|
|
|
|
|
Question: What Makes a Good Pitch Deck?
|
|
By Marc Vartabedian, WSJ Pro
|
|
|
|
|
Good day. Last week we asked how investors know which portfolio companies they encourage to grow versus those they want to cut costs.
-
Florian Leibert, general partner at 468 Capital: “Companies with runway of more than approximately 18 months and low product market fit should stay disciplined, continue to develop the product and find [product market fit] before slowly starting to build an efficient go-to-market motion. Companies that have found PMF but have less than approximately 18 months of runway should either focus on reaching profitability or raise additional capital in order to accelerate.”
-
Charlie O'Donnell, partner at Brooklyn Bridge Ventures: “If you know that a dollar out comes back as two dollars in net of your costs, and does so within a reasonable amount of time given your cash in the bank, then yes, you can grow your way through a downturn.”
-
Justin Overdorff, partner at Lightspeed Venture Partners, cautions startups to not move to a multiproduct approach until they have reached scale or have strong product market fit with their original offerings.
-
Jeremy Jonker, managing partner of Infinity Ventures, warns that in the current economic environment, startups that are pitching the promise of revenue optimization may have a more difficult time generating revenue and thus should focus on cost-cutting in the near term.
This week’s question: What makes a good pitch deck in today’s fundraising environment? Which pitch deck slides are investors paying attention to versus skipping over?
Please email responses to marc.vartabedian@wsj.com.
And now on to the news...
|
|
|
|
|
|
Cryptocurrency platforms such as Tornado Cash are increasingly run by computer code distributed across computers worldwide. PHOTO: LUKE MACGREGOR/BLOOMBERG NEWS
|
|
|
|
Crypto regulation. The U.S. sanctioning of a prominent cryptocurrency platform this week exposed technical gaps in the government’s ability to prevent criminals, national adversaries and extremist groups from using the services to launder money and finance their operations, analysts said, The Wall Street Journal reports.
-
Among the central challenges: Cryptocurrency platforms are increasingly run by computer code distributed across computers around the world, rather than by individuals facilitating transactions, analysts said.
-
The Treasury Department on Monday imposed sanctions against Tornado Cash, a popular cryptocurrency platform known as a mixer because it blends funds from different users and redistributes them, obscuring their origin. The Treasury Department accused Tornado Cash of laundering billions of dollars in virtual currency, including $455 million allegedly stolen by North Korean hackers. As part of the penalties, officials blocked all property held by the exchange under U.S. jurisdiction and barred U.S. companies and individuals from transacting with it.
|
|
|
Minnesota’s Perry Reflects on Markets and Investing in Last Lap as CIO
|
|
Mansco Perry, who has led the Minnesota State Board of Investment—the state agency that manages public pension and trust assets—for the past nine years or so as chief investment officer and executive director, plans to retire by early fall. Under his stewardship, the pension fund’s assets under management grew from $68 billion in 2013 to $131.4 billion at the end of March. Mr. Perry, however, declines to take all the credit for the investment performance during his tenure. “I don’t want to say I had this great idea,” Mr. Perry said. “I had some good help.” In a recent interview with WSJ Pro Private Equity, Mr. Perry reflected on his career, which included earlier stints with the Minnesota board and as CIO
at Macalester College and the Maryland State Retirement Agency, and his plans for the future.
|
|
Crypto’s Collapse Deals New Challenge for Regulators in Singapore
|
|
Two years ago, Singapore opened its doors to cryptocurrency firms. Now, after the implosions of several digital currencies and players rooted in the city-state, regulators are trying to distance themselves from the blowups while they grapple with how to rein in the industry, WSJ reports. Crypto brokers, lenders, exchanges and blockchain companies flocked to the Southeast Asian financial hub after it enacted a regulatory framework for payment services in early 2020. Close to 200 firms applied for licenses to provide digital-payment-token services, according to the Monetary Authority of Singapore, the country’s central bank and top financial regulator.
|
|
|
|
|
People
San Francisco-based Piva Capital said Daniel Ketyer joined the firm as an investor. He was previously at Deloitte and Kohlberg & Co.
CoVenture appointed Naved Sheikh as general counsel. He was previously an executive director at Morgan Stanley.
NextRNA Therapeutics, which is utilizing noncoding RNAs to develop novel therapeutics, promoted Dominique Verhelle to the post of chief executive. Before co-founding the company, she was at Takeda Pharmaceutical Co., Third Rock Ventures and Pfizer. Boston-based NextRNA counts Cobro Ventures, Lightchain Capital, Evans Capital and Rivas Capital as investors.
