angel investing

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Episode 88-The benefits of a customer and patient centric approach in women's health care innovation with Kerry Rupp of True Wealth Ventures

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Terri talks with Kerry Rupp of True Wealth Ventures about how True Wealth Ventures views women’s health, the opportunities and challenges in the space, and how innovators need to have a more customer-centric approach earlier in the innovation cycle.

Who is Kerry Rupp?

 

Kerry Rupp is General Partner at True Wealth Ventures, an early-stage VC fund investing in women-led businesses in consumer health and sustainability. She teaches for the NSF I-Corps program, mentors startups, and consults on innovation and strategy. Kerry was previously CEO at DreamIt, a Top Ten US startup accelerator and VC fund. She founded Holiday Golightly, a group travel service for women.  Kerry holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA from Duke.
 

Show Highlights

·      Kerry shares why women’s health is interesting to her from an innovation and a funding perspective, her path into venture capital, and what True Wealth Ventures is all about

·      Kerry talks about True Wealth Venture’s focus on the broad definition of women’s health and how little research and emphasis has been on women and women’s bodies and brains

·      Kerry and Terri share the view that awareness, research and innovation in women’s health are critical right now

·      Kerry shares what she is excited about in women’s health and both Terri and Kerry talk about the difficulty in choosing the ones to invest in

·      Terri and Kerry talk about the gap between the startup innovation and the healthcare providers and how to bridge the gap

·      Kerry shares how to connect with her and Sara at True Wealth Ventures if you have a startup within their investment thesis

 

Terri’s Key Takeaway

We need to be doing more to bring together the healthcare providers and healthcare innovators earlier in the process. 

 

References in the Podcast

·      DreamIt Ventures:  https://www.dreamit.com

·      True Wealth Ventures: https://truewealthvc.com/

·      Sara Brand: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saratbrand/

·      Lisa Health:  https://www.lisahealth.com/

·      Genneve:  https://genneve.com/

·      Mighty Menopause: https://www.mighty-menopause.com/

·      Pandia: https://www.pandiahealth.com/

·      Lemonaid Health: https://www.lemonaidhealth.com/

·      Braincheck:  https://braincheck.com/

·      Katie McMillan:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/katie-donohue-mcmillan-mph/

·      Springboard: https://sb.co/

 

Contact

Kerry can be reached through LinkedIn  www.linkedin.com/in/kerryrupp or her website www.kerryrupp.com.   

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead. 

Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com.

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife.

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Episode 77-Bringing groups of women together to introduce them to angel investing and funding female-led startups with lynn-ann gries

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Bringing groups of women together to introduce them to angel investing and funding female-led startups with Lynn-Ann Gries

Who is Lynn-Ann Gries?  

 

Lynn-Ann Gries has spent her career in the financial arena. From investment banking to venture capital she has experience working with a wide range of companies, from start-ups to those in the Fortune 1000. 

 

She began her career in the mid-80s working for two investment banking firms in New York, Smith Barney and Morgan Stanley. When marriage brought her to the Midwest she began working for the regional firm McDonald and Company, now part of KeyBank. At McDonald she was primarily responsible for helping companies access capital through the public equity markets, but also assisted 

companies in the processes of raising growth capital or transitioning ownership through sales or mergers. 

In 2001 she began working in venture capital, managing a small venture development fund with a mission to invest in tech-based start-ups. Over the course of 12 years she and her team invested $30M in 80 companies, all located in Northeast Ohio, including CoverMyMeds (sold to McKesson for $1.1 billion), CardioInsight (sold to Medtronic for $90 million), Wireless Environment (recently sold to Ring for an undisclosed amount) and OnShift, one of the Northeast Ohio region’s premier software companies.  

As of July 2018, she is the newly hired Managing Partner of the First Check Fund, the newest in a family of 15+ funds managed by Alumni Ventures Group. She also runs her own consulting firm providing a variety of business services including management of a women’s angel network, financial analysis, market research, and advisory services to entrepreneurs seeking capital. She currently serves on the boards of the Smith College Club of Cleveland, Summer on the Cuyahoga and In Counsel with Women.  

