Angel Investment Network Blog

The gender pay gap has come under intense scrutiny in recent years. Movements like #MeToo and #TimesUp have brought sexism issues to mainstream attention. This is true across a spectrum of industries. But there is a nuance when it comes to the startup investment space. Female founders are still underfunded compared to their male counterparts.

As an industry, it’s time to close this gap. To do so, will require a concerted effort from all parties – founders, funds, networks and investors – to overcome biases and to support merit wherever it is found. read more

Impact investing is a hot topic at the moment. And rightly so! We find this so encouraging because it is timely validation for the work we’ve been doing at our impact crowdfunding platform, SeedTribe. But there is more work to do before this industry can deliver the positive outcomes it promises. Part of this work involves incentivising the millennial generation of investors by giving them access to the best impact investments. Last month I wrote a piece on this ‘democratisation’ of impact investments for Angel News. read more

The cryptocurrency market has caught the attention of many people in recent years – from traders who want to make a quick profit to angel investors concerned about the authenticity and transparency of the system. Within the startup community, ICOs (Initial Coin Offerings) have come into prominence.

So far, ICOs have helped many entrepreneurs raise funding far more rapidly than traditional avenues. Many investors too have reaped the rewards of being able to exchange an asset that would normally only realise its value when and if the business exited via trade sale or IPO. read more

What is Due Diligence?

‘Due diligence’ sounds awfully serious.

When it came into use in the mid-fifteenth century, it simply meant ‘reasonable care’. It became a specialised legal/business term in the 1930s when the US government passed a law to ensure that securities brokers disclosed sufficient information when selling to investors.

It is now used as a general term for the process of verifying information.

The level of due diligence required and the level of due diligence possible varies depending on the information being checked. Naturally, a high-level corporate merger would require extensive due diligence. read more

Podcasts are becoming some of the most avidly consumed content available. More and more people are tuning for their ‘microdose’ of wisdom from industry leaders and pioneers. It’s a great and easy way to broaden your mind while you commute, work, cook, exercise and relax.

I’ve got in on the act with my colleague, Ed Stephens, from the senior team at Angel Investment Network.

On our show, The Startup Microdose Podcast, we interview successful entrepreneurs and investors to unpack their stories, opinions, quirks and wisdom.
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In the past few years, there has been a dramatic surge in interest relating to so-called ‘impact’ companies and investments. Public awareness and concern for global economic, environmental and social issues are at an all-time high. We attribute this in part to the so-called ‘Blue Planet Effect‘ and in part, to the ever more ominous severity of the issues we face. As a result, institutions like United Nations have set out strategies like their Sustainable Development Goals to help solve these issues (more on these below). read more

My first project when I joined Angel Investment Network back in 2014 was to organise a pitching event in central London. We selected five of the most exciting UK companies who were fundraising; we had no specific agenda to include impact companies – we just wanted innovation! We prepped them to pitch to 150 investors whom we had specially invited from our network.

what3words was one of those companies.

Mike Lebus & James Badgett, the founders of Angel Investment Network, had already invested in what3words’ seed round – so they were keen for Chris Sheldrick, the CEO and co-founder, to put in a good performance.
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Last month, I published our first ‘Impact Investing Interview’ with Work For Good who are revolutionising the market for corporate charity donations. Since the publication of that interview, Work For Good is now overfunding (accepting pledges until 30th April) on SeedTribe (Angel Investment Network’s impact-conscious crowdfunding platform). Thanks to those of you who contributed and shared!

For those new to impact investment, the post starts with a concise definition of impact investment, its benefits to investors and its ability to bring about positive and lasting change in the world. read more

Here’s our list of the top women founders we’ve worked with over the years. Why? To celebrate International Women’s Day 2018, of course!

There are some great names and some great companies. So in no particular order, our women of the moment and their success stories so far…

Tech Women

Pip Jamieson – Founder & CEO, The Dots

Pip started out in the British civil service, then worked with MTV (actually launching MTV in New Zealand aged just 24). She then founded a ‘LinkedIn for creatives’ called The Loop in Australia. read more

Why is due diligence important?

