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Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Amit Grover, Member, Mumbai Angels (Part 4)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Amit: Let’s take Apalya Technologies. The first time they came to Mumbai Angels, we didn’t shortlist them at all. We told them to take three or four months and come back with a prototype in place with customers, a few service providers signed up, and television channel providers. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Amit Grover, Member, Mumbai Angels (Part 3)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: Do you require that the entrepreneurs you invest in have previous business experience?

Amit: In terms of running a venture of their own, no. In terms of having some experience of at least being in that sector, understanding the nitty-gritty details of what they are getting into, there we always look at what kind of experience they have.

They do not have to be serial entrepreneurs before they come to Mumbai Angels. There are people who have left their jobs at McKinsey or Microsoft to start their companies. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Amit Grover, Member, Mumbai Angels (Part 2)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: How many deals do you get each month, approximately?

Amit: On average, I would say we get maybe sixty to seventy-five, but it can be up to one hundred.

Irina: How many of those deals deserve a closer look?

Amit: Once the one hundred companies apply to Mumbai Angels, we have a screening committee that looks at each one and shortlists fifteen of them as meeting our criteria, which include the team, which is the most important, the scalability, and the business plan. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Amit Grover, Member, Mumbai Angels (Part 1)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

This is the nineteenth interview in our series on financing for entrepreneurs. I am talking to Amit Grover, member of the Mumbai Angels and the founder of Nurture Talent Academy, a training institute for entrepreneurs in India.

Irina: Hi, Amit. Let’s start with your telling us a little bit about your background.

Amit: I am a mechanical engineer, an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi. I got my MBA from the India Institute of Management (IIM) Indore. I have worked with leading companies in the past few years, in different roles. I was a software engineer at Infosys Technology Limited, then I did my MBA. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Eric Paley, Managing Partner, Founder Collective (Part 7)

By guest author Irina Patterson

Eric: It is amazing how much investors can damage a company. And I think the first thing an investor needs to do is not damage a company. Investors to be really careful to help the management team stay focused, be responsive and helpful, but not be demanding in ways that are really not productive for the company. I think that is number one. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Eric Paley, Managing Partner, Founder Collective (Part 6)

By guest author Irina Patterson

Irina: Do you have any sector preference?

Eric: We are seed-stage, software-enabled capital-efficient investors. So, within that there are a lot of things we can do, but our setup tends to lend itself to a lot of Internet investing.

We can do other things, and we are doing other things. I think it really depends on the company. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Eric Paley, Managing Partner, Founder Collective (Part 5)

By guest author Irina Patterson

Irina: Do you have a number for what is a reasonable size?

Eric: I think there is no set number. I need to believe that the entrepreneur can build a big company. It depends what you mean by niche. A $500 million–dollar market where there is no real competition and the company can attain a significant portion of that of total available market might be unappealing to most investors, but it doesn’t necessarily bother me. >>>

Seed Capital From Angel Investors: Eric Paley, Managing Partner, Founder Collective (Part 4)

By guest author Irina Patterson

Irina: Do you think in terms of the valuation of the company?

Eric: We have a zone of valuation we think is appropriate for our thesis of investment as seed investors. If a company reaches a point at which it feels it has accomplished far more than what we call seed, then we are probably not appropriate investors for that company. It would be outside our valuation range. So, we have a fixed zone for what we think makes sense for our type of fund. >>>