VC10X - Venture Capital Podcast

Musician turned Venture Capitalist | Drew Leahy, Managing Partner, Hawke Ventures

Drew is the Managing Partner of Hawke Ventures Funds 1 & 2, where he operates the venture firm through fundraising, diligence, and operating investments. Drew is a data-driven, product-focused entrepreneur and VC. Driven and motivated by the thousands of softwares that power brands, He has extensive experience in consumer mobile & web, b2b SaaS, social media, video, apparel, and entertainment verticals.

Increasing Financial Inclusiveness Across the World w/ Liza Curcio-Rudy, Associate, Accion Venture labs

Liza Curcio-Rudy is a Portfolio and Investments Associate for Accion Venture Lab. Liza supports and leads investments in early-stage fintech companies, guides our portfolio companies through strategic projects and engagement activities, and supports additional fund initiatives around gender lens investing and LP engagement. She is also responsible for the assessment of new investment opportunities and the development of investment theses, particularly in the US market.

How to get your startup funded by the government? w/ Matthew Weinberg, Partner Max Ventures

Matthew (Matt) Weinberg is a Partner at Max Ventures, an early-stage venture capital fund based in New York City that primarily invests in digital commerce and digital healthcare startups across the United States and Europe. Prior to his current role, he was a White House appointee in the U.S. Small Business Administration and served as Senior Advisor in the Office of Investment and Innovation. He helped drive federal programs that directed over $6 billion in capital to investment funds, early-stage technology companies, and accelerators and incubators across the country.

Investing in Exceptional Founders Before Everyone Else w/ Brett Martin, MD, Charge Ventures

Brett Martin is the Managing Partner of Charge Ventures. Charge is a NYC-based pre-seed/seed stage venture fund. They invest 200-500k at the earliest stages of company formation and then help founders take things from 0 to 1. When not working directly with startups, Brett spreads the startup gospel as an adjunct professor at Columbia Business School. His teaching focuses on product strategy and entrepreneurial finance. In his spare time, he's written for Harvard Business review, launched a little website called Vice, found a rock band, and sailed thousands of miles on a 30ft sailboat.

Investing in the African Startup Ecosystem w/ Eunice Ajim, Founding Partner, Ajim Capital

Eunice is the Founding Partner at Ajim Capital. Ajim Capital is an early-stage fund that invests in pre-seed and seed stage companies that focus on using technology to fill significant economic and infrastructure gaps for consumers and enterprises across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Investing in the growing Austin Startup Ecosystem w/ Morgan Flager, Managing Partner at Silverton partners

Morgan has over 25 years of experience as a venture investor and technology executive. He joined Silverton in 2006 and has sponsored 24 investments and realized 11 acquisitions and two IPO’s. He currently sits on the boards of multiple portfolio companies. Prior to Silverton, Morgan worked with FTV Capital in San Francisco, where he focused on growth investments in software and financial technology. Morgan started his career at Ingrian Networks (acquired by SafeNet) and Kintana (acquired by Mercury Interactive Corp.).

Democratizing Access to Capital w/ Jason Kirby, MD, Thunder

Jason Kirby is the Founding Partner & Managing Director at Thunder. A platform that connects capital raisers to the right capital allocators using AI and human relationships. Thunder serves startups raising $1-$20M for their Seed/A/B+ rounds or GP raising $10M+ for their funds.

The Canadian Startup Ecosystem w/ Matt Wilson, MD Allied Venture Partners

Matt Wilson is the founder and Managing Director at Allied Venture Partners. He founded Allied VC after being a private angel investor since 2012. Allied has since grown to more than 1400 investors globally, and they've deployed over $3.5 million into early stage startups across Canada and United States.

"The Dream Investor" - Jeff Wald, Angel Investor & Limited Partner at VC firms

Jeff Wald is a serial entrepreneur, Angel investor in future of work and an LP in several Venture Capital firms. A couple of his past companies have been sold to ADP and Salesforce. He also serves as a board member to some of his portfolio companies.

"The New Builders" - The True Future of Business with Seth Levine, Managing Director, Foundry Group

Seth Levine is a co-author of The New Builders, a book that brings you Face to Face with the true future of business. A long-time venture capitalist, Seth is a co-founder and Managing Director of Foundry Group, a Boulder, CO based venture firm. He's a passionate advocate for entrepreneurship, Seth also spends time as an advisor to venture funds and companies around the world.

Metaverse, Gaming & Web3 with Eze Vidra, Managing Partner at Remagine Ventures

Eze is co-founder and Managing Partner at Remagine Ventures. Previously, he was a General Partner at Google Ventures (GV), Alphabet’s venture capital arm, the European head of Google for Entrepreneurs and the founding head of Campus London, Google’s first physical hub for startups, now available in 7 countries and 30 partner hubs. While at Google, Eze spearheaded strategic commerce partnerships in EMEA, and helped launch Google Shopping, Local Shopping, and Google Wallet in various European markets. At Remagine, he's investing in seed/pre-seed startups in the interactive entertainment, meta verse, and consumer tech with a focus on Israel.

Investing on Crowdfunding platforms - Raymond Brown, Angel Investor

Today we've Raymond Brown with us. Angel investing since early 2018 Raymond has personally invested in over 60 startups. He was the lead investor for Zestbloom which is a web3 NFT marketplace built on the Algorand which also support NFTs search capabilities blockchain. He has helped founders raise over $500K from investors. Scouted for DVC and Global millennial capital. He's been know to invest in startups before that masses. He's also interviewed over 35 founders who have raised on platforms like Republic.com and Wefunder.com on the Money Clip Podcast. Some of his well known investments are Immersed, AltoIRA, Asaak, Stacksource and Beaconsai.

