Angel Insights | Angel Investing | Crowdfunding

Now for today’s show we thought we would go for something slightly different, I have had many emails from people asking about how to get into the world of investing in startups and we thought today we would take some our favourite entrance stories and show you a collection of how they did it. The ultimate guide to how to make your way into the world of early stage startup investing. Discussed In The Show Today: 1.) How Tim Mills came into the industry from the world of banking and came to be at The British Business Bank? 2.) What was John Spindler’s start in the angel investing industry and what is his route to where he is today with the London Co-Investment Fund and Capital Enterprise? 3.) How did Dominic Wilson make the transition from the world of property to the world of property tech investing, now being Managing Director @ Pi Labs. 4.) Every startup founder needs a mentor, so when did Jonathan Pfahl appreciate the importance of mentors and being the founding of Rockstar Mentoring? 5.) Like mentoring,

Collette Ballou is the Founder and President of Ballou PR, one of the leading European public relations that works with high-growth technology and technology-enabled companies, as well as technology investors. Colette has worked with the likes of Facebook, Whatsapp, TransferWise, Eventbrite, Evernote just to name a few. Alongside this incredible operational journey, Collette is also an active angel investor and has mentored with the likes of 500 Startups and Seedcamp. In Today’s Episode with Colette we discuss: 1.) How did Collette make her way into the world of angel investing? 2.) In the proliferation of content for marketing, is a contrarian approach the right way to go for cutting through the noise? 3.) What does Colette make of the increasing personalisation of VCs and angels? 4.) How can investors balance their own personal brand with the brand of their fund? 5.) What does Colette make of the rise of Twitter? To what extent should it be used as a marketing tool? How does Colette react to tweet st

Dominic Wilson is Managing Partner @ Pi Labs founded on the thesis of becoming of the centre of innovation in the property ecosystem creating scalable businesses that will disrupt the property sector. As for Dominic himself, he has a wide background in Private Equity Real Estate having worked with both AEW Europe and Savills Investment Management and transacted over €3bn of deals across Europe. You can also find further resources on the show and investing articles on the site at syndicateroom.com. Today We Discuss: How Dominic made his way into the world of early stage investments? What are the pros and cons of operating in a largely antiquated incumbent heavy industry? How does Dominic view the early stage angel network in London? How does he look to work with them? With the rise of tax reliefs, this has spurned many more angels, is this money ‘dumb money’? If so, is all dumb money bad for the ecosystem? How does Dominic view the wider macro economic effects of Brexit? What does he predict for both t

Paul Arnold is the founder of Switch Ventures, a seed stage venture capital firm focussed on identifying the most talented startup entrepreneurs by taking a very data-driven approach to founders. Paul was a senior executive at AppDirect, helping build it from a small startup into the unicorn ($1bn+ valuation) it is today. He oversaw company-wide operations, built and led multiple teams, and learned what it takes for a startup to scale rapidly. Prior to AppDirect, Paul was with McKinsey & Company in Silicon Valley. He worked with C-suite, Board, and frontline employees to drive changes. In Today's Episode with Paul We Discuss: 1.) How Paul made his way into the world of tech and early stage investing? 2.) When examining the data on founders, what elements of pattern recognition has Paul found with regards to founders? 3.) What is Paul's take on follow on funding? Is it always obligatory for seed investors to follow on with their investments? 4.) How has Paul's investment decision making process changed

Tim Mills is an Investment Director at the newly formed British Business Bank and also leads the investment activity and operations of the Angel CoFund. Tim started his career with Merrill Lynch where he became an Associate Vice President in the technology group at Merrill before moving to Barclays Capital to work on the integration of the firm's expanding global operations. In the past Tim has worked with a leading credit analytics consultancy and one of the UKs largest hedge funds.Prior to the creation of the British Business Bank, Tim spent 5 years with Capital for Enterprise, leading investments into venture capital funds as well as launching various funds, including the Angel CoFund. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Tim made his way into he world of tech and investing? 2.) How Tim has applied his learnings from investing in funds to investing in startups? 3.) What does Tim look for in co-investors? What are the optimal traits that Tim assesses? 4.) How has Tim seen the early stage investing

