Joey Levy

What's our "WHY" at Champion Venture Partners? 1. Access! Providing athletes and athletes adjacent professionals access to the private alternatives sports asset class as a lot of their financial advisors don't play in them or even look at them. 2. Access! Providing the general public the opportunity to invest in the private alternatives sports asset class. How awesome is it that you can invest on the same terms as some of the biggest names in sports and entertainment! 3. Education! If you want to learn before you invest, we have programs and services available. 4. Partnerships! CVP are long term "forever partners" for our portfolio companies. Sure, we may have a few turn and burn VC & PE deals as that's the nature of the business, but our bread and butter is long term strategic growth value add no matter if it's a 5 year deal or a 30 year deal or a "forever deal".

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Summary: Keith Rabois, managing director of Khosla Ventures, is on a mission to turn Miami into the next Silicon Valley and has been actively promoting the city as a tech hub. Despite some challenges and opposition, Rabois remains optimistic about Miami's potential and the growth of its tech ecosystem. Key takeaways: Keith Rabois is determined to make Miami the next Silicon Valley and has seen progress with a growing number of seed investments in the city. Khosla Ventures, where Rabois works, has made multiple investments in Miami, including one into a startup aiming to "reinvent education." Rabois continues to split his time between Miami and San Francisco, but believes that Miami offers a better quality of life and potential for building a thriving tech community. Counter arguments: Some big name investors, such as Andreessen Horowitz, have pulled out of Miami, suggesting that the city does not offer the same opportunities as other established tech hubs. Miami still has a relatively small share of total U.S. seed investments (2.6%-3.5%) which may indicate a lack of resources and opportunities compared to other cities. #venturecapital

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If you’re an entrepreneur, you need to study Slack. In just 8 months, Slack hit a billion-dollar valuation. Here's the story of how Slack took the corporate world by storm👇 2009: Flickr cofounder Steward Butterfield and Cal Henderson launch Tiny Speck, a new game company. 2011: They introduce their 1st project Glitch, an online game set in the minds of 11 giants. But it was:  •Too dull •Too slow •Too complex 2012: Glitch shuts down. What followed was unexpected. Butterfield proposed a BOLD pivot to enterprise software.  The glitch team built an internal messaging app with huge potential beyond gaming. So, Tiny Speck became Slack Technologies. 2013: Slack launched and it was an INSTANT hit. Today, Slack boasts: - $5B ARR - 2K+ employees - 38M+ daily users Here are 3 core factors behind their SUPERFAST growth👇 1️⃣ Organic magic Slack's initial growth came solely from word-of-mouth. Gain users → Delight them → They tell others → BOOM. This was pure product-led growth. Slack served a purpose that many people wanted to solve and it spread like wildfire. 2️⃣ Freemium & Upselling Slack is a truly free product. -No gated free trial -No credit card information Slack heavily attracted small to mid-sized teams with its freemium model. Also, upsold the users to pay more to access the messaging history and other features. A perfect strategy for conversion. 3️⃣ Prioritized User Feedback Slack always prioritized user feedback. The Slack team👇 • Built a help bot for assistance • Attended every support ticket • Has a dedicated Twitter account for reporting incidents They ask, listen, and improve. This increased customer stickiness. Finally, Salesforce acquired Slack for a whopping $27.7 billion. ———————————— Hope you found this story interesting. Share it if you did ♻️ Follow me for all things SAAS & entrepreneurship 👐 Join me on the bootstrapping journey to take SaaS to $10M ARR!

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Great analysis of recent #vc trends. Thank you Kaela Roeder and Technical.ly for including my thoughts in the piece. My "expanded" two cents below for anyone curious... It is easy to get excited by what is happening in venture capital these days given the advent of AI. However, for early-stage startups, the numbers tell a more nuanced story. Early-stage deal volume in Q4-2023 was down 66% from the peak (Q4-2021) and a quarter of the deals were down rounds. In 2024, volumes stayed fairly flat relative to 2023 levels (signalizing a normalization to pre-pandemic VC activity) and 32% of deals were down rounds in Q1 (a worsening since year end). Early-stage valuations have spiked back up this year – a pleasant boon for some founders. But, this inflation is largely driven by the excitement around AI and strong demand for capital-efficient, high-growth companies. Many startups have tried to become “dot AI” businesses overnight; however, such tactics are not the “silver bullet” to fundraising challenges and growth. With limited time and capital, funds are on the hunt for companies with bulletproof fundamentals or those with exponential growth potential. If you don’t check one of these two boxes, the VC world looks fundamentally different for you. Locally, there are some positive tailwinds. The D.C. area has outpaced other metro areas in adding AI jobs due in large part to the defense industry and an increasing number of tech companies opening-up federal outposts. Over the long-term, this will be very positive for D.C. startup growth and talent.

