Investor Connect Podcast

In this episode, Hall welcomes David Weaver, Partner & Chief Investment Officer at City Side Ventures. With its headquarters in Birmingham, Michigan, City Side Ventures is a venture group that manages various venture funds and represents investor syndications across the U.S. Their group is committed to being a catalyst in growing the startup ecosystem in Michigan, and in connecting Israeli early-s...

In today's show, you'll hear investor perspectives on the COVID-19 impact on the cannabis market. This is Investor Perspectives, I'm the host of Investor Connect, Hall T Martin, where we connect startups and investors for funding. It's the time of COVID-19. Cannabis is currently gaining regulatory approval across the U.S. and is gaining rapid adoption. The lockdown has declared certain sectors, in...

In today's show, you'll hear investor perspectives on the COVID-19 impact on the cannabis market. This is Investor Perspectives, I'm the host of Investor Connect, Hall T Martin, where we connect startups and investors for funding. It's the time of COVID-19. Cannabis is currently gaining regulatory approval across the U.S. and is gaining rapid adoption. The lockdown has declared certain sectors, in...

In today's show, you'll hear investor perspectives on the COVID-19 impact on the cannabis market. This is Investor Perspectives, I'm the host of Investor Connect, Hall T Martin, where we connect startups and investors for funding. It's the time of COVID-19. Cannabis is currently gaining regulatory approval across the U.S. The lockdown has declared certain sectors, including cannabis, to be an esse...

In this episode, Hall welcomes Spencer Graff, Co-founder and CEO of NFuzed. With its headquarters in Boulder, Colorado, NFuzed is a cannabis manufacturer with licenses in Colorado and California specializing in value and innovative products. In the first ten months of production, NFuzed has grown to over $1.7M in total revenue, $300K in March 2020 alone, with products available in over 260 dispens...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. After funding, you need to keep your family and friends investors informed on the status of the startup. Consider the following: Be transparent about the results and share both bad news as well as good news. Stick to facts about the current state of the business and not just forecas...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In raising funds from family and friends, you could take it in the form of a gift. Most family and friends want to help you out rather than make a return. A gift is an ideal way of taking the funds without going through valuations, loans, and other funding mechanics. The tax laws al...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. The elevator pitch is the short-form version of your presentation for investor opportunities that give you a limited amount of time. The key to an elevator pitch is not to talk faster, but rather to choose your words more carefully. In sixty seconds you can cover the same number of...

In this episode, Hall welcomes Smoke Wallin, CEO of Vertical Wellness. Vertical Wellness is a leading, vertically integrated, consumer-focused health and wellness brand company with innovative hemp cannabinoid solutions. Their mission is to help people by bringing the most innovative and effective portfolio of cannabinoid (CBD and others) brands to the market. Initial VWEL brands include Kathy Ire...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In your pitch deck, the tenth slide is the Value Proposition slide. The Value Proposition slide shows what value your product/service brings to the customer. It should answer the question, 'what benefits does it offer' and 'why customers will choose you over competitors'. If you hav...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In your pitch deck, the fifth slide is the monetization slide. It answers the question on how you make money. Show the business model you are using such as recurring revenue, transaction fees, or other. Highlight recurring or repeat revenue where used in your business. Show the aver...

In this episode, Hall welcomes Stephen Rice, President and CEO of Upskill Enterprise. Located in Belfast, United Kingdom, Upskill Enterprise helps companies overcome the inertia of traditional HR processes with TalentSensus, an online, intuitive and multidimensional talent management tool for visualizing current and future skills beyond the conventional organizational chart. Stephen is a pioneer a...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In launching your startup you must consider your intellectual property strategy. Intellectual property or IP includes patents, trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. You should trademark your company name. For your technology, you can either file patents or keep it as a trade se...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In raising equity funding, you can only raise from investors who are accredited. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) establishes the criteria for those who are accredited. You can see the specific requirements on the SEC website. Just search online for 'sec accredited inves...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In launching your startup you must consider employment law. You should check to see what contracts your prospective employee may have signed with a former employer around non-competes, non-solicitation agreements, and assignment of inventions. A non-compete means the employee cannot...

In this episode, Hall welcomes back Jake Moilanen, Austin General Partner at Seraph Group. Located in Austin, Texas, Seraph Group brings together successful individuals who share a passion for investing in technology startups. Opportunists join Seraph for a managed and curated portfolio of 20+ companies, for the ability to co-invest on a deal-by-deal basis, and for the opportunity to work with ent...

In today's show you'll hear investor perspectives on the COVID-19 impact on the cannabis market. This is Investor Perspectives, I'm the host of Investor Connect, Hall T Martin, where we connect startups and investors for funding. It's the time of COVID-19, cannabis is currently gaining regulatory approval across the U.S. The lockdown has declared certain sectors, including cannabis, to be an essen...

In this episode, Hall welcomes back Mark Peter Davis, Founder and Managing Partner of Interplay. Interplay co-founds, incubates and invests in companies. The firm is sector, geo and stage agnostic focusing on disrupting industries through the use of technology and design. Interplay is located in New York City with offices across the U.S., the Philippines and South America. Mark is a venture capita...

In this episode, Hall welcomes back Graham Forman, Managing Director and Founder of Edovate Capital. Edovate Capital is a seed and early-stage venture capital company investing in early-stage companies that are innovating in K12 education. They look for outstanding people to partner with for the long term who have products or services that will transform education. Graham spent his career in educa...

In this episode, Hall welcomes back Eric Bielke, Investment Director at GE Ventures. GE Ventures is committed to identifying, scaling and accelerating ideas that will make the world work better. Focused on the areas of software and analytics, advanced manufacturing, energy and healthcare, GE Ventures helps entrepreneurs and start-ups succeed by providing access to GE's technical expertise, capital...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. In launching your startup you must have a legal entity to raise funding. Start with an LLC or Limited Liability Company. This can be filed with your Secretary of State at your state government. The cost is low and it will serve well for the early days of the business. For family and...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. All startups need to have a legal entity. Before you launch your fundraise make sure you have a legal entity filed as you'll need it for accepting investment funds. Start with an LLC which is a Limited Liability Corporation. It's low-cost and easy to file with your Secretary of Stat...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. If you want to raise venture capital funding, then check these points to see if you are venture fundable: Do you have the following: Recurring revenue - Do you have recurring revenue in your model? Platform-based approach - Are you taking a platform-based approach to the product/ser...

Hello, this is Hall T. Martin with the Startup Funding Espresso -- your daily shot of startup funding and investing. Raising funding requires document and business preparation as well as pitching and extensive followup. Throughout the process there's one thing you need to do before you can raise the funding. You need to build a relationship with the investor. If you are raising funding through a c...

This is Investor Perspectives, I'm the host of Investor Connect, Hall T Martin, where we connect startups and investors for funding. In today's show, you'll hear investor perspectives on the COVID-19 impact on the cannabis market. It's the time of COVID-19. Cannabis is currently gaining regulatory approval across the U.S. The lockdown has declared certain sectors, including cannabis, to be an esse...