Jonathan Pfahl is the Managing Director @ Rockstar Mentoring. The Rockstar Mentoring Group is the UK's Number 1 mentoring organisation for entrepreneurs looking to grow or raise finance. To date, they have helped over 8,000 business owners to gain the insights they need to succeed through tailored and personalised mentoring. Their mentors have sold their own companies for an average of £18 million. In Today's Show We Discuss: 1.) How Jonathan came to found Rockstar? 2.) Why we should care about mentoring? Is it not just another buzzword? What are the tangible benefits? 3.) Why is it imperative to pay your mentor? Why does this create the incentive in the mentored to pursue the activity with passion and rigour? 4.) What are the important things to remember when starting the process of being mentored? Why is it so important to be goal and data driven from the offset? 5.) How should individuals view the mentor personality fit? What should they look for and what should they be wary of? As always, you can lear

John Spindler is the CEO of Capital Enterprise and a key player in establishing a culture of innovation and investment in the blossoming London tech scene. John has had over 15 years’ experience as an entrepreneur and business advisor/consultant and as well as being responsible for the day to day management of Capital Enterprise is also a director and co-owner of audio designer and manufacturer Ferguson Hill. Today We Discuss: 1.) How John made his way into he world of early stage tech investing? 2.) What does it take to establish a culture of entrepreneurialism and innovation? What comes first, startups or funding? 3.) What further challenges does London face to become the central hub for tech? What can be done to further the progress made in the last few years? 4.) How will Brexit affect the London tech and investing scene? Why is John concerned about the potential of Brexit? 5.) What is the roadmap for John with the London co-investment fund? What is John looking for in potential investments? How has hi

Katie is the investment Manager for the 3 innocent drinks founders Rich, Adam and Jon at their Venture Capital/Angel Investment firm JamJar Investments. Katie’s role involves sourcing, managing deal process and working with the portfolio post deal to add strategic insight. JamJar focuses on consumer facing high growth businesses looking for seed/round A funding in both digital and non tech. Katie has previously held roles at Innocent Drinks, the BBC and Hamilton Bradshaw Venture Partners. In the show today we discuss the importance of consumer brand, how to differentiate in a proliferated consumer product market, the benefits of investor specialisation and more. As always, you can learn more about SyndicateRoom here: www.syndicateroom.com

Henry Joseph Grant has extensive experience both in startup operations and mentoring. Having started working as a paperboy at 11, he then went on to work with the likes of Virgin, JustEAT (where he saw the company's hyper growth phase from seed to Series D) to where Henry is today with UNIDays. Alongside this impressive operational career Henry has also been a startup mentor and advisor at the likes of SeedCamp and PiLabs. Due to this connection, he has also made several angel investments adding the strategic value that has been gained from his time in operations. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Henry made his way into the world of Tech and what made Henry want to start angel investing? 2.) What were the main lessons for Henry in watching JustEat scale into hyper growth mode? What did they do right and what did they do wrong? 3.) When comparing Henry's angel investing strategy with other angels in the ecosystem, how does his differ? What does Henry make of hyper aggressive super angels? 4.) How

Joining me today is our very own Tom Britton, Co-Founder & CTO @ SyndicateRoom, one of the UK’s leading equity crowdfunding platforms having raised £40m in funding for startups last year and having recently raised their own round on their own platform, so a big congrats to them for that and in the show today we discuss the future for crowdfunding in fluctuating credit cycles, why one business is more suitable for crwdfunding than another and the effect of Title III, will it have the ramficiations everyone is expecting? 1.) How did Tom come to co-found SyndicateRoom from a little office in Cambridge? 2.) How will crowd investing perform during a different part of the credit cycle? Does Tom think crowd investing will do well when interest rates rise and defaults rates increase? 3.) What makes a business suitable for crowdfunding vs suitable for VC, and in which case should a business do something like Beaulah did and utilise both? How does Tom compare SyndicateRoom to Angelist? 4.) With the recent announ