Lynn-Ann received her MBA from New York University (Stern School of Business) and holds a Bachelor of Arts from Smith College where she majored in Economics. She is mom to two grown children and resides in Shaker Heights with her husband, a sixth generation Clevelander, high school lacrosse coach and devoted Cleveland sports fan who has successfully managed to turn a Jersey into a Cleveland Indians superfan.  

Show Highlights 

  • Lynn-Ann shared her background starting in New Jersey and ultimately in Cleveland, OH including her time investment banking and early stage investing in the Midwest.  Lynn-Ann goes into detail on economic redevelopment in Ohio and her work with Jumpstart and the Ohio Third Frontier Program.      

  • Lynn-Ann talks about how she used to think that women didn’t need any preferential treatment to get funding until she saw the data.  This prompted her to share a female founder deal with her successful female friends that led to syndicating her first deal.   Her goal was to get the women she knew in her community with big jobs, at big corporations, where there is no intersection with an entrepreneur, to bring them together with the female led startups looking for capital.   

  • Terri and Lynn-Ann talk about the importance of getting more women to invest and the difference in risk tolerance between men and women and how this affects investing by women.  

  • Terri and Lynn-Ann discuss doing the work for free to support the female founder and female investor ecosystem and investigating options to monetize the time spent building it.   

  • Lynn-Ann talks about the women starting very small funds to build track record to be able to raise bigger funds at a later date.   

  • If Lynn-Ann could wave a magic wand, she would make universal healthcare coverage a reality.    

Terri’s Key Takeaway 

We need to continue to build the connections between investors interested in female-led startups to make it easier for them to get access to capital.   

References in the Podcast 

 

 

Contact 

Lynn-Ann can be reached through LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/lynn-ann-gries-44440/ 

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead.  

Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com. 

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife. 

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Episode 72 - How to improve funding for women entrepreneurs as an angel investor

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Terri talks to Nancy Hayes about how she operates as an angel investor, her advisory style, and why she is focused on female led businesses.

Who is Nancy Hayes?


Nancy Hayes is an active angel investor focused on women-led companies. She has invested in 22 companies and serves as advisor to entrepreneurs and as a management consultant and coach to executives in for-profit and nonprofit corporations.

Nancy left the IBM Corporation, where she was a senior executive, to become CEO of the STARBRIGHT Foundation, an innovative nonprofit organization that used technology and media to help seriously ill children and subsequently was President and CEO of WISE Senior Services, a social services agency which served frail elderly and disabled adults.

Nancy was named Dean of the College of Business at San Francisco State University in 2005 and after six years in that role, was CFO and Chief Administrative Officer of the university for 2 years.

In 2013, Nancy cofounded MoolaHoop, a rewards-based crowdfunding site for women with small businesses.

She was Managing Director of the Silicon Valley chapter of Golden Seeds, a national angel group that invests in women-led companies, for over 3 years.

Nancy has an MBA with a concentration in Finance from the University of Chicago and resides in San Francisco.

Show Highlights

  • Nancy shares her journey into angel investing after helping women with small businesses and seeing the funding challenges.

  • Nancy talks about various financing options available including revenue-based financing and the statistics around the number of companies started each day.

  • Angels join groups to minimize risk.

  • Terri and Nancy talk about the ways in which women can (and should) become active angel investors. Spoiler: just jump in and do it.

  • Nancy talks about her value in advising startups and her favorite investments.

  • Nancy would wave a magic wand to get advice and mentorship to more female founders earlier.


Terri’s Key Takeaway

As women, we think we need to take one more class or get one more degree but with angel investing, we just need to get started.


References in the Podcast


Contact

Nancy can be reached by email at nancy@nkhgroup.com, via Twitter at @nancyhayes and through LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/nancyhayes2.

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead. 

Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com.

