12 VCs, Angels and Seed Investors Pinpoint Where They Want to Invest via the Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum

To benefit entrepreneurs who are seeking funding, I’ve asked many investors to pinpoint what they want to invest in and exactly what they are looking for in startups. Industry trends, segments, locations and areas of personal interest all play roles in developing an investor’s investment thesis. Read the following investor interviews to learn exactly what these VCs, Angels, and seed investors are looking for in startups.

Ashu Garg, General Partner at Foundation Capital, outlines the top trends driving startups and venture capital from his firm’s perspective.

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1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Ashmeet Sidana of Engineering Capital (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: This company is selling to enterprises?

Ashmeet Sidana: Menlo Security is focused primarily on large enterprises. If you’re a bank or financial services enterprise, that is our target market. You have to be very careful what you do and yet you have tens of thousands of employees who have to be able to interact with the web.

There is no modern business that can run without access to the web. Yet, anti-virus was not solving the problem. A radical new technology with a fundamentally new architecture creating real business value is what we’ve been able to create with Menlo Security. >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Cindy Padnos of Illuminate Ventures (Part 4)

Cindy Padnos: We structure our seed investment with, at most, three other co-investors, but typically have one co-investor. We think it’s really important to be investing with like-minded investors.

It’s also a bit dangerous to have a very large fund writing a small check into your seed round. It’s a significant signaling risk if that fund doesn’t come back to lead the Series A. The question is why not. It might not have anything to do with the company. It might be as simple as the fact that that partner had another company that they financed three months ago and they just can’t take on another new investment right now.

Sramana Mitra: What you’re talking about is this trend that has come together in the last decade – spray and pray. There are lots of funds that are putting a little bit of money in a lot of deals and just not taking any Board seats or any real skin in the game. That has become very popular right now.

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1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Cem Sertoglu of Earlybird Venture Capital (Part 1)

Responding to a popular request, we are now sharing transcripts of our investor podcast interviews in this new series. The following interview with Cem Sertoglu, Earlybird Venture Capital was recorded in October 2017. 

Cem Sertoglu is Partner at Earlybird Venture Capital, based in Turkey. Cem brings the spotlight on Turkey and the Eastern and Central European startup eco-systems.

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1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Ashmeet Sidana of Engineering Capital (Part 4)

Ashmeet Sidana: There’s great wisdom in what you’re saying. It is not just something that entrepreneurs should think about doing. You are required to say no to money on the path to success. Every company that is successful, at some point, says no to large amounts of money along the way.

Here’s the way I visualize it with my CEOs. What I tell them is, “You’re running a marathon. Any money you raise is candy. The real thing that you want is whole wheat bread and lots of protein. That’s how you run marathons. You don’t run marathons by eating candy. Raising money is like eating candy. Where is the protein? Where is the whole wheat? That is revenues and profits.”

That is the analogy that I always make. I haven’t seen Pygmalion, but the wisdom of middle class morality was brought to me by >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Cindy Padnos of Illuminate Ventures (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: I have a specific question that relates to our community. We have a global base of entrepreneurs. Very often, entrepreneurs have their development teams elsewhere, whether it’s India, Eastern Europe, or other parts of Europe, but they’re aware of the fact that if they’re going for enterprise customers, North American customers are the primary customer base they want to go to.

How do you look at those companies? How do you define North American companies? Do these kinds of companies fall within your scope or are they outside?

Cindy Padnos: They’re well within our scope. Most of our companies have a portion of their development resources offshore.

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1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Ashish Gupta of Helion Ventures (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Especially for companies coming out of India who sell using inside sales either into the large enterprises or SMB, the SMB market has a lot of headroom in terms of the next 5 to 15 years. That is a market where there is a lot of technology going in. It completely aligns with India’s strength in building global cloud plays.

Ashish Gupta: Especially in those products that are fast follower products. We are still not world class in product management or user interface, but if there is a fast follower opportunity where one can learn from the leader as to what product to put in, that becomes a very interesting example of what you’re calling out. >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Ashmeet Sidana of Engineering Capital (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: The public market, though, is not in a bubble. The public market is reasonably sane these days. Most of these companies who are getting these ridiculous private market valuations would not be able to go public because they don’t have the numbers to go public.

Ashmeet Sidana: I agree completely. It’s on a case by case basis. There are also great companies that get created. As an entrepreneur, what we have to keep in mind is, markets come and go. Markets are cyclic. Economies are always cyclic. Businesses don’t have to be cyclic.

If you can build a company that has true technology innovation and a true sustainable barrier to entry and a competitive >>>