Orson Stadler is an investor @ mustardseed. mustardseed seek to enable the creation of world class businesses that generate positive and sustainable outcomes and they do this by connecting influential investors with socially driven entrepreneurs. Orson himself is a former associate at Blackrock and now at mustardseed his responsibilities include fund strategy and operations, as well as an array of other biz dev roles. If you like the show then headover to syndicateroom.com where you can find a whole host of past episodes and articles from the show. Discussed Today: 1.) How Orson came to be an investor in early stage social impact startups? 2.) Why is there so much skepticism towards the ability for both impact investing and LP returns? How does Orson respond to this? 3.) What needs to change in the public's perception of impact investing? How has crowdfunding affected both the seed and impact investing scene? 4.) How mustardseed look to measure the impact their companies are making? What are the me

Avin Rabheru is the Founder and CEO of Housekeep (https://housekeep.com), London’s top rated cleaning service which allows you to find and book a local and trusted house cleaner in minutes. Prior to being an entrepreneur, Avin worked in venture capital at Smedvig Capital in London, investing in early stage, high growth companies with an investment range of £2-15m. Throughout both Avin’s operational and VC experience, he has been a prolific angel investor having made over 40 direct investments in the likes Zipcar, Crowdcube and Kabbee just to name a few. In Today's Episode You Will Discover: 1.) How did Avin make his way into the world of startup investing? How did Avin’s mindset alter when comparing his angel investments to his VC investments? 2.) How does Avin decide his capital allocation profile? Does he set aside an initial pool of capital and have a set investment range and set portfolio size he is looking to achieve? 3.) How does Avin look to differentiate himself in the ever increasing angel market?

David Rose is the Founder & CEO @ Gust, the platform that has allowed $1.8bn to flow through Gust to startups. David himself is a serial entrepreneur having personally raised millions in VC funding and being named a ‘world conquering entrepreneur’ by BusinessWeek. David is also a prolific angel investor himself having invested in over 70 early stage companies and having founded and chairing the New York Angels. It has to also be said that David is a master of the VC pitch and you can check out his incredible Ted talk here. Topics Discussed Today: 1.) How did David make his way into the world of investing in tech startups? 2.) What were David’s biggest lessons from watching the success and achievements of his entrepreneurial father and grandfather? 3.) How has David seen the startup and investing ecosystem evolve over the last few decades? 4.) Is entrepreneurship itself an element that can be taught or is it an innate being within an individual? 5.) What are the commonalities amongst the great

We have a very special show for you today both in terms of people and organisation. Firstly, we have two guests joining us today in the form of David Barrie, David has created and managed several ventures that have been credited with raising £300m+ of new investment through public-private partnerships. In 2013, David proposed to the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea a seed investment in the foundation of the new Wild Blue angel investment network. David is joined by his investment director Deepali Nangia, who has enjoyed a career spanning the heights of Wall St to the financial hub that is London to founding a business in India. Now the second element that is slightly unusual today is the organization that David founded, Wile Blue Cohort an angel investment network with a specific hyper location focus on West London investing in business close to home. Today's Episode Covers: 1.) How did David and Deepali make their move into the world of investing? 2.) What was the impetus behind the founding of W

Chris Mairs (https://twitter.com/Chris_mairs) is the chief scientist at Metaswitch where he has seen the company exponential growth over the last few decades including the raise of their first vc money in 2008 with the likes of Sequoia and Francisco partners investing, he is also a prolific angel investor and has an immense portfolio with the likes of MagicPony, SmartUp and Adbrain all being investments of Chris’. Chris is also the chair of Code Club and the UK Forum for Computer Education. Finally to cap it all off he is also a Fellow of the British Computer Society and a Fellow of The Royal Academy of Engineering. In Today’s Episode You Will Learn: 1. How Chris made his way into the world of tech and then later angel investing? 2. What were the lessons that Chris took from his communications with Sequoia and Jim Goetz, that he has applied to his angel investing thesis? 3. Which element of the Metaswitch journey was Chris favourite time of the experience to work in? 4. How was the scaling process for Chris

