1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Anshu Sharma (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Do you lead deals?

Anshu Sharma: In Silicon Valley, even $100,000 doesn’t really make you a lead in any meaningful sense.

Sramana Mitra: Depends on what stage. Maybe we should visit the stage question first and then come back to the size question.

Anshu Sharma: It’s not about leading or not leading. The way I think about it is I love being the first check in. That’s what people typically call lead. The classical angel investing is you put in $25,000 and value the company at a few million dollars and then hope for a quick next round so >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Jeremy Schneider and Jonathan Pines of Webb Investment Network (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Let’s now talk about stage and how big is the fund that you’re investing from. What sized investments do you like to make?

Jonathan Pines: In terms of stage, we tend to focus on the seed stage. That’s not necessarily first angel money in but usually the first sizeable $1 million to $3 million round of funding. We invest around $500,000 in total between Maynard and the affiliates. In terms of how much investing we’re doing overall, we do about 10 new investments per year and then we also will write follow-on investments into our existing portfolio companies. We think of it, on a yearly basis, as a $5 million deployment.

Sramana Mitra: How many investments do you make a year? >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Anshu Sharma (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 Anshu Sharma was recorded in March 2018.

Anshu Sharma is an active angel investor who invests in Silicon Valley and India. Anshu has deep experience in the enterprise software space, and a thoughtful, sophisticated perspective. He is one of the early investors in Nutanix, which currently has a market cap of over $8.5 billion in the public market.

Sramana Mitra: Before we get into your investment activities, why don’t you tell our audience a bit about your professional >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Dennis Joyce of Alliance of Angels (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 Dennis Joyce of Alliance of Angels was recorded in March 2018.

Dennis Joyce, Investor and Member of Alliance of Angels, talks about the largest angel group in the Pacific Northwest.

Sramana Mitra: Tell us about your investing focus. How does the Alliance work? What is the focus? What sized investment do you like to make?

Dennis Joyce: The Alliance of Angels is the largest angel investment network in the Pacific Northwest. We have a rotating membership of roughly >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Jeremy Schneider and Jonathan Pines of Webb Investment Network (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 Jeremy Schneider and Jonathan Pines of Webb Investment Network was recorded in March 2018.

Jeremy Schneider and Jonathan Pines, both Directors at the Webb Investment Network, discuss their firm’s investment thesis.

Sramana Mitra: One of you take the lead in introducing the Webb Investment Network. I know you have a very particular model. I’ve known Maynard Webb for a long time actually. Tell us about the program. >>>

10 Seed Investors Discuss Startups in Their Portfolios via the Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum

During my many conversations with seed investors, I’ve asked everyone to talk about their current investment portfolios to help inform early-stage entrepreneurs interested in financing. Here are ten investors who generously share details on what they have invested in, the notable exits, and how they decide which startups to invest in.

Mackey Craven, Partner at OpenView Venture Partners, discusses what Series A VCs are looking for in the realm of software investments. We talk at length about the Series A gap from the perspective of a fund that focuses on Series A and beyond.

>>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Yanai Oron of Vertex Ventures (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: That’s exactly where my question comes from. We are in 2018. There is a lot of stuff that has already been built in all different areas of technology. Right now, there are not as many billion-dollar opportunities, but there are many opportunities that are in that $200 million TAM range.

In a way, there are ways to make money off these opportunities. You build it up to a point and you then flip it a little bit earlier. You can do 3x on these deals. My question comes from exactly that observation. Some of the funds that we are talking to are making that call. Part of the issue also is that there are 700 seed funds in the industry. If everybody is chasing unicorns, there’s not enough of those. >>>

1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator Investor Forum: With Yipeng Zhao of Embark Ventures (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: What do you think of the Series A gap? There are hundred thousand seed investments and 1,200 to 1,500 venture investments. How do you process that?

Yipeng Zhao: Seed and Series A is always a hard gap. By nature of the business, you will always say most companies die after seed. I don’t think that’s because of the structure of the business. It’s just because of the nature of the business.

As I said, venture startup is a high-risk business. Most of the time, companies die quickly. The gap between seed and Series A is not really an issue. Seed is more of a testing phase. Series A is more serious. If a company is not fundable at Series A, there have to be some consequences. >>>