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1. What works in seed funding & …
Piotr Wilam
April 2015 - Wolves Summit

2. What does not work in seed funding
and how to improve it fast.

3. VC PRIMER

4. Build $1B company
Grow your sales to $100m annually
wait, but why?

5. VCs to entrepreneurs
➡ find something scalable($100m revenue potential)
with competitive advantage and grow sales faster
than anybody else.
➡ you will get money to grow(Round A, B, ...), you will
attract the best people, you will generate returns
From: @ VCs
To: @ Entrepreneurs

6. Alternative path is difficult
➡ limited potential to attract talent
➡ limited resources to scale sales
➡ limited success

7. My thesis is that both are necessary
Have traction and a scalable product
Have a view on the financing roadmap of your company
+
How to approach VCs

8. US EUROPE POLAND
S E E D F U N D I N G

9. 3 stages
Pre-seed Money
Seed Money
Round A
Money
prototype
in search of
scalable sales
growing sales
sometimes first sales
This lecture is
about seed stage!
VALUATION
T I M E

10. * There is a boom market.
Changes in the US*
EUROPE POLANDUS
➡ YC gets bigger
➡ Accelerators are abundant
➡ AL expands
➡ Kickstarter expands
➡ VCs go down
➡ micro VCs flourish
➡ angels grow in numbers
➡ There are 100s of seed investors

11. Changes in Europe*
EUROPE POLANDUS
➡ hubs are growing
➡ there are at most 10s of active
seed investors for a given hub
* There is a boom but the market is much smaller.
➡ pan-European investments grow as
well
➡ there are 10s of active pan-European
investors

12. Changes in Poland*
EUROPE POLANDUS
➡ a substantial US interest
among entrepreneurs
➡ few value add early stage
investors
* The market is getting more professional.
➡ interest from Europe
➡ public seed, pre-seed, KFK
funding

13. Conclusions
The number of financing
options grow as you move
Investors from
a local center
Investors from
Europe
Investors in
the US
*The European investment market is at its beginning.

14. Conclusions
Investors in
a local center
Investors in
Europe
Investors in
the US
market hardly
exists
market at
the begining
ripe market with 100s
of investment options

15. What to do?

16. PLAN YOUR GROWTH

17. Enter the path to build $1B company
and grow your sales to $100m annually
Prerequisite

18. Plan your financial roadmap
* There is a boom market.
You will need Round A
locally in Europe in the US

19. Plan your financial
roadmap
You will need Round A
locally
in Europe in the US

20. Step 1
➡ think about geography
➡ make a research of your future
Round A investors.
➡ make a list of 10-20 investors.
➡ see who they invest in and what
are the requirements
➡ make research of seed investors
your round A investors like
➡ make a list of 20-40 seed
investors.
➡ make an effort, meet a couple of
them, listen to feedback and
iterate.
Step 2

21. CONCLUSIONS

22. What does not work
in seed funding?
The seed investment market in
Europe is at its beginning.
How to improve it fast?
Entrepreneurs and investors
have to treat it as a market.

23. Entrepreneurs
Do not hunt in the dark
Have a financial roadmap and treat fundraising as entering
an investment market.

24. Investors for you
★ Understand investors and their offer
★ Have a list of top 20-40 investors that fit to your startup
★ Package what you have as a product for investors
★ Iterate your product: meet, learn and improve
Product for investor
Interactions with investors
★ Increase number of interactions with investors

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