Simon is an active angel investor in UK companies with a focus on the technology sector. His current portfolio consists of twenty companies and to date has achieved four exits, including the likes of SwiftKey to Microsoft. Simon is also a member of Cambridge Capital Group (CCG) and Angel Academe (a predominately female network), where he is on the advisory board. He participates as a mentor for the University of Manchester, Cambridge Judge Business School's Accelerate Cambridge programme and Angel Academe's female entrepreneur programme. In Today’s Episode We Dive Into: 1.) How Simon made his entry into the investing world? What was it that attracted him to the world of startup investments? 2.) With 4 exits in the last 12 months, how has this affected you mindset to investing? What have been the commonalities when looking at those investments? 3.) At what point can an angel decide not to follow on in a round without providing a negative signaling function? Does it matter if you are the cornerstone invest

Russ is an angel and venture investor and non-executive director of a number of high growth businesses. He is also a limited partner in Ariadne Capital’s ACE Fund and an investor in and advisor to Amazing Media Group. Russ is also a board member of the Tech City Advisory Group. Previously, Russ was Vice President & General Manager at Skype with responsibility for its mobile division globally. Russ exited when Skype was sold to Microsoft. Before Skype, Russ was at Telefonica, where he was the Global Innovation Director. This included managing a venture fund and an internal ‘incubation’ initiative. Prior to this role, he was with Telefonica’s O2 mobile business, as Marketing Director, responsible for initiatives such as The O2 venue in London. In Today’s Episode You Will Hear: 1.) How Russ made his entry into the investing world? What was it that attracted 2.) What were Russ’ big takeaways from his career investing institutionally? How does he allocate his portfolio in terms of differing asset classes? H

Jonathan is a General Partner at Indicator Ventures, however, Jonathan has not always been an early stage investor! After graduating from Yeshiva University, Sy Syms School of Business, Jonathan was the Director of Marketing at Sheets Brand Energy and Sleep Strips, helping launch their national advertising campaign in over 50,000 retail locations. He parlayed his experience into founding Socialosity, a digital marketing agency connecting brands with top-tier celebrities and influencers (LeBron James, Serena Williams, Pitbull, Chris Paul, etc.) through social media. Most recently, he was Co-founder of Kodiak Samurai, a NYC-based social media agency catering to complex global brand clients including Amazon’s Audible.com, Rolling Stone Magazine and Polaroid, among others. In Today’s Episode We Discuss: 1.) How Jon made his way into the world of early stage investing? 2.) What does the Jonathan make of the evolution of social with the rise of the mobile? What does Jonathan think will be the platform for social i

Nancy Fechnay is a Partner @ Flight Ventures where Nancy runs the UK syndicate which now has over 430,000 comitted to the syndicate and Nancy moved to London from Silicon Valley in 2014, having spent time with the likes of Kleiner Perkins and GE Ventures. Now in the UK, Nancy is the Interim Director at Techstars London as well as an advisor to several select UK and U.S. based startups and has a soft spot for wearables and other digital hardware plays, but invests across all sectors. Contained In Today’s Episode: 1.) How Nancy made her entry into the tech and investing world? What was it that attracted Nancy to the world of investments? 2.) Having working in both the US and UK venture scene now, when comparing the US and European scenes what are the biggest differences? Do the entrepreneurs have a fundamentally different mindset? Are UK entrepreneurs more risk averse, as is always suggested? Are investor expectations different in the US? 3.) Does the narrow exit funnel for European startups not concern NancyS

Ruzbeh Bacha is the CEO and Founder @ CityFalcon and has worked in finance and strategy roles at KPMG, Nokia, Skype and Microsoft and With more than 15 years of investing and trading experience, he looks for parallels when investing in start-ups, and has invested in more than 10 start-ups since 2013. He also runs London Value Investing Club where members discuss stock investment opportunities and share their investing views and theses. In Today’s Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Ruzbeh made his entrance into the world of startups and investing? 2.) What were the biggest takeaways from working at Skype and how Ruzbeh has applied them to his role at CityFalcon? 3.) What were the hardest elements of starting and then building CityFalcon? What are Ruzbeh’s thoughts on the progression of London’s ecosystem as a fintech hub? Where are we doing well? How could we improve? 4.) What made Ruzbeh want to make the move into the investing world? How has his operational background impacted your investing perspective? 5.)