Category: venture capital

business · Current Events · Technology · venture capital

The Real Opportunity to Re-Invent Healthcare

7 years ago Author By cumeadi

It’s been a while…. I’ve been quite busy over the last couple of months trying to build stuff….. I’ll explain in another post. In the mean time, I thought I’d share some content I had the chance to write for another reason on to my blog. I’ve realized I do a lot of writing but not a lot of posting. I hope with such a nice set up and audience, I’d switch that around for the rest of the year. So here’s an exercise I worked on a couple of weeks ago on defining an investment thesis for the healthcare sector. Thought it would be interesting to think of how the healthcare industry is changing as a whole and where the opportunities are for the entrepreneur, investor, and everyone else. 

Over the last 20 years, I’ve had a well rounded set of experience and exposure to the healthcare industry. I grew up in a healthcare household. My father worked for several cutting edge biotech companies and my mother has worked as a nurse in hospitals and did home care. I had cousins who all became different types of medical doctors. For several summers, I worked and interned at hospitals and pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities in my teens. I’ve been through two near-death experiences where I had to be hospitalized for an extended period of time due to mysterious diseases (a story for another day).

The healthcare industry faces some tough challenges in the next 10 to 20 years. An evolving regulatory environment and changing business models have created declining margins for public and private healthcare in the United States. While margins have declined, demand and costs have significantly increased. We’re seeing growth in our population but also a demographic transition. Baby boomers, for example, are entering a phase in their lives where healthcare will become the primary expense but with diminished savings and labor costs on the rise, how will baby boomers afford to have the same kind of care their accustomed to while dealing with a longer life expectancy and more expensive care?   

While the healthcare industry faces regulatory, demographic shifts, and margin challenges, there are some major themes that get me excited about its future. Healthcare, just like other industries, is shifting from responsive to preventative. With the proliferation of the internet, mobile, and other smart devices, healthcare is something that doesn’t just happen when you’re in a hospital. It has the potential to happen 24/7 and this has a significant implication on service delivery, business models, and product innovation.  Preventative medicine flips the traditional healthcare business model on its head and allows for an endless possibility in ways we can treat people before they ever step foot into a doctors office.

The shift to preventative health is also driven by access and the creation of information in ways we haven’t seen in the healthcare space. For example, I used 23&Me to learn about my genetic makeup/lineage but also received health reports. This information wouldn’t have been available to the average consumer or even a medical professional 10 or 15 years ago. We’ve also seen an increase in the digitization of health records too. Combined, I see a future trend of personalized and holistic healthcare service delivery that isn’t beholden to location or labor costs. This presents an amazing opportunity to solve for population growth and demographic shifts. We can improve quality of care and also deliver high-quality care at scale.

Africa · startups · Technology · venture capital

Africa Startup Ecosystems Ranks: Where does Nigeria Fall on the list?

8 years ago Author By cumeadi

Sometimes a conversation becomes a little more. I shared this a founder who was asking me my thoughts on where Nigeria’s startup ecosystems ranks in Africa. While I didn’t have key metrics, I did mention where I would go to look and how I would evaluate. If I had to make a real essay out of it, (which I’m seriously thinking about doing), I’d probably take a more in depth look at where Nigeria’s startup ecosystems needs to course correct to be a global competitor for talent, ideas, and capital.

So a couple of things… In the life cycle of an ecosystem, Nigeria’s startup ecosystem unfortunately is still in its nascent days. There’s leakages of opportunities for investors and startups due to resource and capital constraints. I do know that we’re heading toward the globalization part of the ecosystem life-cycle. We are seeing a more foreign money, ideas, and resources flow into the Nigerian ecosystem. Comparatively, SA had all of these first and has exits under its belt so I’d still put SA up top. Nigeria still falls in the second tier of startup ecosystems in Africa for the following reason; lack of research and development $ from government, low ease of doing business scores, quality of human capital, access to seed funding (or lack thereof), etc. I will say though, Nigeria has made significant strides in “community” through the cabals, co-working spaces and other community focused pillars that re being built.  This can be accelerated by an increase in the quality of education, R&D investment, and improving the ease of doing business metrics to make it easier for startups to find talent, operate,  and to make money.