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I'm not a huge fan of "contrarian" deals in VC. Those rarely work out. Founders who are not great in storytelling will always struggle with fundraising, so they are not good investment targets unless they learn how to pitch. I'm more of a fan of investing in great founders with "stupid" ideas. Think Airbnb, Reddit, Bolt. Founders with great storytelling skills who struggle with fundraising because the idea is too bizarre / untested / weird / not yet explored tend to be great early bets as later stage VCs usually fund them if they can generate traction.

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About to go live... Startup Studio portfolio VC fund. $8.5 mil. with room to oversubscribe. All deals warehoused and ready to allocate. Built in equity on day 1. Low 1 time management fee. $35k minimum investment. 506c so accredited investors only. GP's are personally invested. Multi tiered exit strategy in place. Liquidity options available at year 2. *** This presentation of Sidecar Portfolio Fund (the “Company”) is for information only and shall not constitute an offer to buy, sell, issue or subscribe for, or the solicitation of an offer to buy, sell or issue, or subscribe for any securities in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful.***

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#ObsessivelyEnthusiasticInvestor #UnreasonablyEnthusiasticInvestor #IrrationallyEnthusiasticInvestor at REFASHIOND Ventures: The Industrial Transformation Fund. We look for the people we believe are doing the best work in Industrial Transformation & Supply Chain Technology; Attempting the impossible. Then we go all-in on them. With obsessive and unreasonable enthusiasm. Join us. #IndustrialTransformation #SupplyChain #Innovation #Technology #Startups #VentureCapital #DemandTheImpossible #UnreasonableEnthusiasm #ObsessiveEnthusiasm #IrrationalEnthusiasm

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Big things on the horizon, we are motivated and blessed to be at the dawn of a new age for the internet. Read more about our journey below or listen to the podcast: https://lnkd.in/eJeNhvVa

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🚀 Brian Clough was a blinkin' genius in football management terms. Love his quote "We had a great team on paper. Unfortunately the team were playing on grass". And yes - it's one of those annoying "This thing happened and here's what you can learn from it" posts. But it's true. Sales projections, market sizing and GTMs are all good and great. And important. But building a startup almost never works like you thought it was going to. You're not building your startup on paper. You're building on grass. And that's what the investor is looking for - do you have a plan B, a Plan C? Do you have what it takes to interpret the data objectively, pivot and still execute the 💩 out of your business? Video in the comments! Psssssst. Do you want to join the nearly 200 people signed up to watch me roast 3 investment decks LIVE? Join me on Thurs Sep 5th to see how investors actually view decks. Direct, candid and no holds barred. Sign up https://buff.ly/3XpMEB8

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The state of venture capital is wild right now. We are witnessing a surge of innovation across the spectrum: - Funds merging - VC doing PE - PE doing VC - Secondary funds - Buyout funds - Spin-out funds - Debt funds - Continuation funds - Infrastructure funds - GP turnover - Hard Tech surging - Family Office uptick

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Did you know that YC founders get a secret weapon… and it’s not what you think. “Bookface” is YC’s internal social network. It was needed because YC had funded larger batches and the hardest part of a community is knowing who is in it and who you can trust and ask for help. On the platform, founders share real methods and advice that would break if it were shared widely It’s secret knowledge shared with a trust-first community - answering 80% of the questions a founder can have about building and selling a product, be it to clients, candidates or investors. Before the platform, if you had a B2B startup, you had to reach out cold to potential customers. Now there are over 1000 YC companies you can sell your service to and all of their contact information is in Bookface. As a result, YC alumni companies are often over 50% of your new sales during YC. It’s superpowers like this that make YC deals so attractive compared to the norm. You are investing in a founder with a 10x network already!

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Today's Boring Biz (# 98): Pirate Ship Party Boat Tour - $4.0M Revenue - $3.5M Cashflow - $2.9M Ask Price - 0.8x Multiple - Baja California (Mexico) Note: We do not represent this deal, highlighting for informational purposes only for viewers What does the company do? 1. Pirate ship party tours 2. Themed entertainment experiences 3. Alcohol + merchandise sales Investment highlights 1. Exclusive liquor license to sell off dock 2. Equipment: 2x large ships + 1x speed boat 3. Seller ran similar business 1990 - 2013, longtime operator Investment risks/concerns 1. Owner dependency risk 2. Vulnerability to Mexico tourism laws 3. Owner health issues/ fire sale #SMB #ETA #finance #Cashflow #investing #search #searchfund #privateequity #microprivateequity #smallbusiness #venturecapital #vc #entrepreneur #business #businessowner #pirate #ship #party #boat #mexico Disclaimer: Hypothetical and illustrative only. Please do your own research (DYOR) or work with tax and legal professionals before making a decision. This video are intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or tax advice, nor should be construed as an offer to sell, a solicitation of an offer to buy, or a recommendation for any security by SMB PE LLC or any third party.

