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Summer Internship Opportunities at Flow Ventures

Robin’s Ultimate SXSW Survival Guide

South By South West Interactive was, in a word, epic, especially as a n00b and a non-road warrior. This is what I learned in (almost) chronological order:

• Choose your seatmate well for the flight into Austin – This way, you’re at SXSW even before you land. Mine was Scott Heiferman, CEO of Meetup.com who is an all-round nice guy. Bonus: see if you can get your plane turned around 30 minutes into the flight due to cabin pressure issues to ensure maximum face time and fear of dying.
• Get some rest – have the airline lose your luggage. You can fritter away your first day pottering around your hotel room in your travel clothes and not unpack your things.
• Party “plans” - treat them with the same disrespect as you do your business plans. Roll with the posse you find.
• Shatter your iphone – it makes for a great icebreaker, pun intended (“what the hell happened?”, “how does that thing still work?”, “HOLY CRAP! I HEARD ABOUT THAT PHONE”) Photo credit: Evan Blaustein
  
• 
• Run into Sean Power randomly and frequently – highly recommended.
• Use a car service – Just because you call a cab doesn’t mean it has neccessarily been dispatched (512-573-2486)
• Have DJs rock your world – namely Flosstradamus (Chicago), Wants Versus Needs (Minneapolis) and Table Manners Crew (Austin represent!)
• Drink early, Drink often - It takes effort to avoid drinking at SXSW so why fight it? Stumbleupon party and Cheezburger party were both excellent. Driskill has great beef jerky (thanks Aidan!) and lots of legit people to meet - just follow the smell of riff raff.
• Gatorade - the true breakfast of champions
  
• Talk about something other than tech – entertain people with videos of your dog Boomer! (thanks John!)
• Panels – ignore the title, research the speakers (thanks Stevey!) and/or go to things you know NOTHING about and expand your mind (thanks David!). If you’re on a panel, encourage people to participate by offering them free beer (thanks Grace!)
• Warm up your vocal chords if you’re going to a panel with Tara Hunt. She will probably make you sing and dance. You’ll appreciate the energy boost it gives you.
• Bring a Sharpie – you never know when you might need one.
• 
• Extend your stay – have your homeward bound flight canceled due to technical issues and stay in Austin an extra day. Don’t forget to cancel your next day’s meetings! Bonus: try to be stranded with David Dufresne (what a mensch!) and hit the music festival. Super Bonus: make sure it coincides with St. Patrick’s Day and watch the chaos reign!
  
• 
• Duct tape – bring it or buy it at 7/11. Your choice.

But enough about me though. How was your week?

Why you should attend StartupDrinksCA

This week marks a major milestone in the life of StartupDrinksCA. It’s the first time the event can be called a truly Canadian event rather than something that’s just happening in a few cities. Since organizing StartupDrinks in Montreal over a year ago, we’ve managed to expand it to Toronto, Ottawa and Waterloo. Now we’re happy to welcome Halifax (which ran its first StartupDrinks last week), Moncton, St. John, Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver. I’m sure there will be more Canadian communities joining.

We’ve created a new Web site (www.startupdrinks.ca) to make it easier to organize and promote StartupDrinks in your city. Check it out to see when StartupDrinksCA is happening in your city.

To mark this important milestone, I thought I would highlight the 3 reasons why I think you should attend StartupDrinksCA:

1. Celebrate your community - I’ve recently started reading Who’s Your City? by Richard Florida. He talks about how important creative clusters are to the work of creative people. StartupDrinks is a great way to celebrate how vibrant your local tech entrepreneurship community is. Take a step back and realize that you’re surrounded by passionate, talented people who’ll go out of their way to enable your passion and talent.
2. Build your reputation - Your personal reputation in the community is crucial, not only if you’re a social media professional. It applies to all types of businesses. Regularly attending StartupDrinks is a way for you to develop a reputation with people you aren’t necessarily doing business with today. But when opportunities arise (e.g. someone looking for a co-founder, or their next investment) you’ll appreciate the fact that you have a social bond to back up the fact you’re LinkedIn.
3. Talk about yourself - All startups (and entrepreneurs) are works-in-progress. There’s no better way to develop and hone your pitch (business or personal) than getting out there and doing it. You’ll get great feedback and just the exercise of hearing yourself pitch will give you new insight into what works and what doesn’t. The nice thing about StartupDrinks is that there are no speeches and no panel of judges. Be yourself, share a pint and talk about your projects.

