Autonomy Corporation - joining as an engineer in the Cambridge R&D team and ultimately serving as the company's US CTO in San Francisco.  In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Suranga made his way into the wonderful world of VC? 2.) Why are so many technical European CEOs fearful of continuing the position as CEO? What can we do to improve it? 3.) What does Suranga think makes a great CEO? Which CEO Suranga respects the most and why? 4.) How have Suranga's years as an entrepreneur affected his investing style? Does Su

Ayan Mitra is the Founder & CEO @ Crowdbnk, an investment crowdfunding platform that allows you to invest in high growth businesses through both equity and debt. Ayan himself has a background as an enterprise architect and technical manager, having worked with leading consumer companies including M&S, Orange and First Direct. He took his LBS MBA to follow his passion and launch CrowdBnk in 2011. Since 2011 Crowdbnk has raised nearly £20m for high growth startups. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Ayan make his way into the world of startups and tech and start Crowdbnk? 2.) What is Crowdbnk, how does it work, what companies Crowdbnk raise for, what is their minimum investment etc? 3.) What are the key drivers of the massive rise of the crowdfunding sector? What effect will the recent SEC ruling have on global crowdfunding? 4.) With the greater and greater amounts being raised on these platforms, does Crowdfunding have the potential to replace VCs in the future? 5.) What are the greatest ba

Eric Paley is the Managing Partner at Founder Collective, one of the world's most successful seed funds with investments in the likes of Uber, Hunch, Makerbot and About.me. Prior to Founder Collective, Eric was the Co-Founder and CEO of Brontes Technologies, later acquired by 3M for $95m. Following it’s acquisition Eric began making angel investments and it was not long before Eric and David, 'super angel' at the time, saw the potential for a Founder First seed fund and Founder Collective was born. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Eric made his move into the wonderful world of venture from founding Brontes Technologies? 2.) What does Eric make of early stage valuations? When creating a venture fund why did Eric believe the seed stage was the stage with the most opportunity? 3.) Question from the legend, David Hornik @ August: At such an early stage where Founder Collective traditionally put in $0.1m-$0.3m, does Eric feel they put in enough money to make it matter? 4.) Does Eric believe that by not d

David Frankel is the Managing Partner at Founder Collective, one of the world's most successful seed funds with investments in the likes of Uber, Hunch, Makerbot and About.me. Prior to Founder Collective, David was the Founder and CEO of Internet Solutions, one of the largest ISP providers in Africa. Following it’s acquisition David made his move into the investing game becoming one of the very first ‘super angels’, following exceptional success in this field, David along with Eric Paley (coming on the show on Wednesday) and Micah Rosenbloom founded Founder Collective, a seed stage venture fund whereby everyone at Founder Collective has started a technology company, they have lived and breathed the founder experience, a true founder friendly venture fund. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did David make his move into the wonderful world of venture from being a founder and 'super angel'? 2.) Question from Spencer Lazar @ General Catalyst: How has David evolved as an investor over time? Has his strateg

Steve O’Hear is best known as a technology journalist, currently at TechCrunch where he focuses on European startups, companies and products. He first joined TechCrunch in November 2009 as Contributing Editor for TechCrunch Europe, where he worked alongside Editor Mike Butcher to help build TechCrunch’s European coverage. However, in June 2011 having caught the startup bug, Steve took a break from journalism to co-found the London and Prague-based startup Beepl. In November 2012, Beepl was acquired by Brand Embassy. Steve is also the writer and director of the critically acclaimed Silicon Valley documentary ‘In Search of the Valley’. Before we delve into the show today, our dear friend and kind donator, Brad Feld has agreed to do a competition giveaway featuring signed copies of his amazing book, Venture Deals, all you have to do to be in with a chance is headover to the website at www.thetwentyminutevc.com and sign up for our newsletter. It’s that simple. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) Where did it a

Jeppe Zink is the General Partner at Northzone, who have investments in the likes of Spotify, Bloglovin and TrustPilot, just to name a few. Jeppe himself established the London office of Northzone and his primary areas of focus are fintech, SaaS, marketplaces and mobile and has made investments in Wallapop, SpaceApe Games and many more. Before we delve into the show today, our dear friend and kind donator, Brad Feld has agreed to do a competition giveaway featuring signed copies of his amazing book, Venture Deals, all you have to do to be in with a chance is headover to the website at www.thetwentyminutevc.com and sign up for our newsletter. It’s that simple. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Hussein mad his way into the wonderful world of venture? 2.) What was it like to start a new fund with Hoxton and why did Hussein leave the security of Accel to start his own? 3.) Why did Hussein believe this was the stage with the most opportunity? Does he think there is too much capital chasing too few deals?

