The Tech City Beat…
Our event at Google Campus last night was a big hit. A packed audience came to hear advice on how entrepreneurs can attract investment and the media to their start-up. According to Google campus, the event was among the biggest they had ever hosted, and the attendees were passionately engaged, asking many questions about funding and angel investment
The potential of tech city is nothing short of extraordinary. However the financial world and tech world- although working ½ a mile away from each other- seldom cross paths. Not only is it hard for the two worlds to meet, when the two world’s do come together, it’s very hard for start-ups to get early stage investment to reach its potential.
Fortunately there are people around to help bridge that gap- and were happy to have three of them joining our panel last night.
Oscar Jazdowski head of Origination for Silicon Valley Bank’s UK office, talked about the types of businesses that banks lend to and offered a crucial tip to entrepreneurs: when you first meet an investor don’t ask them for money. Tell them your story instead – they will pay more attention to you. Oscar knows a thing or two about start-ups, having spent 25 years helping to finance technology companies at all stages and on both sides of the Atlantic.
Steve Karmeinsky offered tips on how start-ups can perfect their pitch infront of angels and investors. He is the founder of City Meets Tech, an initiative that gets London’s banking community in front of start-ups so that they can invest in them. His big advise- keep your slides to a mimimum, have a clearly defined business model and don’t use technical jargon. Steve is currently try launch a new start-up fund for start-ups
Finally, Jane ni Dhulchaointigh, the inventor and CEO of Sugru, a company that produces a play doh super-glue product that is used to fix and modify things. She shared her startup success story with the audience, explaining how she raised funding for her company and encouraged the audience to continue to push for investment and to engage with key influencers and share passion for a company brand.
Citigate kicked off the panel discussion by offering tips on how entrepreneurs can attract media attention to their startup. Citigate shared various tips such as defining your business model and core messaging before pitching to journalists, identifying key influencers by following competitor news, issue hijacking the latest news and writing a blog about it, and being creative with engagements – send samples of products/ video demos/ – anything that grabs attention of journalist.
Thank you to Citigate’s social media and digital team for helping to spread the word online and for TechHub’s support during the event. Finally, a very big thank you to Bloomberg TV for doing a story with the panelists about the issue of start-up funding in the UK.