April 19, 2010
Note: The following is a guest post by Arik Waldman who presented TekTrak at OAF Silicon Valley recently.
As you struggle to raise money for your venture, you encounter a lot of investor attitudes. Some people will just ignore your e-mails or calls, while some respond shortly saying they are not interested; some let you pitch just to tear you to shreds, while others go ahead with you. However, almost every time you feel like investors are doing you a favor by talking to you. After all, they have the money, many entrepreneurs and start-ups are chasing them, so you should be grateful that they even talk to you, especially if you’re a first-timer (and I’m not even going to talk about the assholes that ask for money just so you could pitch them).
This is part of what makes Open Angel Forum an amazing event. My venture got into the Silicon Valley OAF. There were about 20 angels, and 6 companies that pitched. The first thing you notice is the relaxed, intimate atmosphere. You don’t feel intimidated. On the contrary, you feel like the angels are really interested in what you have to say. The pitch format (5 min. demo, 5 min. Q&A) keeps everybody’s attention – you manage to present your main concept and answer the main questions, and you can dive into more details in the networking session following the presentations.
The angels themselves are amazing. Each angel presents him or herself when the evening begins, including what other companies they invested in. My partner and I were eyeballing each other constantly. The names you hear are amazing – companies that made it big time (that’s an understatement) – and they know their stuff. They have incredible track records, either as investors or as entrepreneurs (or both). And you have 20 of these amazing people, sitting in front of you, listening to your business idea, giving insightful advice and helpful suggestions, and considering investing in your venture. It doesn’t get more “smart money” than that.
So for any seed-stage venture out there – go for it. OAF gives you a really unique opportunity and exposure to many prominent investors in a great forum concept. I hope OAF will become a global standard of how angels listen to entrepreneurs. Everybody would benefit.
