Seed and Angel Financing

Entrepreneurs’ Network – 7:00PM, Tuesday, 5 May

 Seed and Angel Financing

Meeting location – Constant Contact, Reservoir Place, Main Building, InnoLoft Great Room, 1st Floor, 1601 Trapelo Road, Waltham, MA.

PRE-MEETING DINNER at 5:15 PM (sharp) at Bertucci’s, Waltham.

Are you getting ready to raise seed investment for your company? Want to know what goes on behind the scenes when angel and seed investors contemplate whether or not to fund a venture? How do you create an investor-friendly financial model for your business?

On May 5^th, ENET will host a panel of leaders from the Boston seed and angel investing community who will answer your questions about how they make investment decisions. Our panel, who all have done it before, will discuss this topic and provide insights on:

*   Who angel investors are

*   Role of angels in the formation of our nation’s start-ups

*   How individual investors complement investor groups such as Common Angels

*   How to identify angels in the Boston Area

*   Best methods for contacting Angel investors

*   Process that angels follow in selecting fundable investments

*   Due diligence on prospective investors – Certified investors, SEC review

*   Valuable sources of more information on the angel investment community.

You will also have the chance to network with other entrepreneurs and to attend a premeeting dinner with our angel investors.

Speaker: Deb Kemper is an active angel investor and a member of two angel networks, Golden Seeds and Clean Energy Venture Group. She focuses on women-led businesses as well as ventures in clean tech, healthcare, and technology.    Previously, Deb worked at McKinsey, where she served clients in the electronics, utility, and health care sectors.    Her functional experience includes manufacturing, product development, operations, strategy, professional development, and leadership coaching.  She has provided leadership support to organizations in China, Peru and the United States, recently working with JUCCCE, a non-profit sustainability think tank in China.  She has a BS in Engineering from Cornell and an MBA from The Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, where she was named an Edward Tuck Scholar.   Deb recently returned to the US after 8 years living in Peru and China.  

Speaker: James Geshwiler, Managing Director, Common Angels, LinkedIn | Twitter .

James joined CommonAngels in 1999 and has been an active investor in mobile, cloud, consumer and business software as well as digital media companies. He also has been a leader in shaping the institutionalization of angel investing. He was the founding chairman of the Angel Capital Association, the professional alliance of angel groups that has grown from 46 groups as charter members to now over 145, representing over 7,000 investors. James also was the founding chairman of ACA’s sister organization, the Angel Capital Education Foundation (now called the Angel Resources Institute), in partnership with the Kauffman Foundation. ARI works with angel investors, venture capitalists, academic leaders and entrepreneurs around the country to provide research and educational programs on angel investing.

James is on the Board of Trustees of the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council and the Board of the MIT Alumni Association. He has written papers and various articles on angel investment processes, and regularly speaks on entrepreneurship and private investing.

He holds a bachelor’s degree with highest honors from the Liberal Arts Honors Program at the University of Texas at Austin and there was elected into Phi Beta Kappa, a master’s degree in political science from UCLA, and an MBA from MIT’s Sloan School of Management. James also is an avid rower and a member of the Cambridge Boat Club.

Speaker: Ryan Moore, partner, Atlas Venture, http://www.atlasventure.com/team/

Ryan focuses on emerging web service companies that make the lives of consumers better and help any size business perform better. Since joining Atlas in 2011, Ryan seeded clypd, DraftKings, and Plastiq and also led our investment in Mojo Motors.  He also serves on the boards of MOO, OwnerIQ, Secret Escapes, The Currency Cloud, Valore (formerly SimpleTuition) and Globoforce. Ryan was also the initial investor in Rocketmiles, Ubersense (acquired by Hudl) and OYO Sportstoys.

Prior to joining Atlas, Ryan was a general partner at GrandBanks Capital, which he co-founded in 2000.  At GrandBanks Capital, Ryan incubated WHERE (sold to PayPal), and led the investment round and served on the boards of Enpocket (sold to Nokia), Nexage (sold to Millennial Media), Savored (sold to Groupon), and Vela Systems (acquired by AutoDesk).  Ryan also served as the lead investor in Achievers.com, First Coverage (sold to TIM Group), InsightSquared, and Vivox.

Ryan started his venture career as an associate at SoftBank Venture Capital (Mobius Venture Capital) as well as SoftBank Capital Partners, a strategic late stage investment fund.  Before that, he worked in investment banking with Robertson Stephens in San Francisco. He received an AB in economics from Princeton University.

Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/pub/ryan-moore/2/337/719

Moderator: Jonathan Stiebel, CEO, Founder, and Executive Director, is an international serial entrepreneur who creates innovative software companies, in educational technology (such as language learning, speech/language pathology and literacy), music discovery, and data security. He has savvy business skills paired with a solid technological understanding position him distinctively as a startup founder who builds businesses. He taught internet marketing on behalf of an entrepreneur (Eben Pagan) who sold over $100m in information goods over the internet. Jonathan led the official mastermind groups for internet marketing in health/fitness and relationships. He manages an educational technology startup in the language-learning space, which can double teaching effectiveness particularly for children with special needs. Jonathan is an MIT $100k Business Plan Semifinalist and a Business Plan Competition Distinguished Finalist at Harvard Business School. He holds a Masters Degree in Computer Science with a focus in Speech Recognition/Machine Learning as well as a Bachelors Degree with a specialty in Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) and Jewish Education. If you wish to join a mastermind group, please email him at jonathan@productlaunchjourney.org.

Co-Moderator: Greg Dawe, https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregdawe, is ENET’s Vice Chair of Operations and has been working in the software industry for over 30 years, first as an engineer, and later, in management. For over 10 years, he held senior management positions in the computer network security industry including experience with RSA Security, Inc. 

Greg specializes in establishing and growing new organizations directly linked to improving company results.