One last reason: there’s a fabulous prize (paid out in kudos) for the person who attends the most Startupdrinks in different cities. We call it: Startup Lush. So far I’m winning but I’d love to have some competition!

Startup Drinks, this Wednesday, October 28!

It’s getting a little chillier, which makes it all the better for getting inside and yakking it up at the next Startup Drinks Montreal.  This whole drinks+networking thing has caught on to other cities so if you’re not in Montreal, don’t despair.  Startup Drinks has become your local purveyor of the highest quality tech startup networking.

Here are the details:

Montreal - Sign up here!

Venue: Brutopia, 1215 Crescent St, Sth of Ste-Catherine

When:  Wednesday, October 28, 2009 from 5:30pm

Toronto - Sign up here!

Venue: Fionn MacCool’s,  70 The Esplanade, Btw Church and Victoria

When: Wednesday, October 28, 2009, 2009 from 6pm

Ottawa - Sign up here!

Venue:  Fox & Feather Pub (cnr McLaren), Upstairs, Fox 2 room

When: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 from 6pm

Waterloo:  

Venue: TBA

When: Tuesday, November 3, 2009 from 6pm

This event is for the faithful and the curious - all are welcome!

See you there,

Robin

Reminder: Startup Drinks in YOUR city!

Well, if you happen to be in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto or Waterloo, that is!

Startup Drinks is a monthly gathering of people working in and around startups of every stripe.  In each of these fine Canadian cities, there are people in your community spending their time and energy to keep it alive. The aim is to do what you mostly call networking - it’s fun, easy and involves drinks.  Yeah!

Montreal: SIGN UP HERE!

Venue: Brutopia, 1215 Crescent St

When:  Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 5:30pm

Toronto: SIGN UP HERE!

Venue: Fionn MacCool’s,  70 The Esplanade, Btw Church and Victoria

When: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 6pm

Ottawa: SIGN UP HERE!

Venue: Cornerstone Grill, 92 Clarence Street (in the market)

When: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 5:30pm

Waterloo:  SIGN UP HERE!

Venue: McMullan’s on King, 56 King Street North

When: Wednesday, October 6, 2009 from 5:30pm

Startup Drinks: Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa and now Waterloo!

We’re now onto our fourth city joining the Startup Drinks bandwagon thanks to Dan Silivestru. Waterloo is a little out of sync for this one to avoid conflicts with DemoCamp Guelph.

So, here are the details:

Montreal:

Venue: Brutopia, 1215 Crescent St

When:  Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 5:30pm

Toronto:

Venue: Fionn MacCool’s,  70 The Esplanade, Btw Church and Victoria

When: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 6pm

Ottawa:

Venue: TBA

When: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 from 5:30pm

and the newest addition (drum roll please!):

Waterloo:

Venue: McMullan’s on King, 56 King Street North

When: Tuesday, September 29, 2009 from 5:30pm

Look out for sign up information shortly!

August Startup Drinks in Toronto and Montreal! Update: now Ottawa too!

The inaugural Startup Drinks Toronto had over 100 people thanks to David Crow and his organizing efforts.  Montreal had another really nice mid-summer showing as well! We’re back for another round this Wednesday, August 26 in Montreal and Toronto for more startup networking.

For Toronto:

Venue: C’est What,  67 Front Street East, Corner Farquhars Lane

When: Wednesday, August 26, 2009 from 6pm

Sign up: here or on Facebook, if you prefer

For Montreal:

Venue: Brutopia, 1215 Crescent St (South of Ste-Catherine, Metro Guy)

When: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 from 5:30pm

Sign up at TechEntreprise

As always, I look forward to seeing you there!