Hussein Kanji really is a pedigree in the industry having started off his career with Microsoft, he made the leap into venture with Accel Partners where he was a board observer with the likes of Playfish, acquired by Electronic Arts and made seed investments in the likes of OpenGamma and Dapper acquired by Yahoo. Following such success, Hussein raised his own fund and is now the founder of Hoxton Ventures, a 2013 fund with $40m under management. Despite, Hoxton’s age their portfolio is immense with the likes of Deliveroo, DarkTrace by the famous Mike Lynch from Autonomy and Campanja, recently acquired by 24/7 customer. Before we delve into the show today, our dear friend and kind donator, Brad Feld has agreed to do a competition giveaway featuring signed copies of his amazing book, Venture Deals, all you have to do to be in with a chance is headover to the website at www.thetwentyminutevc.com and sign up for our newsletter. It’s that simple. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Hussein mad his way into

Willie Biggart is the Chairman @ Spoonfed, a startup on the cusp of 2 extremely hot sectors, SaaS and food. Spoonfed offers a new way for catering companies and restaurants to take advantage of the growing corporate food drop off market. They are currently raising a £500,000 round on SyndicateRoom, which you can check out here! With regards to Willie himself, Willie founded his own business, BD Network in 1990 and exited in 2002 and BD Ntwk is now one of Europe’s largest marketing agencies. Since 1990 Willie has started, developed and sold 3 businesses. CLICK TO PLAY In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Willie make his move into the entrepreneurial path and come to be Chairman of Spoonfed? 2.) Why does Willie believe it is more beneficial to have SaaS based businesses rather than people based businesses? 3.) Often the hardest problem for SaaS businesses is finding their first customers, how did Willie go about getting Spoonfed's initial user base? 4.) What strategies did Willie undertake to try and

Mark Suster is Managing Partner at Upfront Ventures which he joined in 2007, having previously worked with Upfront for nearly 8 years as a two-time entrepreneur. Before joining Upfront Mark was Vice President, Product Management at Salesforce.com following its acquisition of Koral, where Mark was Founder and CEO. Prior to Koral, Mark was Founder and CEO of BuildOnline, a European SaaS company that was acquired by SWORD Group. Mark is also the writer of one of my favourite VC blogs, Both Sides Of The Table which is a centre piece to the whole VC community and is a must read for all interested in entrepreneurship and VC. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Mark make his way into the world of tech and later make the transition to VC? 2.) How have Mark's entrepreneurial origins influenced his investment style and approach to startups? 3.) What really gets Mark excited in terms of the founders and the companies they have built? 4.) How does Mark recommend that startup founders can meet investors and get

Antoine Nussenbaum is a Principal and member of the founding team of Felix Capital. Prior to Felix, Antoine was a Partner at Atlas Global, a private equity fund originally part of GLG Partners. Over the past five years he has worked closely with various early-stage digital startups including Mirakl, Jellynote, Pave, Reedsy and 31Dover and actively helped them launch their businesses. If that wasn't enough he has also been involved since inception with Huckletree, a fast growing coworking operator dedicated to the UK digital community which was started by his wife. To check out the available positions at Felix Capital click here! In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Antoine make his move into the world of VC? 2.) What sectors do Felix invest in? What stage? Geography? 3.) How do Felix position themselves in the VC space? How do Felix plan to differentiate between other VCs firms in Europe? As for the structure of the fund, why did Felix choose an advisor heavy approach? 4.) Why does Antoine think Eur

Ashish Walia is the Co-Founder & COO at 500 Startups portfolio company, LawTrades. LawTrades aims to decentralise the traditional legal hiring process through providing an amazing marketplace of attorneys with domain experience in the startup world having worked with companies from the likes of YC, Techstars and 500. Ashish is also the Host of The Ashish Walia Show, a podcast dedicated to interviewing the latest and greatest world changing entrepreneurs, you can listen to Harry's interview on The Ashish Walia Show here! In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) I would love to kick off today’s show by hearing a little about your background and the origins of LawTrades? What was the a-ha moment for you? 2.) Was Ashish nervous leaving the security of the legal profession for the life of a tech founder? What would Ashish advise people who want to make the leap but are not sure if it is worth risking everything? 3.) The legal space is about a century behind the rest of the consumerised world of tech, why is ther

