BFS’17 Investor’s criteria for your business session
The second session addressed areas such as how to assess investors and how investors assess you. It was moderated by Oliver Wooley — CEO and Co-Founder at Envestors Ltd, and had speakers such as Luke Smith — an Investor responsible for sourcing and executing new investments at Forward Partners (FP), Tim Mills — Investment Director at AngelCoFund and Paul Lantsbury — Senior Finance Partner at PWC.
Luke Smith opened the session by explaining the reasons why they focus on start-ups. Although start-ups represent higher risks to investors, FP is less concerned about it, because they have necessary expertise to provide the guidance and resources companies need to reduce potential risks. FP chooses to deal with early stage businesses because they can identify and support ventures with a high potential return at the very early days. To evaluate a start-up, FP uses the market forces like the level of risk involved and potential value creation. At a later stage, they compare those companies with similar companies from the same sectors.
Paul Lantsbury stated that one of the reasons not to invest in a company is its owner. Many of them don’t know well their business and sector. PWC tends to reject financing businesses, which are potentially too risky. For example, the ones heavily dependent on one supplier or one customer. Another reason is failing to have a good strategic funding plan. Companies must spend time and money, must study the different types of angels and identify which ones are good for them. Spend time on thinking and planning a long-term journey, in terms of money, guidance and long-term strategies.
Speaking about angels, Tim Mills from Angel CoFund shared that they prefer to invest in companies at the latest stage. Usually, these are the businesses with relevant sales and significant presence in the market. Angel CoFund looks for companies with capability to scale fast, the ones that have a potential to make a return on investment of 3 to 30 times.
In short, the first session introduced several sources of funding. Some of them fit companies better in a specific phase or sector. Tim Mills gave an example of crowdfunding. For example, crowdfunding is a suitable solution when all company needs is money and, maybe, publicity. Contrarily, he pointed that this wouldn’t be the best choice for early stage companies, which in order to scale, need knowledge and guidance more than purely funding.
Want to meet top funders or put your networking skills into practise? Join us at our next event “Networking with Funders”:http://bit.ly/2mQVeV1
If you want more advice and information from leading financial institutions keep an eye on our future events: http://bit.ly/2mMWQko
Learn more about the Companies from the Speakers Panel:
Forward Partners back idea stage and seed stage eCommerce and marketplace businesses providing them with funding, office space and the support of an expert in-house engineering, product and growth team.
The Angel CoFund is a £100m investment fund with objectives to back promising UK businesses and help develop the important business angel investment market.
At PwC, our purpose is to build trust in society and solve important problems. We’re a network of firms in 157 countries with more than 223,000 people who are committed to delivering quality in assurance, advisory and tax services.
Envestors brings sophisticated investors from around the world together with unquoted companies looking for equity funding between £500,000 and £10 million. We have a network of over, 3000 investors looking to invest a minimum of £25,000 in companies we select as interesting investment opportunities.
Want to meet top funders or put your networking skills into practise? Join us at our next event “Networking with Funders”:http://bit.ly/2mQVeV1
If you want more advice and information from leading financial institutions keep an eye on our future events: http://bit.ly/2mMWQko