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What makes a good firm different from a great firm? Domain expertise. Take Champion Venture Partners (clearly I’m biased) for example. We all played at the highest levels of athletics, have invested in sport, and have ran/know THE BUSINESS of sport. Having that knowledge can get us into rooms with the top 1 percent of deal flow, produce high growth in our investments, and allows us to put our expertise to work to control the outcome. Protect the capital, control the process, control the outcome. That domain expertise is what makes us great. When looking at any firm… this will help you sort out who is great.

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Make sure that you're hitting up the VC's for the right amount or else they are going to decline and laugh at you. If VC A is an A round focused firm, asking for $250k isn't going to fly. If VC B is a pre-seed round and you're asking for $10k, they aren't going to take you seriously. If VC C is a seed round firm, they aren't going to take you seriously if you're only offering 5% equity. Know the rules before you play the game!

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What is cap table debt & how does it hurt startup founders? Cap tables need to reflect all current and potential shareholders (which includes investors who signed a SAFE or convertible note). Because of the complexity of vesting schedules, repurchase rights, options vs. shares, the variable nature of ownership calculations with convertible instruments, etc., the simple spreadsheets used by most founders are woefully inadequate. We dive deep into the topic of cap table debt and show why founders need to stop using spreadsheets to track your startup cap table in our webinar on "Best Practices with Founder Equity and Cap Tables". You can watch a replay of this webinar here: https://lnkd.in/giHWZkWS

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A lot of investors have been asking me what the major industries are in the Venture Miami Built in Miami Startup Program. Here's the industry breakdown across 214 new South Florida startups. TLDR: The South Florida startups are pretty diverse across industries. Here's the largest categories in order: - 16.2% AI & Machine Learning - 14.2% EdTech - 12.2% Healthcare - 8.5% Marketing & Sales Tech - 8.1% FinTech - 7.4% Sustainability - 6.1% Travel & Hospitality - 6.1% E-Commerce The smallest category: Cybersecurity at 1.2% There's an additional 50 startups that didn't complete the survey in time but we'll get that info updated by Demo Day June 20th. #BuiltinMiami

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We are excited to share our progress in our turnaround at BODi (NYSE: BODi). We just reported our Q1 2024 financial results with: ·      Our first Free Cash Flow positive quarter since going public in 2021 ·      Our first sequential revenue growth in 2 years ·      First consecutive positive Adjusted EBITDA since going public   Our liquidity position improved by $10 million from Q4 2023 to Q1 2024. While our turnaround plan is still in the execution stage, we all have to acknowledge that after 9 months into the plan, this is incredible progress!    @Carl Daikeler, @Marc Suidan and I will be hosting the conference call will also be available to interested parties through a live and recorded webcast at https://lnkd.in/gHs8TXXj.   Q1 2024 Earnings Release: https://lnkd.in/gpfTdkKq       #Shareholdervaluecreation #DigitalFitness #DigitalHealth

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Southeast VC Update: Q2 2024 PitchBook Venture Monitor Highlights The Southeast continues to hold its position in the VC regional landscape #5 in dollars raised for Q2 2024 🥉 #3 in deal count (just behind the West Coast and the Mid-Atlantic) H1 2024 Southeast Breakdown:  📊 10% more deals than Northeast  📈 30% more deals than Mountain region, 20% more than South  💰 5% more dollars raised than Mountain region  💸 23.5% more dollars raised than South YoY Funding Trends:  📈 Southeast: Up 29% 📈 Mid-Atlantic: Up 136%  📉 Midwest: Down 67%  📉 New England: Down 11%  📈 West Coast: Up 59% Key Trend: While closing in on Mid-Atlantic numbers, we are seeing more deals but smaller rounds. This could indicate strong activity occurring in the seed & early-stage funding, despite the macro challenges. (Pitchbook classifies the Southeast as AL, FL, GA, KY, MS, NC, SC, TN, Puerto Rico, & Virgin Islands) #BuildInSE

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Great time on the Embracing Erosion podcast w/Devon O'Rourke! We talked about: 🚀 How to scale a company from concept to 9-figure exit 🔄 How to break away from the traditional consulting model and apply product approaches ⏩ Why it’s important to iterate quickly and often with messaging 💸📈What signals are important to pay attention to when investing in startups and much more!

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