Father of New York Angel Investing - David S. Rose, Founder of New York Angels & MD at Rose Tech Ventures

David S. Rose is an Inc. 500 CEO, serial entrepreneur, super angel investor, best selling author and keynote speaker who has founded or funded over 100 pioneering companies. He has been described by Forbes as "New York's Archangel", by BusinessWeek as a "world conquering entrepreneur", by Crain's New York Business as "the father of angel investing in New York", and by Red Herring magazine as "patriarch of Silicon Alley". He is the New York Times best selling author of both Angel Investing: The Gust Guide to Making Money & Having Fun Investing in Startups and The Startup Checklist: 25 Steps to a Scalable, High-Growth Business.

Fostering Entrepreneurhip at the grassroot level in India - Udit Akhouri, MD Aim Capital (Aentor)

Udit Akhouri is a co-founder & MD of Aim Capital (Aentor), a unique venture studio that partners with colleges & student entrepreneurs in India, and helps them build their startups. Udit has previously sold his past startup for $200,000. What makes his story even more exciting is that he's only 20 years old.

7 Meta Themes for Startup Investing by Martin Tobias, Founder of Incisive Ventures

Martin Tobias, the founder of Incisive Ventures. With over 25 years of investing, he has identified seven meta themes and developed a screening process that has produced superior returns. This process has grown out of the analysis of hundreds of investments and what has been common among the winners in their characteristics and his decision process. He is a serial entrepreneur who has also invested in over 250 companies as an angel, half a dozen as a venture partner at a major VC firm, and he is a limited partner in over a dozen VC funds. He is also the Founder of a leading Angel network, Element8.

How to start an Angel Syndicate? w/ Jed Ng, Founder of Angel School

Jed started Angel investing 5 years ago. He got his first exit in year 2, and his first unicorn 2 years after that. He saw syndicates as a way to scale capital, diversify risk, and earn more upside through carried interest. He learned that it's really HARD to build a syndicate from 0. So he started Angel School as a passion project to help others start their own angel syndicates.

Building the Social Capital Bank for Founders with Mat Sherman, Founder of Seedscout

Mat Sherman is the founder of Seedcout - A platform that helps founders build their investor networks. Seedscout has 800+ investors in its network that are regularly reviewing deals on Seedscout and also giving feedback to founders on how they can improve.

All you need to know about Techstars Anywhere Accelerator w/ Ileana Gonzalez

Ileana is the tip of the spear, constantly meeting entrepreneurs and innovators on the bleeding edge of technology and business in the hottest markets in the world for tech and innovation. She finds and screens pre-seed startups in preparation for admission into the Techstars Anywhere accelerator. Once startups are accepted to Techstars Anywhere, Ileana helps maintain the relationship with startups and is constantly on the lookout for opportunities to get them exposure to potential employees, investors, customers, partners and other VIP's through Techstars Anywhere.

Adam Draper, MD BoostVC, "The Contrarian Investor"

Adam Draper is the founder and managing director of Boost VC. Adam is a 2x entrepreneur and a 4th generation venture capitalist. For Adam, no idea is too crazy. He dreams of building an ironman suit and leads the deals in the wildest SciFi Tech investments - exoskeletons, jetpacks, rockets... Go big or go home. Adam co-founded Boost VC after his success as an Angel Investor in companies like Coinbase, Amplitude and Plangrid. In a previous life, he wanted to be a professional tennis player and has an odd affinity for Australians. He once drank an entire bottle of tabasco sauce (the big ones) in 43 seconds. He's 4th generation venture capitalist, 2-time entrepreneur, and most importantly, he’s a friend :)

Darrel Frater from Visible Hands VC on how they're increasing diversity & inclusion by supporting underrepresented founders, accelerator program, & more

Darrel Frater is an Investment Associate with Visible Hands VC, where he assists the Visible Hands team in managing a portfolio of companies. Before Visible Hands Darrel was a Venture Fellow at Score3 Ventures, where he helped underrepresented founders raise over $1 million in startup capital, and mentored over 60 founders since joining in 2019. Darrell is a three time founder with his latest company being a live-streaming platform for networking called The Club, which he founded in 2020. He is an MBA graduate from the College of New Jersey, where he studied strategy, innovation and leadership.

How Steph Nass of OpenVC connects founders to VCs

Steph Nass is the co-founder of OpenVC. He is on a mission to create an open gateway between founders and investors across the world. I interviewed Steph to talk about how OpenVC drives deal flow from 1200+ VCs, Angel networks, and Corporate funds.

Andrew Gluck of IrrvrntVC on raising $10 Million dollar fund, investing strategy, & more

Andrew is the General Partner of irrvrntVC, a firm focused on early-stage companies in the DTC, AdTech, and NextGen Commerce areas. He especially loves partnering with first-time founders so they can learn from the mistakes he made as a founder. Prior to that he co-founded and ran Agency Within, the fastest-growing independent DMA with a focus on direct-response, data-driven marketing. He managed close to $1BB in spend for clients like Nike, Billie, Zola, Outdoor Voices, Goop, and Etsy.