Phil, Very nice idea. I'm wondering whether some of the start-ups might benefit as much from the VC experience as the potential to pitch/present to prospective customers, particularly given how all of a sudden cash is king again? ;-)
I'm familiar with a couple of expo type events that are running around the place. Unlike the TC50 experience where they do it for the news/publicity, these sorts of events charge $$$ - often big $$$ - for people to exhibit. Often the companies who do have big marketing budgets, and I'm thinking a lot of them have been slashed/trimmed or redirected into SEM and other more measurable things the last few months. The problem is, these expos need to have a sufficiently good volume of interesting exhibitions to encourage the people they spend a lot of their own money getting along to think it was worth coming, so they'll come back next year. So, I'm wondering out loud: would our SBA community be able to field a group of 20-30 companies, for a more modest, reasonable fee (since exhibition centre space isn't likely to be dolled out for free), to participate in a special demo-pit and pitching area/day/morning as an adjunct to something like CeBIT Australia? Potentially, the NSW Department of State and Regional Development (which has started funding clusters, which is what our group kinda is, just a lot more decentralised) would be prepared to kick in the can so that any hard $$$ costs can be reduced even further. This is all just shooting the breeze at the moment, but is there demand to do this sort of thing in conjunction with another event (where they're already a lot of a hard stuff, like space, booths, insurances, publicity and stuff already being taken care of)? Geoff -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Phil Sim Sent: Tuesday, 3 February 2009 5:30 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [SiliconBeach] Re: question about startup funding in Australia Okay, here's a proposal... What we need is something akin to the TechCrunch50 event and Demopit. I did the Demopit last year and it was an awesome experience and I think its a fantastic model to borrow from. We have somewhere between 10 and 20 companies present that are looking for money. We assemble an audience exclusively of Angels and VCs. This is obviously the key for it working but if the combined professional network of silicon beach can't bring together a reasonable audience, then we truly are screwed. Each company gets 5 minutes to present and give their pitch. Following the pitches, everyone drops back to a demo area where the investors can float around, ask questions and make connections. Even if nobody gets a dime, the startups get to practice their pitching, make connections and build some relationships that perhaps might bear fruit at another time. The investment community becomes that much more accessible and visible, which I think is key. It could be done extremely cheaply especially if the space can be donated (perhaps by someone like one of the technology parks?) and wouldn't take a great deal of organising. On Mon, Feb 2, 2009 at 4:36 PM, Deniss <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi, > > I was looking for events in Sydney where I could meet > potential partners or investors for a startup and it looks like I > couldn't find much. I've read about Startup Camp II, but couldn't find > any information about the next one. Same with WebJam. > On http://www.startup-australia.org there are links to techstars and Y > Combinator what is good, but that's not AUS. > The big question for me as a newcomer is how startups raise money here > in Sydney? What resources are available? > > > Thanks very much, > Deniss > > > > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Silicon Beach Australia mailing list. No lurkers! It is expected that you introduce yourself: http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia/browse_thread/thread/99938a0fbc691eeb To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/silicon-beach-australia?hl=en?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
