Sramana Mitra: What is your modus operandi? You have a small fund. Are you looking for unicorns? Are you looking for early exits?
Dan Roselli: We know that we will still have a relatively high failure rate. When you look at the failure rate of companies in general, you get less of that in the Series B stage. At the seed stage, you’re still trying to figure out if the company is going to make it.
>>>Sramana Mitra: What does the company need to have by way of proof point to qualify for your funding?
Dan Roselli: I’ll start by saying what’s next and then work backwards. Series A investors want to see about $100,000 in monthly recurring revenue.
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Responding to a popular request, we are now sharing transcripts of our investor podcast interviews in this new series. The following interview with Dan Roselli was recorded in July 2020.
Dan Roselli is Founder and Managing Partner at CFV Ventures, a North Carolina firm focused on FinTech and InsureTech.
>>>Sramana Mitra: Perhaps we should work together to some extent, this is very aligned to what I do. I can understand why you guys approached us to be featured. Is there anything else that you want to add to what you have shared so far?
Joe Silver: A couple of additional interesting things about our company, I would say we are international now. We launched recently in Canada and closed our first loan there. This is a big step in the right direction for us.
>>>Sramana Mitra: How does that split out of the 700 investments you’ve made? How many follow the route of going on to venture capital? How many continue to bootstrap? Is there any other nuance to it?
Joe Silver: Of the companies that have exited our portfolio, which is about 15%, it’s split down the middle. Roughly half of them have been acquired or raised for their equity and another half may have refinanced with us with other debt or paid off with organic cash flow.
>>>Sramana Mitra: You said that you lend up to $3 million, with the first loan being $400,000, what does the company need to have by way of proof points for you to start lending to that company?
Joe Silver: We size our loans of a multiple of monthly recurring revenue so generally three to four months. The first criteria is that they need to be generating revenue. We like to see at least six months of revenue or longer.
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Responding to a popular request, we are now sharing transcripts of our investor podcast interviews in this new series. The following interview with Joe Silver was recorded in July 2020.
Joe Silver discusses his firm’s debt-financing model for startups.
>>>Sramana Mitra: What is the background of the founder that makes him so high quality?
Raoul Maier: He was a senior leader at Minerva Project before. He had a very strong leadership background and he also had a strong founder-product fit. He has been working in the child care space for a long time.
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