Africa · business · venture capital

Re-thinking Venture Capital in Emerging Markets

8 years ago Author By cumeadi

For the last year or so, the team at tiphub has done a lot of interesting research and testing to identify key needs to accelerate entrepreneurship in emerging markets like Nigeria. One of the most common challenges, as most would assume, is access to capital. However, speak to VCs and they say they don’t see enough invest-able companies and are constantly fighting for the best opportunities with other vcs.
There seems to be a deeper disconnect that we haven’t been able to capture. In the next couple of paragraphs, I’ll discuss the actual amount of money in the VC space in Nigeria. (Nigeria will be our case study) Identify where I believe they key gaps are, and present a viable solution that will be the catalyst for start-up funding at scale.

Based on a triangulated estimate, there’s about 300 million USD under vc management in Nigeria. This does not include foreign based funds that operate in Nigeria.  To better put this in perspective, we took GDP/ VC asset ratio to give some context. Its relatively easy to see that Nigeria is lagging in vc capital as an available asset class.  This isn’t the only issue. If we look at how 3oo million USD is deployed year after year, we’ll see that most vc firms look to invest in later stages in lifecycles of most start-ups. This translates into entrepreneurs who need to prove viability and scalability before investment. However, its the chicken or the egg argument. How do companies prove the validity of an idea without funding?

There’s an abundance of growth captial in Nigeria. The key issue is the lack of early stage “market validation” capital needed to get companies off the ground. In more developed markets, entrepreneurs find early capital from the three f’s (Friends, Family and Fools). There are also more opportunities for funding through banks and government grants. Family members are willing to bet on the next big idea.  Ultimately, entrepreneurs in developed markets have access to a diversified stream of capital that 1. is at a smaller amount 2. Friendlier terms and capital structures for young companies.

The key gap, as I see it, is access to friends and family capital in emerging markets. At its core, it stems from lack of access to credit and disposable income in rising and emerging markets. This is the real gap. Early stage companies don’t have the capital to fund their first MVP or to validate their market. As a result, many ideas never get tested in the market.

VCs won’t dare touch risky early stage opportunities due to the demand for returns. There’s not enough disposable capital in emerging markets to make a dent in funding for start-ups. How do we create a bridge from pre-seed to growth stage?

In the ideal world, VCs would partner with foundation and governments to fund small scale experiments/ projects. These projects would either fail or succeed and would move to a scaling phase. For example, if we took Nigeria as a case study, the Nigerian government would match $100 million USD with the Elumelu Foundation’s TEEP program focused more on grants to validate….lets say… 2000 ideas. After a year, 400 (20%) of those companies would be invest able opportunities. 400 is a decent pipeline. Key issue here is sustainability. 200 million dollars a year to identify 400 invest able companies is a tall order. However, 100 million dollars  a year vs  the cost of unemployment  in a place like Nigeria seems like a drop in the bucket.

Maybe later, we can also talk about ways to jump start merger and acquisition activity so people see the light at the end of their investment

Key points to remember:

  1. There’s a lot of money in emerging markets.
  2. The key to differentiation in the early stages of a company is what they’ve learned vs their competitors. Cashflow and other financial indicators don’t start to matter until the later stage.
  3. Entrepreneurs need flexible and attainable early stage capital to validate their ideas.
  4. Private/Public partnerships have to find a way to work together to create the bridge for early stage companies.

Random statistic to leave you with: Nigeria ranks 170 out of 189 for raising finance for a business and 129th (up 9 places since 2014) in starting a business.

Leadership · Self-Revelation · venture capital

Content Diet

8 years ago Author By cumeadi

Your time is extremely valuable. What you choose to read is even more valuable. On my end, I find subscribing to newsletters beneficial to my content diet. I often go for three types of content:

  1. Content that helps you/your company operate better.
  2. Content that helps you understand what others in your industry and sector are thinking.
  3. Content that helps you think more existentially.

Here’s a list of the top 20 newsletters I subscribe to…Its a mix of vc, startup, and randomness. They all do a bit of all three.

