Reshma Sohoni, co-founder & Partner - Seedcamp
@rsohoni
European Entrepreneurship & Innovation (ME421)
Stanford Engineering School
March 5 2012
About Me
• Born in India
• Grew up, studied and worked in the US in business and tech (M&A and incubator 1.0)
• Moved to Europe for MBA, worked in Corporate, back to VC for 6 mos, started Seedcamp
So – what is Seedcamp?
Seedcamp – catalyzing Europe!
• The #1 European startup accelerator – Funded (unique) by the VCs and Angels across Europe
– 1.500 mentors active annually
– 200 companies mentored annually (500+ total)
– 20 investments made annually
– 12 Events across EMEA/US annually (40+ total)
– Wide reach beyond our portfolio
• Active in all of Europe and beyond – Finland to Italy, Spain to Croatia, Canada to Brazil
– From idea stage to great products
– Awesome founders, always.
Process
Preparation Application
Mini Seedcamp Seedcamp Portfolio
Program Timeline
• Mini Seedcamp – Monthly, one major startup city in Europe
– 20 Teams, 80 Mentors from the industry
– Average of 2 Investments
• Monthly Seedcamp Days – In London, by topic, with experts from the network
• Seedcamp Week – London, September – 500 mentors, experts, speakers
– Huge Demo Day and many networking events
• Seedcamp US roadshow
Kyko
22 companies in SC 1
33 companies in SC 2
CROWD
Blossom.io
Success Stats
• Growing a great group of startups – 60 portfolio companies
– More than $45 million raised by companies
– Employing 400+ across portfolio of companies
– Several category leaders
• Basekit, Boxed Ice, EDITD, ERPLY, GrabCAD, LOOKK, Mybuilder, Ubervu, Zemanta
• Strong partners to grow further – Reach: Startup competitions
– Support: Local partners like 500startups in Valley
– Funding: Partnership with Angellist
– Access: Sponsorship & support from GOOG, MS, FB
Challenges – US as one part of
the arsenal
• Mini Seedcamp New York – Mostly European Teams, connecting with our mentor base
• Strong connections since start – Investors in SC companies, friends of Seedcamp:
• Atlas, USV, IA Ventures, 500startups, Redpoint, Matrix, many angels
– Partnerships with HQ, not European divisions
• Seedcamp US roadshow – 3 weeks of meetings – 1 week East – 4sq, NYSE, mongoDB, USV, Betaworks, ETSY
– 2 weeks West – Goog, FB, LinkedIn, Twitter, i/o, 500, etc
– Rest – Microsoft, Amazon, Qualcomm, finale at SXSW
What’s up in Europe?
Exits are birthing new angels
Big M&A:
Small M&A:
US VCs have noticed
Plink
Huge numbers of events and
hackathons Competitions
Hackathons
Training Accelerators
Several hot spots
• London is number 1 in Europe, all ingredients: – Startup successes = experienced entrepreneurs and Angels
– Tech ecosystem = talent, customers, partners, acquirers
– Diversity = Local talent, universities, creatives
– Finance ecosystem = angels, VCs, LPs, later stage finance
• Berlin is catching up and has a major cool appeal – Startup successes = the much hated copycats and others
– Ecosystem is growing = place to be in DE, but no industry
– Diversity = lots of talent, creatives, cheap labour
– Financial Ecosystem is nascent, but no place is far
Hotspots, c’td
• Paris is still very local – Strong scene, great design and creativity
– Few connections to outside, but starting to improve
• Vienna is surprisingly active in the south – Austria, Slovenia, Turkey, Italy, etc close by
• Estonia has its own Skype Mafia – 4 of 20 SC investments in the last year
– Great talent & infrastructure in Baltics (Skype, Nokia, Rovio)
Not Silicon Valley, but our own local color
Some portfolio companies
EDITD – Bloomberg for Fashion
• Big data geek & fashion designer – Large scale thinking about industry trends
– Skills and insights in place
• Fashion is changing – 8 seasons per year – move fast, adjust
faster
– Competition driven market – copy or die
– Social is driver & multiplier – understand or vanish
• Success – Great customers (brands, retailers,
designers, agencies)
– Great investors
GrabCAD – worlds biggest engineering team
• Outsourcing mechanical Engineering (CAD) – Market place for 3D designers,
mech. Eng.
• Estonian Mafia – local talent – Former Skype engineers & design
– Mechanical engineers as founding team understood issues
• Worldwide market – Starts w/ smaller projects, growing
in size
– Competitions bring PR and great coops
• Great progress and Investors – Atlas, Matrix,
– now over 40K Engineers!
Vox.io – real browser telephony
• Team of former Slovenian Telco engineers – Very relevant local experience
– In SF at the moment – hiring!
• Use social paradigms for telephone – Vox.io/albert
– Linkify, short URLS, one-time codes
– Think bit.ly for your phone
• Industry ripe for 2nd wave – Skype huge but slow
– Mobile a big item
Transferwise – p2p FX
• Very European problem (GBP, EUR, CHF)
– Transfers a daily issue between currencies
– Currency gap because of little innovation in banking
• Cut out the middle man – Virtual transfer between individuals, match
and leave
– FSA regulated = trust + access to mid market rates
• Great team with relevant background – First non-founder employee of Skype
(=currency issues)
– Fin Services advisor and experts