Karoline Gross

#London Startup Funding Directory. Discover the list of startups that have received funding in #London. Access it whenever you need! View the directory here https://lnkd.in/dvn8WMgz #startup #startups #vc #venturecapital #investmentbanking #privateequity #managementconsulting #b2b #founders #entrepreneurs

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SaaS founders and players of London! 📣 Free this Wednesday at 6pm? I've got an idea for you: COME TO A TECH ROAST 🔥 Hosted by Ghita El Haitmy from TechBible along with Vasily Alekseenko and Seven Jacobs from Rare Founders. If you've been to their events before, you know this will be good. If you're a SaaS founder, you can apply to pitch and get roasted on stage. If you're not a SaaS founder, just come and meet everyone. Link for more info and tickets in my bio. See you there. Agree? #saas #tech #roast #startups

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Wise is one of Europe's most successful #FinTechs ever whose debut on the London Stock Exchange became the UK's biggest & most successful direct listing ever. This is the pitch deck that helped them raise $1M in 2011 👇😳 The deck that #Wise (ex- #TransferWise) made is a masterclass in #startup storytelling. It has it all: - Crystal-clear problem-solution fit 🎯 - Mind-blowing traction: £1M+ transferred, ZERO marketing spend 😤 - 20% monthly growth in paying users 📈 - Brilliant peer-to-peer model explained simply 👏 - Rock-star founding team (ex- Skype & finance pros) 💼 The unusual thing about Wise is that it has been profitable since 2017, while in 2023 its total income increased by 73% to £964.2 million with revenue growing by 51% year-over-year 😳 But it all began with a simple yet powerful pitch deck. Brilliant 👏

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This year is all about survival. I've seen enough data to call it. Multiple reports are showing Flat -> No growth. Wayflyer/Iris Finance report had Q1 overall growth at +4% YoY. Common Thread Collective Index has same store sales flat YoY. What does this mean? This year is about survival. The industry as a whole isn’t growing. We can blame this on whatever we want. But the outcome remains the same. Instead of obsessing about your topline growth. (Which is a steep mountain to climb.) Focusing on growing your bottom line. In a low topline growth year, spend time becoming more profitable. 100% YoY growth doesn’t do you any good if you’re out of biz in 2 years. The goal needs to be surviving to 2025. #shopify

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Calling: - self-funded tech startups - bootstrapped tech startups - indie hackers - solo tech founders - people with tech startup ideas You no longer need to be alone Not even 24 hours have gone by since Nana Opoku Agyeman-Prempeh liste https://lnkd.in/e_mvJxTE 131 volunteers have already applied. This is unprecedented! May be everyone love AgriTech or just love Nana! 😁 #SkilledUpLife #techstartups #indiehackers

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It's incredibly rewarding to see positive feedback on our Reddit account 🙌. Our journey has been all about helping people understand and appreciate what we're building 🚀. While many investors and VCs are focused solely on the latest technology, we believe that ease of use is what truly matters 💡. You can have the most advanced tech, but if it's confusing and inaccessible, is it really valuable in the long run? 🤔 "The UI issue is indeed a major barrier. Simplification is crucial for adoption. People need to feel comfortable and familiar with the technology. The Connecter's goal aligns with user needs. Integration into daily life is essential. It's about creating a seamless experience. The easier it is to use, the more people will adopt it. Your focus on an intuitive system is the right approach. I used AIMD app for content creation. It's about optimizing and simplifying, much like your mission with crypto. It's about making complex processes user-friendly. Good luck with The Connecter. Your vision for crypto is on point." #blockchain #tech #technology #AI #fintech #defi #decentralizedfinance #finance #web3 #web3community #crypto #cryptocurrency #bitcoin #ethereum

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Is everyone launching VCs nowadays? In late 2022, I enrolled in the VC Lab programme but the timing wasn’t quite right, so I dropped out. Now, with better timing after selling my business, I’ve rejoined the VC Lab again (here is a spoiler into my future plans 🙈) Sifted tracked only 40 new first-time funds with a first or second close in 2023, a decrease from over 60 in 2022. As of 2024, only 18 new VCs have been launched in Europe. Anyone in my network launching a VC fund or considering it? How are you navigating this process? #VC #VentureCapital #Fundraising #BusinessOpportunity