  1. CB Insights is a company which leverages data to make sense of private markets. Its like buzzfeed for venture capital/ private equity. I’ve been rocking with them since day one. They have an awesome platform and a great newsletter.
  2. Mattermark is another data company which helps vc/private equity types capture data on the private markets. They have great newsletter content that brings unique editoral perspectives from investors, operators, and policy wonks.
  3. Pitchbook is another data company for private markets. It’s like the Bently of data companies for private markets. They’ve improved their newsletter over time but Pitchbook has always had the most technical perspective on private markets out of the data companies I’m familar with.
  4. First Round Capital, to me, has the best editorial team in the venture capital industry. They bring experts, operators, investors, and other stakeholders to the table and create super informative content for founders. I’ve learned so much from their long posts.
  5. Monday Morning Macro (Y Combinator) Good round up of information on whats going on in YC land and how they are thinking. The venture capital space is like sheep leading sheep and firms Like YC are the lead sheep so its nice to see the things they are pointing out and working on.
  6. StrictlyVC is a newsletters which has its pulse on all things funding and tech. I don’t know why this is on the list.
  7. Tomasz Tunguz is probably one of the brightest VCs in the game. He has great posts about fundraising, growing saas businesses like they are plants waiting to be harvested, and great data insights. He’s brilliant.
  8. Andreesen Horrowitz newsletter has a frontier perspective on industry and emerging technology. Ben and Marc also have interesting blog posts every once in a while with great podcasts. They could do a better job on being consistent but I believe they are busy raising money, closing deals, and supporting thier portfolio companies.
  9. Bothsides of the Table is cool because Mark Suster is an investor and founder so he brings a really interesting perspective on operational experiences but then how to communicate with investors and what he looks for.
  10. Hunter Walk’s 99% Humble, 1% Brag is a blog/newsletter focused on Hunter’s Homebrew Fund. He brings a unique perspective to a ton of things including investment, diversity, his portfolio companies. Hunter is really approachable too. Reach out to him and he’ll most likely respond back.
  11. The Plug is the “difinitive” daily newsletter highlighting the voices of black founders and business leaders in tech news from around the web. One of the few indeed. Also a really good channel to get information out.
  12. Iafrikan Newsletter is one of the still standing technology, investment, and entrepreneur news content in Africa. The are a little spotty with their newsletter but it seems they have great content on their website.
  13. Results Junkies is kept by Paul Singh. We was the MD of 1776, Founder at Disruption Corporation, and was a partner at 500 Startups. He has quick and dirty knowledge nuggets in his newsletters and has a great program where he travels the United States and works on entrepreneurship ecosystems and invests. I definitely would like to do something like this in Africa. Little known fact…. Paul is African. He was born in Kenya.
  14. Term Sheet is more for growth stage deals but is very helpful to know whats getting captial when you’re looking for it.
  15. 500 startups Distrosnack delivers a bite sized blitz scaling guide into your mailbox on a weekly basis. Super helpful
  16. Growthhackers Weekly provides a great curation of top posts from the Growthhackers website. Imagine the thoughts and posts of top “growth hackers” in one newsletter. It’s a treasure trove of tips and resources.
  17. Community.is Great Newsletter about building community. You won’t regret joinging this newsletter list. A lot of product, marketing and great community driven content.
  18. Stratechery I don’t pay for much but when I do, I pay for Stratechery daily updates from Ben Thompson. Let’s just put it this way….. Ben is fully supported and well paid by his subcription model. He’s gotten some of the best minds in the world listening and looking for what he’s got to say on a daily basis.
  19. Farnam Street I might have saved the best for second to last. I’ve gotten a majority of by book reccomendations, big picture questions, and list of people to take out to cofee. This post helps on the existential front.
  20. tiphub newsletter ? We’re re-vamping our newsletter. If you haven’t noticed, this list lacks the African/ African diaspora investor/ operator perspective. We think we can be the smart/nerdy yet cool analysis stakeholders need to be great. Let us know what you think . Like seriously, reach out to one of the partners and let us know what you’d like to see.

You are what you read…. This is what comes to my mailbox most of the time. I’d love to hear other newsletters I should sign up for.

business · startups · venture capital

On Fundraising

8 years ago Author By cumeadi

 

Had the holidays so I took a break…. This week is the Bola special. It’s dedicated to fundraising like a boss.

For those who don’t want to read everything, here are the 4 takeaways on how to fundraise. I will most likely go super granular on each part in the future.