Robin

UPDATE!

If you’re reading this from the fair city of Ottawa, you can also join in the synchronous fun too thanks to Scott Annan from Mercury Grove!

Here are the details:

- Date: Wednesday, 26 August, 2009
- Location: Metropolitan Brasserie, 700 Sussex, Street level entrance (map)
- Time: 6pm until late

Sign up here!

Ontario Emerging Technologies Fund: Good for Investment, Not Good for Angels

The Ontario Emerging Technologies Fund was unveiled last week and I know investors across the country have been anxiously awaiting the details. Here’s the skinny:

• $250 million fund size
• Matches investments for qualified investors (more on that later)
• Invests in Ontario companies
• Sectoral targets: clean technology, life sciences and advanced health technologies, and digital media and information and communications technology sectors

Most Angels I talked to previously were wondering what the qualification process would be and whether the fund would discriminate against out-of-province investors.

Now that the details (at least version 1.0) have been released, I can say that there’s good news and bad news.

The good news is that, over five years, $250 million will be flowing to early stage tech ventures in Ontario. This is nothing to sneeze at and a much-needed shot in the arm for Ontario entrepreneurs. Will this encourage new investments? Absolutely, especially in clean tech and life sciences where capital needs are greater.

But several aspects of the fund are not great for Angels and other seed-stage investors, especially in ICT or even the earliest stages of clean tech and life sciences.

Investment Round Must Be $1 Million or More(p. 10, Fund Guidelines, link to PDF)

According to the Kauffman Foundation (Appendix to Returns to Angels Investors in Groups) the average Angel investment is less than $200,000. This is consistent with what I’ve seen in Canada. Many Angel groups and seed funds invest in this range. So why the $1million threshold?

If this is a conscious choice by the OETF to favour later stage deals, they may actually draw Angel dollars away from pure startups and towards later-stage entitities. This would be a bad thing for growing the number of startups in Ontario.

If this is a subtle encouragement to Angels to invest more dollars, it ignores the fact that many (I’d say most) pure startups don’t need $1 million. I would personally never invest in a startup whose capital needs from day one were in this range. It’s not exactly “lean”.

Angels Must Re-Apply for Qualification for Each Investment (p. 7, Fund Guidelines, link to PDF)

Venture funds can apply for qualification once and have this remain in place for all future investments. Angels, on the other hand, must re-apply for each investment they make. I’m going to give the OETF the benefit of the doubt and assume that getting qualified once will mean getting qualified again. But this doesn’t exactly reward Angels or Angel groups who have a proven track record. Why not treat them the same as VCs?

Ontario Footprint

OETF is not the only fund tied to a specific geographical region so this is not a new complaint. But it still bothers me to see penalties for a company no longer having “enough” of an Ontario footprint:

• OETF has the right to force repurchase of its shares at a price set by a 3rd party, or
• OETF has the right to force refund of its investment + 10% compounded annually

As an investor, I prefer the highest return on my investment no matter where the company needs to grow. These kinds of terms discourage investment from outside the province and outside Canada.

Favouring Ontario-Based Investors

Finally, there are some silly questions in the Angel application about proving that you are dedicated to investing in Ontario. Presumably, this doesn’t apply to Angels who live in Ontario. This is counter-productive. It’s better for Ontario to draw in investment dollars from outside the province. And why do I have to prove that I want to invest in Ontario when I’m already showing that by applying to invest in a specific deal?

The not-invented-hear syndrome is not good for startups and it’s not good for regional investment.

Conclusion

I applaud the Ontario Government for taking steps to encourage early-stage investments in the province. It’s difficult for governments to truly take a back seat to private investors when it comes to investments and the OETF is a good example of this struggle. It’s not really the matching investment fund that we had hoped for, but a new investment entity with specific regional and sectoral focuses. It’s still good to have a new player on the scene and I hope that the model evolves based on market feedback.