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Remove the detailed roadmaps from your pitch decks. No VC will invest the time to go through all the milestones in your history and those in the future, with all the bullets providing details about each milestone. Far too early. VCs are not warm enough when they read your pitch deck. Put your detailed roadmaps into your data room and let VCs digest them after they had 1-2 meetings with you and ask for further material. If you think a roadmap could help to increase a VCs appetite, then only provide 3-5 high-level milestones on a slide that could be read and understood in max 10 seconds. Check my FundraisingCOUP program if you want to become a Top 1% fundraiser & get in touch with me if you're building a disruptive Future of Work & Learning startup and looking for Pre-Seed or Seed funding.

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Founders: What are you lying to yourself about? This is one of the most profound questions that Mike Del Ponte asked me and I want to pass it along to you. - What do you believe is true, that in fact is not? - What do you think your business is, that it really isn't? - What do you feel will happen, but is destined to fail? If you're feeling stuck in your business I encourage you to ask this challenging question, and answer as truthfully as you can. The result may just be the unlock you've been looking for.

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New Solo GP: Backfuture Ventures Fund I🚀 By the time Alexander Theuma had run his annual software startup conference, SaaStock, for several years, speakers and investors began encouraging him to launch an investment fund. Initially, he thought it would be a distraction, but not anymore. Recently, the first close at $3m of his target $10m fund for BackFuture Ventures was announced. The firm aims to invest in early-stage SaaS companies, primarily in Europe, leveraging SaaStock's extensive network.💰 “It has, unsurprisingly, been hard,” Theuma says, referring to the market downturn making it challenging for emerging VCs to raise funds. Despite this, he has secured 48 LPs, and hopes to reach the final close by September.💪 The strategy is to write £100k-200k cheques for pre-seed and seed-stage SaaS companies. The firm won’t lead deals and will likely avoid many AI deals for now due to high costs. About 70% of the portfolio will be based in Europe, 20% in the US, and 10% in the rest of the world. Theuma emphasizes the strategic value of Backfuture, stating, “The least interesting thing about us is the money. It’s a strategic play for the founders. No other VC has access to a community and network like SaaStock; through it, we can provide access to VCs and experienced founders.”🎯 Backfuture's initial investments include: - Happl - Tipple Theuma is currently working part-time on the fund, his associate, Kenneth Kashif Thomas, whom he met at a SaaStock event, is full-time. By the second fund, Theuma hopes to dedicate himself full-time to Backfuture.⏰ Inspired by an episode of Harry Stebbings’ podcast 20Minute VC, Theuma adopted the strategy of accepting LP cheques of any size to get the ball rolling. Initially, he accepted nothing below £10k. He later raised the minimum to £50k, then £150k, noting that “people typically come in at the minimum.” To keep the pool of LPs manageable, he plans to raise the minimum further near the final close, aiming to keep it well under 100 LPs.🏃‍♂️ So far, Theuma has spoken to around 200 LPs, with 48 committed. Notable LPs include: - Phil Chambers, cofounder of Workday Peakon Employee Voice. - 🔥 Bridget Harris, CEO of YouCanBookMe. - Taeh Hea Nahm and Ryan Floyd, managing partners B2B VC Storm Ventures. - Christian Reber, founder of Pitch. - Gregory Galant, CEO of Muck Rack. 🦸‍♂️With Backfuture Ventures, Theuma joins a growing community of solo GPs in Europe, excited to support a new generation of SaaS founders. 🚀 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #VCfund and increase the international pool of your LPs?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments (Series A/Series B)?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE #VentureCapital #SaaS #StartupFunding #EarlyStageInvesting #EuropeanTech #SoloGP #SaaStock #Innovation #TechInvesting

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Just went to London's Spitalfields market for Lunch. Hundreds of independent stalls, each carving their niche. And it got me thinking about the app world... Many founders chase the "million user" dream, unicorn status, big exits. But what if success looks different? Maybe your app doesn't need to be the next Amazon. It could be the friendly local bakery app, serving a dedicated community and thriving. Success can come in many forms: a loyal user base, passionate reviews, or achieving a specific impact. Being small, but still profitable and serving customers. So I genuinely think it’s time to redefine how success for a digital product looks like. And it's totally fine if you build something small and simple. #entrepreneurship #appdevelopment #startup

