how to pitch vcs on an early stage idea. presented at bases, stanford university
DESCRIPTION
Slides from a talk presented at Stanford University BASES e-Challenge Workshop by Rohit Sharma. Mohr Davidow Ventures.TRANSCRIPT
Venture Pitch 101
rohit sharma
Mohr Davidow Ventures (MDV) www.mdv.com [email protected]
e-Challenge Workshop "The Entrepreneurial Pitch"
2
today
What are (early stage) VCs looking for?
Typical pitch content | guidelines vs. rules
Design
Q / A
3
venture process
all about assessing risk & opportunity
Meeting w/ Pitch
Meeting
More Meetings w/ Pitch
Meeting w/ Pitch
4
the risk curve
Risk (ideal)
Valuation
Seed A B
iterate
time
$/risk
Risk (likely)
5
risk
Market
Technology/Product
Team
Financing
Strategy
6
the risk trajectory (hurricane tracks)
money
time
objective
7
the risk trajectory
money
time
objective
8
market risk
Size of market
Characteristics of the market
Customer development plan?
Customer behavior change ?
Cost of customer acquisition
Competitive landscape
9
technology/product risk
Technology creation
Product creation
Product 2.0?
Triangulate people time money
Other (support, maintenance, upgrades,…)
10
team risk
Current skill-set (to address market/product dev)
Required skills, people – fearless leader
– bold visionary, evangelist – grumpy ass-kicker
– customer advocate
Hiring (Geography, sources, time, effort)
Will this team raise the next round?
11
financing risk
How much $$ to subsequent financings
Financing sources, type
Does market permit (large) company creation?
12
strategy?
Is there strategy risk?
(Un)Expected behavior of competitors, companies in adjacent market spaces?
Do ‘receptors’ exist in customers?
Identify: – Early adopters?
– Risk-takers? – Market-makers?
13
the un-definables
(this is what we are *really* looking for)
14
but, that’s not how you organize *your* powerpoint
Introduction (team) Problem & Non-obvious insight Market Product development, customer development Customers: identify, acquire, retain,… (Market construction) Competition? State the plan, financial model End bits (plan? summary? insight?)
– Single most significant factoid about you or venture – Recap 5-minute drill in 1 minute
3-5 Minute drill
15
design
All design is choice (Edward Tufte)
Powerpoint is a very challenging method of effective communication (worst S/N ratio of any method?)
Can you write your ‘pitch’ in report format? In ‘Word’?
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Edward Tufte | www.tufte.com
$7
$40 $48
17
build a picture worth ten slides
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powerpoint guidelines