Corvus Insurance promoted Madhu Tadikonda to chief executive. Prior to joining the company as president one year ago, Mr. Tadikonda was global chief underwriting officer at AIG. Boston-based Corvus is backed by investors including Insight Partners, Bain Capital Ventures, .406 Ventures, Telstra Ventures, Obvious Ventures and MTech Capital.
Exits
Threat protection and content filtering provider DNSFilter acquired data privacy tools developer Guardian for an undisclosed amount. Washington, D.C.-based DNSFilter is backed by Insight Partners, Arthur Ventures and Inner Loop Capital.
Hiring technology provider Harver BV purchased pymetrics, a provider of soft skills assessments, for an undisclosed sum. General Atlantic, Salesforce Ventures, Workday Ventures, Khosla Ventures and Jazz Venture Partners previously invested in pymetrics.
Signal AI, a platform helping companies understand external risks and opportunities, acquired KELP Inc., a provider of healthcare and defense reputation insights. Terms weren’t disclosed. In December, Signal AI said it raised a $50 million Series D round from Highland Europe, Redline Capital Management, GMG Ventures, MMC Ventures and others.
|
|
|
|
CleverTap, a Mountain View, Calif.-based customer engagement and retention platform, secured $105 million in Series D funding. CDPQ led the round, which included participation from IIFL AMC’s Tech Fund, Tiger Global Management and Sequoia Capital India.
Boulevard, a Los Angeles-based client-experience platform for self-care businesses, raised $70 million in Series C funding. Lead investor Point72 Private Investments was joined by Toba Capital, Index Ventures, Bonfire Ventures, BoxGroup and VMG Partners in the round. Eddie Kang, who leads growth-stage investment activities for Point72 Private Investments, will join the Boulevard board.
Betr, a Miami-based sports betting startup, picked up $50 million in Series A funding from Florida Funders, 8VC, Aliya Capital Partners, Fuel Venture Capital, FinSight Ventures, 305 Ventures, Elizabeth Street Ventures, Riverside Ventures, Gaingels, Moving Capital, Elysium Venture Capital, FJ Labs, Tampa Bay Ventures and several others.
Injective, a New York-based smart contracts platform optimized for decentralized finance applications, landed a $40 million investment. Jump Crypto led the round, which included additional support from BH Digital.
Nightfall AI, a San Francisco-based cloud data-loss-prevention startup, closed a $40 million Series B round. WestBridge Capital led the investment, with Managing Partner Sumir Chadha joining the board. Additional investors including Next Play Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Venrock and Pear VC also participated in the funding.
Superblocks, a New York-based platform enabling developers to quickly build custom internal tools, snagged a $37 million investment led by Kleiner Perkins, Greenoaks Capital Partners, Spark and Meritech.
Central Payments, a Dell Rapids, S.D.-based provider of payments technology and issuing services for fintech and embedded finance businesses, completed a $30 million growth equity investment. Led by Castle Creek Capital, the round included participation from Launchpad Capital.
Finix, a San Francisco-based payments technology company for software platforms, nabbed $30 million in new funding from investors including The General Partnership, Franklin Templeton, American Express Ventures, Acrew Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Cap Table Coalition, Homebrew, Insight Partners, Inspired Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Precursor Ventures and PSP Growth.
Levita Magnetics, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based robotic surgery startup, raised $26 million in Series C financing from investors including MedTex Ventures, Invermaster and Carao Ventures.
FundamentalVR, a medical simulation platform with offices in Boston and London, secured a $20 million Series B investment. EQT Life Sciences led the round, which included contributions from Downing Ventures and Tern.
Merkle Science, a predictive crypto risk and intelligence platform, added more than $19 million in Series A funding. Co-lead investors BECO Capital, Darrow Holdings and K3 Ventures were joined by Uncorrelated Ventures, Republic Crypto, Kraken Ventures and several others in the new financing.
Jiminny, a U.K.-headquartered provider of conversation intelligence to sales teams, completed a $16.5 million Series A round led by Kennet Partners.
|
|
|
|
|
The Securities and Exchange Commission has contacted Melvin Capital investors in recent months as part of its probe into the hedge fund. PHOTO: ANDREW KELLY/REUTERS
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
-
Urban Innovation Fund raises $121 million to up ante on urban tech (Government Technology)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|