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Scale-up business guide to getting investor-ready: THE PITCH (4/7) Have you got your business up and running but never pitched to an investor before? Do you know what you need to prepare for a pitch? Your business’ future may depend on your next pitch. This article outlines the different aspects of your business you need to bring into a pitch. #Investorready #Business #Growth #Funding

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From overcoming rejections to pioneering new markets, discover key strategies for first-time founders to thrive 👇 Drew Houston (Founder & CEO of Dropbox) provides valuable insights on overcoming early challenges, building a successful startup, and maintaining a strong mission and culture in “How to Win as a First-Time Founder, a Drew Houston Manifesto”. Check out the key insights in the attached presentation 👇 ───── 👉 Follow me, Alexander Small, for tactics and strategies for building startups from industry-leading Founders, Operators and Investors

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Startup decks vs Business plans. It's accepted that a startup needs a deck. Dax Dasilva of Lightspeed Commerce made an important point on 20VC. Writing a business plan - including financial projections - is an important step. It requires discipline. It provides a rigorous framework for thinking deeply about the problem you're trying to solve. Harry Stebbings countered that he doesn't even want to see a deck since it's all dreams. We spent a lot of time and energy on our business plan with the expectation that we would show it to no one ever. The business plan was part of our roadmap for the company. We researched customers - including having 50+ conversations. We wanted to understand them: their background, their interests, their presence on social media. We also wanted to understand how they were evaluated by leadership and how integrated they were with the business of the company they were protecting. We researched pricing both with potential customers and other products in our industry to find out if OpEx or CapEx was a better fit. How did they buy today? How would they like to buy? We did market research to understand the verticals and map the right entry point - we were wrong but that doesn't reduce the value of the research. We looked at competitors in depth to understand what they were seeing that we weren't. Dax is right. This is an invaluable document that should be updated every year - the company is changing, the market is changing, there's more feedback about price and ICP. It's not for sharing with the outside world. It's a map for driving forward. Decks won't get you investment - VCs invest in people. We make decks but we know they don't tell our story. The deck is a calling card. Dax and Harry are both right. https://lnkd.in/e25M82xY

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Every tech founder want cash (nothing new here) 😂 Cash comes in many ways: - Revenues - the best form - Equity finance - Debt - Grants I (https://deallite.uk) sit on investor data with relationships built over a long time. Whilst I (Deal Lite) share this data through monthly subscriptions, I avoid investor introductions at all cost due to a number of reasons. I'm currently evaluating a light weight approach of investor introductions for Techcelerate members. Deal Lite also has the ability to include live fundraisers. Just wondering whether there is sufficient demand for us to create a product related service. It could look like below (not finalised - very early research): Product: - Listing on https://deallite.uk (company needs to keep us up to date so the data remain live) - Pitch deck sent to us for a quick review and inclusion with above. Service: For personal introductions, you would need to follow additional process: - Join Techcelerate as a Member. - Build credibility and trust within our community - Sign an agreement on light weight fundraising - Make introductions Of course, I would chat with Stuart Scott-Goldstone to understand legal ramifications. Whatever decided, it has to be a very light weight product related solution to ensure a decent quality of service. No decision has been taken. Just researching at present. I bet David John William Bailey might have some views on this. #fundraising #investment #DealLite

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Who wants free access to a list of 2,000+ VC contacts investing more than $20bn into SaaS startups (early stage + growth) in 2024? We've spent more than 1 month to compile this data and make it easily searchable in our database. If you are a SaaS founder looking to raise VC money within the next 6 months, then this VC list will help you save tons of time. Get free lifetime access to the VC list here https://lnkd.in/eDTgBb7p If you know of any SaaS founders who could benefit from this list, just mention them in the comments section. If you know some really awesome VCs investing into the most promising SaaS startups, then please mention them in the comments and we will include them into the VC list. #venturecapital #startups #startupfundraising #saas #vc

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