Toronto: Venture Finance: Friends, Family and Angels
We’ll teach you the principles for valuing an investment and how to structure, paper and close the deal. The course will also cover special issues (receiving investments from US relatives, deal “sweeteners”, RRSP eligibility). We’ll also talk you through the first 90 days after the deal is closed – how to avoid common problems in managing your investors and employees and protecting your assets. Some angels and founders will be on hand to add their views, too.
Enterprise 2.0 Mini Conference
Enterprise 2.0 Conference - Toronto
From a top manager’s perspective, this session will explore how “social media†and new collaborative models are already changing business and what lies ahead for the future. Cost to participate $29 in advance $39 at the door (includes breakfast).
The morning program will be followed by an interactive Q&A session. Afterward, feel free to stick around for a day-long series of participant-led workshops.
I am looking forward to this. The last few Enterprise unconferences in Toronto have been fantastic. Thanks to Tom for putting this all together.
Under The Radar Recap
It’s nice to be back in one place for a while, I have to admit that having only 2 days to recover from almost 2 weeks on the road, 7 timezones away, before leaving for San Francisco wasn’t much fun. I think if it was an option, I would have forgotten about the whole thing.
A trip to San Francisco is always nice though. The flight can be a tough trip, 5 1/2 hours in the air if you are going direct, longer if making a connection but when you get there, and the sun is shining, things start to turn around.
I was honored to be asked to come to Under The Radar and show off Firestoker. Being a truly “under the radar” company, it made a lot of sense. After working with customers and overseeing development day in and day out, it is nice to get to show things off in public a little more.
After seeing just how mature some of our “compeitiors” for our track were (VC funded, been around for 2 years+), I admit I was a little worried. In the end, I ended up tossing my prepared talk and went for an off-the-cuff overview of the company, with a quick demo (I would have loved more time to demo).
Things went fine, and while we didn’t steal the show, it was a great first for us. It has drawn a lot of attention to Firestoker, and it’s all been good attention.
A few notes:
* A lot of people commented on the fact that we were “missing” some features, such as wikis, document management and fine-grained security controls. What we have discovered, however, is that these process-driven “features” are bigtime distractions for our clients, who’s real interest is not in helping people get “better” at creating documents or process together, but rather to find new things, like new efficiencies, new ideas and new innovations.
* Stowe liked us the best in our track, he thinks, which is awesome. Account coming soon Stowe,. promise!
* Being a deliberately small, revenue-funded, company like ours seems to be immediately less-sexy to this crowd than over-funded feature-insanity products based in SF. I can understand that I guess.
* I thought microsoft would have much healthier food catered than sandwiches and brownies!
* I think the companies who paid for the “Graduates Circle” really overpaid at 4000$ each. If the intention was to sponsor the event and earn some goodwill, then it probably is money well spent, but if the intention is to get in from of potential customers, or even get an audience with some VCs, then UTR wasn’t a good event for that. The time slots for these companies were poor (people were switching rooms during them, etc) and people were distracted.
* You could not vote via SMS from a Canadian cellphone. Canadians were shut out of voting.
All Software Updates for your Mac in One Place
“AppFresh is an utility that keeps all applications on your Mac up to date by checking the internet for new releases and makes downloading and installing them a breeze.”
fumbles
The coolest thing from Under the Radar
“I think it was Concept Share, a system that lets designers interact with their clients on things like brochures, business cards, logos, and other designs that they need to work together on.”
LAUNCH: Highrise - (37signals)
It’s a new contact, a lead, a customer, a journalist. It’s someone saying something important you need to remember.
What do you do now? Where do you log notes from the conversation? Where do you put the contact information? Where do you set up your next action?
Stirr on Wednesday
See you there!
