Nick Edouard

“Susie doesn’t care about your cost recovery strategy…” 🤷 “...She just wants free & fast delivery.” There are few legends in the industry like Nathan Bush. When we were asked to tell our story on the Add To Cart podcast, we couldn’t say no. After rejecting us at a conference half a decade ago, it was fun to chat with Bushie about how Shippit was born, what we’ve learnt over the past 9 years and how retailers should look to meet growing customer expectations, particularly when it comes to a consistent and reliable delivery experience. Check it out here: bit.ly/4b5Ft5r #CommerceDeliveryPlatform #DeliveryExperience

113

11 Comments

🔐 Critical Update: Personal Privacy in the Digital Age 🔐 The UK’s new app reimbursement policy is a game-changer for personal privacy. With increasing concerns over data misuse, this policy reinforces the need for transparency and accountability in app-based services. It highlights the growing demand for stronger regulations to protect consumer data, ensuring users are reimbursed when apps fail to meet privacy and security standards. Businesses must now prioritize user data protection or face legal and financial consequences. #Privacy #DataProtection #DigitalSecurity #BusinessImpact #UKRegulations #ZeroTrustAdvocate #ProtectOurGlobalPrivacy

3

I couldn't help noticing that the debate about UK Capital Gains Tax has been based around first time founders (who don't care about tax) and investors (who may or may not care about tax). Missing from the debate are serial founders. It's a significant blind spot because they are a very important part of creating a self-sustaining (tech) startup culture. It seems that in the general imagination, startup life is like this: 1. Have a great idea 2. Work hard at it 3. Make millions 4. Retire and get a yacht Reality is a lot more messy and convoluted than that. I'd bet that the vast majority of founders don't follow this path. So I hope that the narrative gets wiser to the nuances of the startup sector; I'd love to see the UK building a more self-sustaining tech startup sector. Post here: https://lnkd.in/euKNpjAw

10

Fantastic to see MMC Ventures's coaching for founders playbook go live - appreciate them including some perspectives from me! As someone who has benefited enormously from coaching for over 10 years! (thank you Simon Bloom!!) I know first hand and without doubt I would not have been to scale Signal AI to where it is today without that support. For founders, coaching can offer more than support—the report provides clarity, fosters better decision-making, and accelerates both personal and professional growth. The playbook explores: ✅ What coaching is (and isn’t!) ✅ Different coaching styles tailored for founders ✅ How to choose the right coach ✅ Maximising the impact of your coaching experience Access the playbook here: https://lnkd.in/eR4kZpei #Coaching #ExecutiveCoaching #FounderCoaching

41

My prediction for a key trend in board performance in 2025 We have 10+ conversations each year with key regulators, industry bodies, stakeholders. There's been so much added to the remit over the past few years (which has dramatically increased variability in many cases), we think it's likely we're coming into a period where the external imperative is 'making sure the fundamentals are done really well'.

17

In 2019 I heard about this SaaS startup - with an unusual name - that two brothers had founded. Curious, I read up about Joyous and knew I was destined to help them make life better for people at work. It took me a while to land a coffee date with Philip Carden but it was one of those moments where you just know this is the start of something amazing. I joined Joyous as their first product person and have since helped across every function, learning more than I could ever have imagined. Michael Carden and Philip Carden are two of the best humans I know and I feel much the same about the entire team. It’s an honour to work alongside them and the biggest compliment of my career that people of such high calibre are putting their trust in me as we forge ahead. The product we’ve built together has grown into something that I couldn’t be more proud of. One that’s truly unique. The way we use AI to help gather feedback from the frontline at scale and quickly synthesise it into action is nothing short of a miracle. I say that because the road to get here hasn’t been straightforward and it’s those tough journeys that are always the most worthwhile. Today we get to see Joyous make people’s jobs easier at some of the world’s largest organisations - based on their own ideas and expertise actually being heard. There’s just no better feeling! Seeing that also translate to huge cost savings for organisations in what might be the toughest economy of our age - well that’s just about the best icing on the cake. Here’s to the next chapter! Let’s go!

