Finance is one of the key ingredients for successful startups. Many entrepreneurs, however, lack knowledge of finance. This course teaches basic financial knowledge needed in starting and operating startups to entrepreneurs or would-be entrepreneurs who did not major in finance. Students of this course will learn to read and understand financial statements such as balance sheets, income statements and cash flow statements. They will also practice simple financial planning of a startup. This course also covers the concept company valuation as well as how startups get funding. This is a practical course aimed at direct application of the knowledge gained into running real startups. It also aims to enable entrepreneurs and would-be-entrepreneurs to understand the "language of finance" so that they can talk to professionals with confidence.
CF3-7 Advice on VC Fundraising
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来自 Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology 的课程
Finance for Startups
个评分
从本节课中
Financial planning and funding
Financial planning of a startup and seeking funding from outside investors.
与讲师见面
Steve AhnProfessor
K-School
So, in this section,
we will talk about some advices on Venture Capital fundraising.
Before you meet venture capitalists,
you need to ask how much you will ask.
Here you don't need
any complex financial models because in startups there are so many uncertainties.
So your input is not reliable,
and even though you are using a very complex financial models,
it would be just like garbage in garbage out.
So rather, I suggest that you focus on a length of
time to get to the next meaningful milestone.
For example, how long will it take to ship
the first product or to get a certain number of users?
Then you need to figure out what's your burn rate that you need to get to this point?
For example, if you need $50,000 of burn rate for six months,
then you raise maybe 500,000 not 300,000 because you need to have some cushion.
A venture capitalist said that,
"The only thing that we know about
financial predictions of startups is that 100 percent of them are wrong."
Maybe he's right because for sell-offs it's not
easy to predict when you really get
your paying customers and when you will first get your revenue.
But what you can do very well is to control your spending.
So you should really control your spending exactly to your plan.
So, before you go out to meet the venture capitalists or other investors,
you should prepare fundraising materials.
So first, short description of your business.
So, it is often called an elevator pitch.
Suppose that you meet a very famous investor in
an elevator and then maybe you have only 20 to 30 seconds at most,
and then, within that time,
you should make the investor very interested in your company.
Then, how will you describe yourself or your company?
Think about that. That's an elevator pitch.
So, that's one to three paragraphs that describe the product,
the team, and the business in a very compact way.
Then you should prepare a presentation.
But the content is more important,
so don't overdesign your slides and focus on the content.
If you are introduced
to investors or if you meet investors in an elevator,
if you're successful in making them interested and they would
probably ask you to send your presentation material.
Then, you should send your material that's clear, concise,
interesting, and easy to understand and stands on its own.
If the investors are very interested in
your company and they will do due diligence and they'll ask you many materials.
So, please prepare these materials beforehand, like capitalization tables.
It shows the list of shareholders of your company.
If there are any contracts,
you should prepare all of them so that you can show them to
your potential investors and
the employment agreements and maybe start set
up very well prepare for things like a board meeting minutes,
but I suggest that you do this regularly and prepare all the documents.
So, you should really organize all these documents for quick delivery to investors,
so that you don't slow down the investment process.
So, once venture capitalists are interested in you,
they will ask you many things.
Things like the several presentations and
maybe longer and longer presentations because they want to dig deeper in your company,
and the projections, and your target customers,
and your development plan and competitive analysis.
So, if you are asked this,
that means these investors are very interested in you.
You will go through multiple meetings,
like e-mails, and phone calls, and some meals.
Why do they serve you meals?
That's because they want to know you as person.
Because VCs at the end of the day
will invest on person or team rather than these ideas.
So, they want to know who you are and who your team is.
They want to know whether this team is capable of bringing your idea into reality.
So, this is a typical picture of
a venture capital firm and presentation by an entrepreneur.
If a venture capitalist decides to invest,
the next step is to issue a term sheet and we will talk about this later.
One final advice to you is that you choose your investors wisely,
because you will be working with them for a very long time.
Think about how working with this current investor will position you for the next round,
including issues like the reputation of this venture capitalist.
Money we are using is in a commodity, it's all the same.
But the money from investors are not created equal.
So, you should really get the high quality money.
Then money should come from those investors who can help you grow and succeed.
Your target in fundraising is to get multiple term sheets at the same time,
so that these investors are competing each other to invest on your company.
