Roundtable Recap: September 17 – Around the World with Startups in Ninety Minutes

During this week’s roundtable, we had as our guest Robert Weber, Managing Partner at Great North Labs located in Minneapolis.

Medifees

As for entrepreneur pitches, this week we had Hugo Gallegos from Portland, Oregon, pitching Medifees, a solution for assessing medical expenses.

Halalworkchop

Next up, Muyideen Ayinla from Nigeria pitched Halalworkchop, a digital services company catering to small businesses.

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1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Julianne Zimmerman of Reinventure Capital (Part 4)

Julianne Zimmerman: The company did eventually have mainstream well-known investors. It took us a long time to get there. Also, that company was one of innumerable companies that were killed off in the extinction event that occurred when the markets imploded in 2007.

I had an amazing experience of being at the forefront and accomplishing something incredible with my colleagues, but the ultimate success was outside our control. That was an excellent learning experience.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Sonali Vijayavargiya of Augment Ventures (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Tell me more about the business model. A large percentage of enterprise software is sold via the subscription business model. So is that your business model?

Sonali Vijayavargiya: Exactly. Most of our companies have a subscription business model. Investors value the recurring model. I feel that products don’t walk by themselves. You have to get engagement.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Julianne Zimmerman of Reinventure Capital (Part 3)

Julianne Zimmerman: I never aspired to be in the venture capital world. I started off as an aerospace engineer. I went to MIT when I was 16 because I had wanted to be an astronaut since I was 12.

I thought that that’s how you became an astronaut. It’s not the worst idea, but it’s a bit naive. This was the way I thought about it. I double majored in Literature.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Sonali Vijayavargiya of Augment Ventures (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 Sonali Vijayavargiya was recorded in July 2020.

Sonali Vijayavargiya, Founder and Managing Partner at Augment Ventures, discusses her firm’s investment approach, including early exits.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Julianne Zimmerman of Reinventure Capital (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Given your target audience, where do you source deals from? What is the strategy that gets you face to face with such entrepreneurs?

Julianne Zimmerman: This pertains to one of the fundamental myths at the heart of the current incarnation of the venture sector. We have this deeply-rooted pernicious myth that there’s a shortage of investable talents. You’ve probably heard VCs complaining about pipeline problems.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Julianne Zimmerman of Reinventure 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 Julianne Zimmerman was recorded in July 2020.

Julianne Zimmerman is Managing Director at Reinventure Capital, a firm focused on minority founders.

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Dan Roselli of CFV Ventures (Part 3)

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.