266

57 Comments

Despite playing an extraordinarily important role at the centre of Healthcare Delivery & Management, the 'Practice Management Software' industry seems to go by unnoticed within the VC / Startup community. I recently met (& had a great conversation) with a partner from a prominent German VC, he chucked and told me that he thought Saas was 'done', that all of the major industries had been disrupted already. Then someone drew his attention to 'Practice Management Software'. 👀 🧠 High-Level, what is it? 👨🏻‍⚕️👨🏻‍💻🤒 The software by which Healthcare Professionals within medical practices manage all patient administration & regulated processes. 🩺💊💰 Such as: Health Records, Medication Prescriptions, Medication Plans, Medical Forms, Insurance Management, Billing, Lab Data, Device Data, Waiting Room, Calendar, etc. 👩🏼‍⚖️✍🏽✅ The software is complex, highly Regulated & Mandatory: if a patient is state insured (90% of the german population) a doctor 'must' be using a regulated PMS in order to treat them. 🏥🇩🇪💰The German healthcare market is the 2nd biggest in the world (after the US) with a yearly spend of 13% of GDP. 🏥🏥🏥 There are a LOT of medical practices in Germany, over 110,000 of them in-fact (especially when you compare to a country with a similar population size, e.g. the UK, with 7,000 practices). What is the current state of affairs: 📠 The highly regulated PMS industry has remained relatively undisrupted over the past 30+ years. 📀 Most practices are still using software that was developed in the 80s/90s: DOS based, On-premise, Offline/No Cloud, No modern UX, No proper interoperability. 📉 By far the biggest player in Germany is CGM, who have the largest % of the doctors using one of their softwares. However, when you look at the stock price over the past few years, things do not appear to be going so well, but why? 🔮 📉While still turning over large amounts of revenue, the future does not appear so good. - Government & Regulators are pushing for meaningful nationwide digitisation. However, with PMS at the heart of how HCPs work & health data is created/stored, this digitisation feels like it's being blocked by the legacy PMS. - There is no modern cloud based system. - A lot of leadership/vision changes over the past years. - The general customer satisfaction is very low. The need for PMS is not reducing, but the likelihood/belief that this company will be the one to provide it in the long-term future is diminishing. Meanwhile: 🥇We at doctorly are the first (& only) VC backed tech-startup to be certified to sell Practice Software in Germany. 📈 With hundreds of HCPs already using doctorly to fully manage their practices, we aim to fill the evident & growing need for a modern PMS over the next years. 🤝 Beyond an efficiency boosting PMS for HCPs, we also intend to provide a platform for true interoperability & data flow across the healthcare industry. #healthcare #digitalhealth #healthtech

42

15 Comments

Why do companies lose Product Market Fit? Blog 2️⃣ in my series - Losing Product Market Fit (PMF). Last week I talked about what it takes to find PMF in a Venture backed business: 👀 Vision 🤝 Customer engagement ⚖ Scalability In this weeks blog I list the external factors that drive PMF from a business: 🤼 New customer requirements 🌍 Opportunities in new markets 📉 Poor sales performance The blog goes on to describe how these factors destroy the internal systems: ⛰ Confused mission 📢 Breakdown in Communication 🥟 Destruction of the Gross Margin And, how ultimately PMF gets destroyed and the business ends up in a downward spiral. Please read the blog and send some comments! https://lnkd.in/eunSzCqZ #venturecapital, #founders, #productmarketfit

18

musings on uk politics from across the pond: given what we've seen in US 2024 politics with a merging of populist right (Trump) and builder libertarian (Musk) successfully capturing the zeitgeist in US whether a Farage (populist right) is going to merge with builder libertarian energy (unsure who represents that in UK) under the banner of something like "Putting the Great back in Britain" UK has v different dynamics to US so may not work. but it doesn't seem unreasonable to think something like this may be the next iteration of the Conservative party. interesting.

9

3 Comments

Mental health founders and operators ‼️ I'd love your help. What has 2024 has been like for you? What challenges have you faced and what are you excited for next year? Want to help, just complete this survey for The Hemingway Report > https://lnkd.in/g87wRGXm Insights will be shared in an upcoming report :) #MentalHealth #BehavioralHealth

45

6 Comments

If you read between the lines, this is not a Box announcement, this is an OpenAI announcement. These value-props are now commodity features. What "for the first time ever it lets us unlock all of the value inside of our information" implies is that "instant legal expertise to your contracts, summarize a long research report, ask questions of marketing assets on how to best position a new product in sales, identify trends and patterns in customer data" are all now commodity features available to any start-up with access to GPT-4o and the like. The disruption is coming and this is where it most likely begins.

8

1 Comment

This should be required listening by all start-up founders. There is a revolution of smart start-up founders that eschew VC's by building capital efficient and profitable businesses (I welcome you to the "club"). We spend our time solving clients very real problems, rather than with "money people". We do not get hundreds of likes for raising capital, and we do not care. We work for our clients, that feedback is all we need. Kudos to the following people for leading this revolution: Right Side Capital Management, Dave Lambert, Kevin Dick, John Eng, Paul Swiencicki, Samantha Lewis

10

What is interesting in this sifted piece re the Babylon AI founder and his new project is they miss out on how he refused to allow clinical & evidence-based review of Babylon. It was fundamentally viewed as unsafe (couldn't tell the difference between MI and upper GI symptoms) https://lnkd.in/dX-S9Y22