Strict due diligence was not always necessary.

In the past, if you wanted to find investment for your business, your options were closely tied to the reach of your personal network.

This had the following consequences:

On the one hand, any investor you were introduced would most likely have come from a referral you trusted. As a result, trusting the prospective investor and their credentials was relatively easy. Most of the due diligence was accomplished via the intimacy of the referral.

On the other hand, your reach would have been limited to your network. And as a result, many businesses would have failed to find funding because their entrepreneurs weren’t linked to any ‘Old Boys’ Club’ or similar. read more

Last week, I wrote an article called ‘How to Update your Investors for best results’. The post set out the importance of updating your investors; and how you should go about it. I laid out a useful (hopefully!) formula for your updates. And gave you some real-world examples from fast-growth companies in my network like Sweatcoin and ScreenCloud.

The post proved more popular than I expected; a number of people have been kind enough to contact me with their thoughts. The response was positive except for one thing: I had only covered one aspect of a broader theme… read more

Fundraising on Angel Investment Network – A User Story:

Kresimir Budinski first reached out to me through LinkedIn. He is the founder of Air Ticket Arena – the first fully-automated platform allowing passengers to bid for unsold seats on scheduled flights; and helping airlines to recuperate some of the £120 billion in lost sales each year through unsold seats.

He recently closed a £350,000 of seed fundraising through Angel Investment Network.

Kresimir, or ‘The Bishop’, as he is affectionately known by his team, complimented me on my article about SEIS & EIS Tax relief. He had apparently used it as an explainer throughout his fundraising. Both for investors he had found through Angel Investment Network and other channels. read more

Investors are all looking for a startup investment they believe will be successful. That much is self-evident. Of course, some investors will be looking to invest in companies in which they are interested or experienced. But ultimately, everyone is linked by the shared ambition to back winners.

So that begs the question – How do you pick a winner?

The answer to this comes in three parts: the first is to do with Deal Flow and will be discussed in this post; the second concerns Deal Evaluation which was discussed in a previous post; and the third part is to do with Due Diligence, which will be covered at a later date. read more

An angel investor’s task is to predict the potential of a company based on early indications and very little else. There is no infallible process for doing this. This is the risk investors face; and the fear they must overcome to invest. Only then can they give themselves a shot at the returns available from a shrewd investment.

Your task as an entrepreneur seeking finance is to mitigate and alleviate that sense of fear and so lower each investor’s risk threshold. The two basic ways of doing this are: read more

We recently learned that Pivigo is one of 15 of the UK’s fastest growing tech companies founded by women selected to visit Silicon Valley.

The trip is part of an initiative to build ties with the US tech scene. The other firms heading to Silicon Valley include:

• High-end hotel website Mr and Mrs Smith.
• Health startup Raremark.
• Property startup Settled.

All are showing an annual growth rate of at least 118%.

Pivigo is a data science marketplace founded by the remarkable Dr Kim Nilsson. Their mission is to connect “…data scientists and businesses across the world…to revolutionise the way we work, live and stay healthy.” read more

SEIS and EIS are the given acronyms for the generous tax breaks the UK government offers to investors in startup companies. (Seed) Enterprise Investment Scheme. The company must be UK registered and meet certain eligibility requirements. Eligibility is a great way to incentivize investors because it reduces their risk. Dramatically.

As it’s May the 4th. As in May the Fourth be with you. As in Star Wars Day. I thought it appropriate to share an article I wrote explaining the benefits of SEIS and EIS with a few lame Star Wars puns thrown in. You know, to keep it, well, Light. read more

“There’s an app for that”, or some variant of the phrase, is now one of the most common responses to anyone raising a complaint or bemoaning a problem, however small.

The extreme sense of entitlement coupled with the profound idleness that characterises our age has created a market for apps which manage or assist with our dry-cleaning, our sex life, our tampon subscription, our polyphasic sleep-mapping, our pets’ bowel movements…I wouldn’t be surprised if somewhere in the murky depths of the App Store there’s an app for communing with the dead – or perhaps I’ve just been watching too much Black Mirror. read more