Organizing a Fundraising Dinner: Template Best Practices

One of the most powerful ways to attract investors to your fund or company is to organize a carefully curated dinner for qualified potential investors. Here’s my quick template cheatsheet for making that happen: Invite [Firm] Investor Dinner Please join us at a curated salon dinner exclusively for existing and potential investors in [Fund] Where?...

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Rebooting PEVCTech: Events in NY and Boston

We’re now rebooting PEVCTech, our community for investors and technologists responsible for investing in private companies, primarily at private equity and venture capital funds. Our focus is on sharing information on technologies and systems that make investing in private companies more efficient and effective. We cover all stages. We are partnering with some allies on...

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How enterprise can learn from the innovation economy

One of the core functions of a VC is to identify the next generation of disruptive companies.  I presented last month to a Microsoft senior executive offsite on how large corporations can do the same, to inform their investing, M&A, and competitive intelligence.  My presentation was based on my research on deal origination best practices...

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Startup Grind interview (with vertical pushup)

Last month I did an on-stage interview with Peter Crysdale of Startup Grind. You can read a summary at AlleyWatch. For fun, I did an on-stage vertical pushup at the end of the interview (skip to 44:00)....

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How to Judge an Investment Proposal (especially at Pitch Contests)

I periodically serve as a judge at pitch events for companies raising funding. In every case, I’m assessing each company against our standard criteria for investing. For some of the new employees at our firm, I put together a guide on how to serve as a judge at investment pitch events, evaluate investment ideas, and...

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How to keep the people attending your event alive

Do you organize events?  Do you like your attendees alive? Event organizers like their attendees to be energetic, enthusiastic, and preferably, alive.  Joe Reilly organized 50 events a year while serving as President of the Family Office Association. He said, “Conferences are the unnatural situation par excellence, almost like a casino.  You are in a recirculated-air,...

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