  1. Know why you need to fundraise
  2. Know who you’re fundraising from
  3. Have your fundraising game plan and have your end game in mind
  4. ABC. Always Be Closing

Know why you need to fundraise

Most founders will say they need to fundraise because they need money. While for many, that’s always the case, sometimes cutting cost, going after a more attainable growth trajectory, or eating what you kill (customer driven growth) is a better option. The metric most used to identify what needs to be spent is milestones. From there, understand how much each milestone will cost the company (people, time, $$$). Understanding milestones and use of funds along with market comparables will ensure you’re in a better decision to identify whether you need to fundraise or not and will also make your justification to family and friends, angels, and vcs sound more persuasive.

Know who you’re fundraising from

When I engage venture capital firms or angels, I try to know as much as I can about them…. How long have they been in existence? Who have they invested in? What is their thesis? Who are the key decision makers? What is it like to have them as an investor? Founders need to approach investment as if your hiring. You want to do as much due diligence on the investors you’re interested in as they will on you.

It’s also important to start the investment conversation before you need money. You’ll get a chance to “date” the investor a little bit and see if there is a fit. Also, they’ll get to date you and see if there’s interest. I normally advise reaching out and developing/creating these relationships 6-8 months before you need to fundraise.

I know the most common question after the last two paragraphs is “Where do I get all this information from?” Well, I’m glad you asked. The first place to start is to look at your networks. Who do you know and who do your friends know? I often start with all my friends in business school, law school or people I met at investment conferences. From there, I can get warm intros. If I don’t know anyone or need to know more information about their firm, I usually start with their website. Hopefully, you’ll see their investment thesis, portfolio companies and partners. From there, you can use LinkedIn, CrunchBase, Mattermark (sign up for a free trial and get information on all the investors you need…don’t tell them I told you that though.) or other platforms like VC4Africa, Angel List, Pitchbook (very expensive, find someone in the private equity industry who has access)

There are three strategies I’ve seen from founders raising capital for their company,

  • Make as much noise as possible through marketing and PR that potential investors will come talk to you (seldom effective but works.)
  • Research and develop a target list based on investment profile (geography, size, stage, industry) and reach out via warm intros.
  • Get an email list of potential investors and send (cold emails).

I’m sure most people have use a combination of all three.

Have a realistic perspective on how long and how much effort it takes to fundraise

Once you’ve made the decision to fundraise, you’ve got to develop a fundraising plan. You should understand and document the following:

  • How much you’re fundraising, valuation, terms, and how you intend to use the funds.
  • The type of investors you’re going after and clip you’re accepting
  • A real timeline: when you’re starting, when you intend to close, and when you really intend to close
  • How you’re going to reach out to investors… Communication strategy, relationship building and how you’re going to gain access to them

In putting your plan together, be realistic about how long the process will take. There’s one company I’m working with now and it’s taken 9 months to finally get the company into fundraising mode. Sometimes crafting the narrative is more than just words, it means acquiring the right customers, bringing on the right team members, or evaluating a new business model.

ABC. Always be Closing

In fundraising mode, those who are focused on it (should not be the whole organization, will take away from operations) should be focused on driving activities which will get interested parties down the funnel. I believe fundraising is essentially like sales for your company but to a different customer and product. Every activity should be tracked to bringing people more information to get an investment decision. This doesn’t give you the license to be entitled and pushy, but it does allow you the opportunity to be realistic and upfront to investors where you are in the process (to a certain extent…will follow up on a negotiations post)

Don’t half step

To conclude, fundraising is a skill and expertise that is essential to any company. You must learn how to go through it and how to be successful. To do that, you’ve got to be fully committed. An alternative way to think about fundraising is encapsulated in a saying I heard in my previous experience at Fortify VC, “The best investor is the customer.” You’d be really surprised but sometimes, customers are willing to bend over or pay for the idea of a problem being fixed. I know business models can vary but getting customers to pay ahead to create value is something which has been around for a long time. That’s a conversation for another day.

Toolkit

Here’s an example of an excel sheet I use to track engagement. Some of you may be fancy and have a crm to do this for you.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1ghPJOUGlD95oEQV_tq8QYYgiSouCQilnXEwB8UvmLaY/edit?usp=sharing

I use mixmax to track my emails and create templates for broad distribution.

I just got hip to a new investor crm/manager that looks cool. I smell a clone opportunity for African markets (writes down in idea notebook) https://foundersuite.com/