Finance Arena

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Reason Street

Fundraising Readiness
for Innovation Norway

I'm ready to fundraise on the international markets and need to practice my pitch, learn the cultural differences, and understand how to manage my fundraising process

Welcome, you are ready to raise on the international markets. 

Fundraising Culture Shock: Preparing for Upside Down Worlds when Raising Capital Across Boarders

The Process

Depending on where you are, your process will have to change when raising on international capital markets infused with Bay Area dynamics. 

The Dance

Negotiation rituals, behaviors, and document sharing are different when you are dealing in high competition markets that like to move fast and invest big.

The VC View

Funders in Bay Area infused ecosystems have different measures for valuation and think differently about your role in the company.

The Checklist: Have These Assets and Resources Ready to Go

Rehearsed 3 minute story
compelling story 100%
Send Ahead Presentation
20 slides or less clear narrative readable on phone 100%
Longer form conversation deck
practiced narrative and practiced questions and answers 100%
Lawyer with experience in startup docs in the market of your intended lead investor
get a lawyer! 100%
Business model with unit economics, assumptions, and scenarios
ready to share with investor to stress test how you think and strategize together 70%
At least 50 investors well-researched in a CRM or list
start with 50, aim to add to 100 as you go 50%

Additional Useful Preparation

How to Get Meetings with Investors and Raise Money by Aaron Harris

Great description of how to write a bad cold email [18:12]

And how to write a great cold email [20:02]

How to write a great email:

Do research on the investor, investment thesis, past portfolio investments .

Reference these in relationship to your concept and business.

Fundraising Fundamentals By Geoff Ralston

Basics for Seed Round for Angels on West Coast

Useful for founders who have not pitched to angels in the West Coast who do not all want to see a deck, just the story.

Heuristics around fundraising

Seed round founders typically give up 10-15%

Series A 25-30%

Series B highly variable (20%~)

DocSend: The Anatomy of a Series A Raise Data from March 2021

This is an excellent set of data collected by the company that is the primary SaaS tool for secure doc sending for pitch decks and diligence data.

Key highlights:

The narrative is everything – the average Series A investor spends 3.11 minutes on your Send Ahead deck.

Show big vision and repeatability.

20% read your deck on mobile -make your slides clear and clean and readable and big font.

The Series A US company raises $8.6 MM, meets with 50 investors and has a total of 26 meetings on average.

Startupfest 2019 – How to fundraise Jonathan Lowenhar 

This talk will cover revealing topics such as the “the 28 questions all investors ask.”

Have these questions answered before you start.

What represents a “minimum viable investor funnel.”

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