Angels and entrepreneurs: what do you think of the OETF?

Investors: What Have You Done For Your Startups Lately?

Over the last two weeks I’ve spent over 24 hours driving to various client meetings for one of our startups. Yes, the ratio of driving time to meeting time (6:1) is pretty high, but these were crucial meetings that were significant milestones for the startup. During these long drives I had a lot of time to think about the crazy things we investors do to help our startups.

At the same time, behind closed doors I hear a lot of entrepreneurs quietly complaining about how little hands-on help or “value add” their investors bring after closing a deal. So I thought I would put out a challenge to Angels and VCs: What Have You Done For Your Startups Lately?

If you’re wondering what more you can do, here are some suggestions:

• Work your Rolodex - Remember all those times you bragged about your fabulous network? Besides the week after closing, when is the last time you systematically went through your contacts and opened those doors?
• Make sales calls - Don’t just shoot off intro emails. Pick up the phone and call in favors. In the early days most sales will be through personal persuasion/coercion.
• Have a good elevator pitch - I’ve met a lot of investors who can’t give a convincing elevator pitch for their startups. Your elevator pitch should be as good as the CEO’s.
• Know the details - Knowing the size of the market is great for evaluating a business plan, but do you know the crucial details of the business? What specific segments are they targeting? Who are their customers or prospects? What are the features and technology. What’s the price? Knowing the details makes you a knowledgeable ambassador for your startup rather than someone who can just put someone in touch with the CEO.
• Give feedback - Investors have a habit of dropping out of sight then giving harsh feedback at board meetings. I always tell entrepreneurs to manage upwards, i.e. manage your Board. But the same applies for investors. Be a hands-on mentor to your entrepreneurs. And don’t forget that praise is feedback too.
• Get your hands dirty - Besides providing sagely advice from the “high level” think about giving day to day help once in awhile. You can be sure your startup needs it. If you’re financially minded (which you are because you’re an investor right?) get into Excel and help the CEO develop projections and budgets. Sit in on practice pitches and help build their next sales deck. Look over their legal documents and fire up your MacBook to test the latest deployment on Safari. Getting tactical means saving the management team precious time.

At Flow we take hands-on to the extreme because that’s our model. Not many investors are writing code, closing sales, executing marketing plans and recruiting employees. But no matter what your model is you can be sure that your startup needs you.

Startup Drinks, Montreal and Toronto: Wednesday, July 29!

This Wednesday, July 29, Startup Drinks will be held simultaneously in two different locations! We’ve been working behind the scenes with Canadian startup agitator David Crow to get our Toronto brethren into the Startup Drinks act.  Startup Drinks Toronto makes its debut in the wake of DemoCamp and at last count there are over 180 (!) people slated to be there.

Speaking for Montreal, this drinking and networking event has become a touchstone for the tech community because of the regulars who keep the open spirit of the startup culture alive.  With David’s help, I hope we can achieve this modest end in Toronto with the same “no frills” philosophy and conviviality.

I asked David - who has no lack of projects on the go, mind you - why he was getting behind yet another community building effort and he said it’s because “Startup Drinks embodies the culture needed to build strong connections between entrepreneurs. Montreal has such a fantastic startup culture, and sometimes imitation is the finest form of flattery. This is a great social event for entrepreneurs and startups to gather over a pint and share what we’ve been working on.”

If you’re a Montrealer in Toronto for DemoCamp, check it out just as our own Raymond Luk will be doing.  You know the drill!

Without further ado, these are your need-to-know details:

For Toronto:

Venue: Pogue Mahone, 777 Bay St (Cnr College St)

When: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 from 7pm

Sign up: Startup Drinks Toronto Facebook Event

For Montreal:

Venue: Brutopia, 1219 Crescent St (Sth of St-Catherine)

When: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 from 5:30pm

Sign up: Coming soon!

You can come by yourself, with a friend or with a posse.  Everyone is welcome!

See you there,

Robin