Marvin is a Partner at 500 Startups, running the SF based accelerator program as well as investing in Seed stage start ups. Prior to 500 Marvin is a 10.5 year veteran of Yahoo! Inc., having held roles in various departments from Sales, Business Development, Ad Operations and Marketing and presently serves on the boards/advisory boards of several internet advertising and ad technology companies across the globe. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Marvin make his move into technology and the investing game? 2.) How was Marvin's time at Yahoo? How did Marvin see the company change over the 10 years he was there? How do you feel your position at Yahoo equipped you for 500 Startups? 3.) So coming from 10 years at Yahoo you could have had your pick of VCs to join. What was it about 500 that attracted you and why do you believe this very early stage is the biggest opportunity to exploit? 4.) 500 has now ironically invested in 1000+ startups, leading me to ask, what is the admissions process like and what

Matt Lerner is a Distro Partner with 500 Startups, and runs their London office. He specializes in conversion optimization, analytics, engagement and retention. As a member of the in-house growth (AKA “Distro”) team, he partners with 500 portfolio companies to help them build growth engines and scale. Previously, as a 500 Startups Mentor, Matt helped over 40 companies develop and execute growth strategies. Prior to joining 500 Startups, he worked as a Marketing Director at PayPal, where he built and managed three growth teams that generated hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue across the funnel. Here are some of Matt's amazing growth hacking slide decks: 10 Growth Hacking Tools To Disrupt Your Competitors Growth Hacking 101 For your chance to win a signed copy of Brad Feld's amazing Venture Deals, all you have to do is click the click to tweet link here: http://ctt.ec/C61w6 and you will be entered into the competition. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Matt made his move from Paypal

Joining us in the hotseat today is a young man who is insanely smart, he skipped 4 grades in school and graduated University at just 17, at which point he moved to the states on his own and within months was working alongside tech legends Kevin Rose and Jay Adelson at Digg. However, it was not long before he started his own company Kiip, a category-creating mobile rewards network that is redefining mobile advertising through an innovative platform that leverages "moments of achievement" in games and apps to simultaneously benefit users, developers and advertisers. If you have not guessed it by now, shame on you, it is of course, the incredible Brian Wong, one of the youngest people to ever raise VC funding receiving investment from the likes of Hummer Winblad, previous guest at Transmedia Capital Chris Redlitz (Episode 26), True Ventures and many more. For the chance to win Brad Feld’s amazing book, Venture Deals, all you have to do is head on over to ProductHunt’s new podcast section and upvote this episode

Weston Gaddy is a Senior Principal at Bain Capital Ventures where he focuses on investments in early-stage companies and assists the portfolio operations group. Weston is also a YC alum with Frogmetrics, a handheld survey device company, he co-founded in college and received funding from Founders Fund, Y Combinator and Alexis Ohanian at Reddit. Outisde of the tech and VC world Weston was a Weston worked as a strategy consultant for media, financial service, and consumer product clients at Bain & Company in New York. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Weston make his way into the technology and VC? 2.) What was Weston's biggest takeaway from the YC experience? Has the experience impacted his investing strategy? 3.) Why is the world of branding changing from dominant players using traditional mainstream channels to a more open opportunity for startups to connect with consumers? What is changing? 4.) On the topic of brand loyalty how brands create brand loyalty in the fickle generation of young m

Patricia Nakache is General Partner at Trinity Ventures where she focuses on funding companies launching innovative online consumer and business services. Her portfolio of past investments is just astonishing with the likes of LoopNet and Care.com IPOing, PayScale being acquired by Warburg Pincus, Uptake being acquired by Groupon and many more. To be entered into the competition to win a signed copy of Brad Feld's legendary Venture Deals, all you have to do is click here and upvote this episode on ProductHunt and you will be automatically entered into the competition. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Patricia get into the technology industry and then later make her transition into the world of Venture Capital?  2.) A recent study has shown that the total number of female partners has fallen from 10% to 6% in the time that you have been at Trinity. Why is there this gender misrepresentation and what can be done to improve female equality in the VC industry? 3.) Sheila has invested in some incredi