21,224 Members | 30,208 Reviews
6,719 Ratings - 9,621 Comments
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This firm has grown to be one of the best in Canada. I've been working with Shawn Abbott for the past year and have nothing but good things to say.
Private: 515 Chars
These guys have put $10M+ into my company over a few years of working together.
Sometimes they're arrogant. Sometimes they check themselves and listen.
They have a good brand that's respected in the industry. It's not the best but it does help.
Everyone here is smart. Some of them have an ego to match.
There's internal firm politics. It's not great. But it's not the worst either.
It's a good, but not great, firm. You could do a lot, lot worse.
Private: 569 Chars
Private: 2862 Chars
Typical revolving door for greedy old farts with delusion of relevance and expertise. Their idea of state of the art in search is attensity or other assorted crap like that. Better than the now defunct Angels' Forum -- which I observed closely -- they are there to entertain themselves, and waste your time.
They cannot even keep to their own timetable.
Private: 423 Chars
We raised our A round led by Amish and FirstMark. Due diligence is not for the faint of heart. You probably will not be examined this deeply by others even at B or C round. I have been through M&A due diligence and it was easier.
Amish will also beat you up on terms. He is a shark, this is his business, his team is no joke, and considering he sits on boards of 18 companies, he is better at this funding biz than you will be. Suit up, have a good fight on what really matters, and plan to make back what you were beat up on later down the road.
Now that A round is way behind us, I can tell you that his help, and that of his team, is worth it. He has "nose in hands out" style. He will ask a ton of questions, he will be right there to look at every detail of strategic decision and make sure you aren't missing anything. He will question your data, he will question your hypothesis, his right hand man David is at maniacal level with details. And I have learned to really appreciate it. Amish and his crew have immense impact on our business. He will push you to upgrade your skills daily, he will call you out on your BS, but the context of it all is why you need to grow thicker skin and bigger ears - he is a kingmaker. Look at his track record, it speaks for him.
Also, look at FM team. Not your usual viagra crowd. Everyone from associates to partners - top notch.
Also, come rain or shine or snow, he will be at your board meeting, he will come prepared, and for those couple hours your company is the only thing that exists for him and you have all of his attention, skills, and experience at your disposal. No answering of texts or emails, no taking phone calls, etc.
I do not think they exist anymore.
Most angel groups are revolving doors for the greedy people with the organizers making money. One of their angels Mike complained to me that he had lost $4M in investments. The more reputable ones that got suckered into joining -- former CEO of Rambus and former CFO of Maxim (I think), will not even list it on their Linkedin as an experience.
Carol Sands had a Halo Fund in parallel with Angels' Forum. She would invest the funds money in what the Angels' thought were the best deals, but would not tell them that she is also investing. Her background in entrepreneurship was None. Halo Fund's track record dismal. Last I look
PTV added Rick Anderson (not listed) six to eight years ago and he has made a significant difference. Very well connected and very knowledgeable of the medtech space.
Sach and Mike are top notch when it comes to assisting companies. They not only support companies from their first investments into them, but also help to ensure that there is a strategic path towards best opportunities for the company and employees involved. Although there was one poor comment written above, you should take that with a grain of salt, as this is a group that can help you scale with the right resource assistance when needed.
We went to them through a referral.
Though they started off slowly, they moved through diligence pretty quickly. Even early on, they mentioned that they would bring in a new CEO which seemed strange (as our CEO had gotten us thus far). Our founding team had discussed this issue earlier amongst ourselves and felt that we would bring in someone for a Series B or C. So, while we all (including our CEO) were OK with it, we felt it was rude as it was suggested early on without giving him a chance.
While we had Alpha customers in a particular vertical, one partner insisted that was a wrong market. Another partner (who was in that vertical) told us to ignore the first partner.
They went through a very detailed diligence and spoke with our customers and references. Their own network of CTO/CIOs seemed rather modest and it was not clear whether their network would be valuable.
While they claim to be "white space", this is completely FALSE. They are quite risk averse and the term sheet was designed to further minimize their risk.
They also explicitly tried to set one founder against another (asking him privately "Are you sure you have enough equity?").
They had some average EIRs who they seemed to want to push onto us. They seemed to position these pushes like suggestions, but their attempts were clumsy.
We did get a term sheet from them. We wanted a syndicate. Interestingly, many of the other VCs we talked to asked if they could bring in their own syndicate partner. To their credit, the term sheet did NOT have egregious terms). There were some issues that penalized the entrepreneurs too much and we negotiated on some of those.
While we got a term sheet and had initial agreement on most points, the deal did not go through. Their approach seemed sleazy. In fact, based on our conversations with the VC, our lawyer (from the largest bay area startup law firm) told us that the founders should not be surprised if they are fired to allow the VC to recoup some of the (founders') equity stakes.
Many of my experiences seem to mirror previous comments. I will not go to them again.
Private: 515 Chars