Eric Alexander’s Post

How do you craft a compelling value proposition for an Australian VC as an international company? We asked top VCs to share their tips for foreign companies raising money in Australia, including Bree Kirkham of F5 Collective, Jayden Basha of Investible and Terry Hilsberg of Fork Ventures. Here are their top tips: 💸 Identify investor motivations: understand and appeal to their investment hypotheses 💸 Demonstrate customer focus: highlight how your product addresses local needs 💸 Position as a testing ground: Show your scale by positioning Australia as your launch pad into larger markets 💸 Navigate nuances: Educate investors on market nuances and tailor your pitch accordingly 💸 Understand the 5 types of value propositions that attract Australian investors to international companies Cracking the Australian VC code can be tough for a foreign founder. The good news is that local VCs are increasingly looking towards global tech. Read the full article for all the insights and strategies: https://lnkd.in/gE4pCgSg #venturecapital #investment #australiaexpansion #globaltech #vc

Where is the gold? Where is our future let alone current prosperity, wealth, sustainability? Where do we look? How do we unlock? How do we challenge our assumptions to do something more, better? It is not in Ireland. It is not in Israel. Nor Singapore. These places inform us, feed us but they don't determine us. We need to find our own path. Loved catching up with Simon Walker this morning as I heard about his 'missions of impact' and I am looking forward to joining him and this mission to find the things and the paths that will make a difference, now and into the future. As I walked back home from our coffee, I got thinking about my own framework which is focused around macro, micro & system. Macro is top down, what do I see is here, what is missing, what and where do we, should we, could we address. Micro is bottom up, what is showing evidence of working that could be scaled up to make more impact and/or what can we do to prove out a hypothesis. Micro is magical because it can change the 'world' - top down macro never does, it informs, but it does not solve. System is when you see enough micro evidence that you look to achieve scale on a 1:Many and Many to Many basis. Where is the gold for New Zealand - I know it does not exist in our large firms that are domestic economy focused, it exists in other places. Where? Right, I also know that operating experience informs so many things - so off I go back to raising capital and building out a deep-tech startup. Hey Sam Blackman we need you to join the mission when you are back in NZ.

Today I had the pleasure chatting with Phelan Murphy from SeedLegals about SEIS/EIS and UK-based investments, and it blew me away. 🤯 In the UK 🇬🇧, investors are given serious incentives to back early-stage businesses, like up to 50% tax relief and capital gains exemptions. That’s a huge win for both investors and founders as it encourages risk-taking and fuels innovation. Now let’s talk about Canada. Starting in 2024, Canadian investors will be facing higher capital gains taxes, with an increase in the inclusion rate to 66.67% on gains over $250,000. No real relief, no incentives like SEIS/EIS. In fact, Canadian investors may even be penalized for taking risks on startups, making it harder to attract early-stage capital. 👎 This makes Canada look like a pretty tough place to launch a new SaaS business. When you compare it to the UK, where the government actually incentivizes investment in innovation, it’s clear that Canada isn’t doing nearly enough to keep investors interested or startups thriving. Luckily for us at Fitag, we’ve based ourselves out of the U.S., allowing us to tap into far more favorable investment opportunities and incentives that keep our growth on track. 🇺🇸🤝 #SEIS #EIS #UKInvesting #CanadianInvestors #SaaSStartups #StartupFunding

Australia and New Zealand's young private markets wrestle tough global headwinds Australia and New Zealand’s private markets have not been immune to the challenging dealmaking climate, with investments in private equity and venture capital slowing in recent years. The exit markets in both countries have been quiet; exit value has yet to exceed the annual amount invested in PE or VC in any year, according to PitchBook’s inaugural 2024 Australia & New Zealand Private Capital Breakdown, sponsored by J.P. Morgan. Although recent numbers have been disappointing, optimism remains for the region’s private markets, which are still in their early stages. The number of investors and amount of capital available for startups has grown significantly over the past decade, while PE dealmaking is still registering well above 2020’s levels.

Anyone else read Mario Draghi's new report (https://lnkd.in/dpfZfW55). It contains a great picture of the gap in VC funding between the US and EU, appended below (page 21). He recognizes that many EU startups move headquarters to the US as they mature. He claims that this difference is caused by his view that the "Single Market is fragmented and incomplete". I mean seriously - that's what you are going to latch on to? Ya don't think that high taxes for wealthy VCs, investors and successful entrepreneurs might be an issue? Mercifully its not all bad - he does mention - at least in passing that the high regulatory burden in Europe is bad, and points to the static nature of Europe's industrial structure.

"Rapid #VentureCapital growth. Huge potential. But a challenge in seed-stage funding. Welcome to Canada's VC landscape. Conflicting? Perhaps. Intriguing? Certainly. According to BDC's recent report, Canada's VC market is expected to swell to CA$6.2 billion by 2023, exhibiting resilience even amidst the pandemic that rattled global economies. Here's where the plot thickens. Despite this surge, securing seed-stage funding remains challenging, particularly for Canadian #startups and #tech companies. The culprit? An increasing trend of late-stage investments and dwindling early-stage investments. Per BDC's report, only 20% of overall VC investment in Canada was channeled to early-stage companies in 2020, a drop from 26% in previous years. So, what can be done to bridge this gap? 1

Cut Through Venture’s quarterly report for Aussie venture funding has been published. Some indicators showing that the Aussie ecosystem is thriving and sentiment amongst investors continues to improve #vc #australianvc #venturefunding #vcinvestment #venturecapital

Some promising signs in Cut Through Venture's latest Australian funding report: 📈 Improved investor sentiment 💰 Strongest funding quarter since Q4 2022 🤖 Most deals for AI 💲 Most capital raised in Fintech It's probably too early to say it's a trend, but it's good to see some more positive news!

Cut Through Quarterly Q2 2024 is out, and things are looking up. Except for one big problem… 💰💰Funding to Australian startups hit a six-quarter high, with the return of $100M+ mega deals pushing total funding to $1.5B. 🤖🖊️Artificial intelligence deals topped the sector deal count table for the first time after sitting on top of the list of sectors investors are most excited about for a year. 🧔🏻♂️🌲Guest contributor Airtree's Craig Blair has high hopes for the decade ahead, envisioning the ecosystem as a job and wealth creation engine for the Australian economy. 👨🏻💼🧑💼 Investor sentiment continues to improve, with 46% of investors describing the funding market as more favourable compared to last quarter. Additionally, 42% reported assessing more deals, and 30% rated the quality of deal flow as good or excellent. 👩💻🚫 The share of capital flowing to female founders plummeted to a level not seen since 2019. While deal share at the Pre-seed stage hit a high, female-led startups were noticeably absent from large later-stage funding announcements. Thank you to our supporters, HSBC, Corrs Chambers Westgarth, Vanta, GXE, and Deckmatch, for enabling us to deliver another quarterly report. Download in the comments.

Cut Through Ventures reports that in Q2 2024, the share of venture capital flowing to female founders plummeted to the lowest level since 2019. Is this an issue of supply or demand (or both)? How can we boost deal flow from female founders? 👩