6

1 Comment

We at Female Founders Fund started investing in #womenshealth 10 years ago and continue to believe that there is a huge opportunity through digital innovation to improve care by building targeted solutions for all women.  Over the past few months, it has been promising to see government funding being directed for the first time towards clinical research focused on understanding the critical life stages of a woman's reproductive journey and creating better solutions for the female patient. In honor of #Women’sHealthMonth and to shine a spotlight on the investment opportunity that exists in #menopause, I’m sharing key takeaways from a 2020 study we published with Fortune below:  💰 With 100% of women as the target market, menopause to be a $600B market opportunity, with a need for better products and solutions catering to this life stage.  📈 On average, women spend $2k per year on menopause treatments, doctor visits, devices and products, and 1 billion women are expected to be in menopause worldwide by 2025  👩‍⚕️ 80% of OBGYNs are not trained in menopause as part of their medical training 👯‍♀️ 75% of women in menopause get their information from their friends / community 💗 The biggest opportunities for innovation exist across products such as supplements and hormone creams targeting specific pain points & hormonal shifts, telemedicine, and digital communities for women. It is exciting to see start-ups and government funding paving the way for promising solutions in women’s health. We’re proud to be early investors in companies like Maven Clinic and Kindra that have been at the forefront of providing menopause care. Still, we recognize that there is room for more development, funding, and attention to be brought to this space. With advancements in testing and medicine underway, we believe there is opportunity for more preventative solutions that are increasingly personalized and targeted to address the unique needs of each woman. Full study: https://lnkd.in/ecBaQzC

310

23 Comments

Scale-up business guide to getting investor-ready: THE MARKETPLACE (5/7) When heading into a pitch or conversation with an investor you need to know the relationship your business has with the marketplace like the back of your hand. You need to know the answers to the questions in this article to be investor-ready. #businessgrowth #business #marketplace

1

🎉 Tomorrow, Experiment Nation's Product Experimentation Event goes live! As always, this event will be virtual and on-demand.🎉 Here's the agenda: 📅 August 18 👉 Bridging the Discovery Validation Gap featuring Eclipse Group Solutions Ltd.'s Ellie Hughes 👉 5 Ways Onboarding Drives User Retention featuring Perrigo Company plc's Aarushi Raizada 📅 August 19 👉 Product Discovery - How could Product benefit from CRO methods with konversionsKRAFT's Stefanie Grimmling and Anastasia Shvedova 👉 Essential tools and strategies for modern experimentation featuring Miro's Olga Kosyreva 📅 August 20 👉 Crushing Customer Pain Points: 5 Tactics for Product Growth Teams featuring Marilyn Koutsonikolas 👉 What and How of Product Experimentation with AI featuring Blue Bagels' Jyoti Malec Malek 📅 August 21 👉 5 Steps to build a structured experimentation program for your product featuring Online Dialogue's Dennis Nederlof 👉 Build a testing backlog with the business team featuring Santander Brasil's Marylisa Santos 📣 Join Experiment Nation's Slack to get access to the sessions here: https://lnkd.in/gaZ7TTPc We will publish new sessions each day. #product #experimentation

16

1 Comment

🌍 October Spotlight: Major HealthTech & Biotech Investments Across Regions In October, we’ve seen significant investments in HealthTech and Biotech globally, with innovative startups securing funding to advance critical research and therapies. Here’s a look at some standout deals across Europe, the Middle East, and the United States: Europe 1. AviadoBio (UK) 💰 Investment: $30M upfront, potential for up to $2.18B in milestone payments 🤝 Lead Investor: Astellas (Japan) 📈 Description: AviadoBio is pioneering gene therapies for neurodegenerative disorders, including treatments for ALS. (Source: Fierce Biotech) 2. CSPC Pharmaceutical Group & AstraZeneca (UK) 💰 Investment: $100M upfront, with potential for up to $1.92B 📈 Description: This partnership aims to develop a new preclinical lipid-lowering therapy to enhance cardiovascular health. (Source: Labiotech) Middle East Investment data in HealthTech and Biotech from the Middle East remains limited, but the region is increasingly focusing on AI-driven diagnostics and medical technology, supported by public and private funding. We can expect future updates here as investments grow. United States 1. Aliada Therapeutics 💰 Investment: $1.4B acquisition by AbbVie (Source: Labiotech) 📈 Description: Aliada’s focus is on antibodies targeting Alzheimer’s disease, promising new treatments for a complex pathology. 2. EvolveImmune Therapeutics 💰 Investment: $65M upfront, with potential for up to $1.4B in performance payments 🤝 Lead Investor: AbbVie 📈 Description: This collaboration focuses on innovative cancer therapies, with a particular emphasis on immuno-oncology. (Source: Fierce Biotech) 3. Dewpoint Therapeutics & Bayer (Germany) 💰 Investment: $424M towards developing a cardiovascular disease program 📈 Description: This partnership aims to offer regenerative solutions for cardiac tissue repair. (Source: Fierce Biotech) These strategic investments underscore a continued interest in cutting-edge innovation in health, oncology, and beyond. The future of global health technology is promising, driven by cross-border partnerships and groundbreaking R&D.

6

We're now raising our pre-seed round and are looking for investors who actually know what they're doing with consumer or social apps. Know anyone who'd be interesting to speak with? Tag them below or give us a hand and make an intro. Whether you're an Angel or VC, If you're not a dinosaur and actually see the new untapped potential in AI & Social, hit us up. AI's about to change how people connect, and Gen z desperately needs something real. we're gonna make it happen with KLIK-Social No bs, just real connections.

35

4 Comments