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife.

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Episode 71- An unusual and circuitous path to becoming an angel investor with Alicia Castillo Holley

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Terri talks to Alicia Castillo about her circuitous path into angel investing that started in a rural town in Venezuela that has landed her in Silicon Valley and how her global experience has made her realize how important it is for us to acknowledge that we, as people, are more similar than we are different.

Who is Alicia Castillo?


Alicia Castillo Holley is an international expert in creating wealth and is passionate about prosperity, innovation, and entrepreneurship. She is an active angel investor and the creator of the 10-week online program called Women Get Funded.

Alicia’s career started as a young scientist and professor on Agronomy before becoming involved in product development for a Bayer-Shell joint venture and eventually turning into an entrepreneur and angel investor.

As an entrepreneur, she has started nine companies -successfully exiting from five of them- and two non-for-profit. She played a pivotal role in the development of the entrepreneurial curriculum and the Venture Capital industry in Chile, where she lived between 1996 and 2002. She has also consulted, mentored, or coached hundreds of entrepreneurs worldwide, is a prolific author and speaker, and pushes academic institutions to reinvent business education.

Philanthropically, she supports organizations that foster education, social entrepreneurship and prevent and turn domestic violence into harmony. A global trotter, she has visited over 100 countries, and has lived in Venezuela, Chile, Australia, Denmark, Switzerland, and the US and currently resides in Menlo Park.

Show Highlights

  • Alicia shares her journey into angel investing. Her journey started in a socialist household in a rural town in Venezuela and took her to all parts of the world.

  • Terri and Alicia talk about bias and chemistry in decision making.

  • Alicia talks about how she operates as an angel investor, what areas she focuses on and the characteristics of the founders she looks to back.

  • Alicia talks about her 10-week, online program called Women Get Funded to educate women on how to get their companies funded.

  • If Alicia could wave a magic wand to change something in the world, she would change war. She would get people to realize that we are more similar than different.

  • Alicia’s favorite founder resources include two of her books How to Fund Your Million Dollar Idea, The Ten Unwealthy Habits and Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki.


Terri’s Key Takeaway

It’s important to build channels of trust regardless of gender.


References in the Podcast



Contact

Alicia can be reached on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/aliciacastilloholley/ or through her website http://www.aliciacastilloholley.com/.

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead. 

Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com.

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife.

Episode 46 - Recap of the week in Angel Investing and syndicating a deal on Angellist

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Terri continues with her series on angel investing with a recap of her activities over the last week including her regular, weekly startup advising, her first syndicated deal, what a syndicate is, and the convergence of her work in life sciences and her investing.

Show Highlights

  • Terri recaps why she is doing this series of podcasts:  create a mesh network of like-minded investors to invest in the startups and founders who aren’t necessarily getting the attention from mainstream angel and venture investors despite having very promising and investable startups.
  • Terri talks in greater detail about syndicating her first deal on AngelList and what a syndicate is
  • Terri shares details about her regular advisory meetings, various meetings with startup founders and investors, and how her life in life sciences is converging with her angel investing 

 

Call to Action

Subscribe to one podcast or one newsletter and get into the groove of listening and reading.  Feel free to reach out to Terri if you have any questions or comments or other suggestions for resources for new angel investors.  PilotingYourLife@gmail.com

 

References in the Podcast

  • The Guild: https://theguilded.org/guild/home/index.html#/
  • Quinn Style: https://www.quinnstyle.com/
  • Tech Futures Group: www.techfuturesgroup.org
  • AngelList: https://angel.co/
  • Sendaride:  https://sendaride.com/
  • Bolt: https://bolt.io/

Contact

You can follow Terri on Twitter at @terrihansonmead or go to her website at www.terrihansonmead.com or on Medium:  https://medium.com/@terrihansonmead. 

Feel free to email Terri at PilotingYourLife@gmail.com.

To continue the conversation, go to Twitter at @PilotingLife and use hashtag #PilotingYourLife.