Everyone Funding Startups

In this episode Jonathan Ortmans, President of Global Entrepreneurship Week and a Senior Fellow with the Kauffman Foundation, joins us to discuss the global growth of the entrepreneurial spirit. With millions of participants across the globe, GEW has become a top event for entrepreneurs and investors worldwide. During the podcast, we discuss Jonathan’s entrepreneurial background as wella as his path to GEW and the Kauffman Foundation. Make sure to listen in for entrepreneurial tips and Jonathan’s view of the crowdfunding market. Listen to the episode here. (save as for mp3 version). If you have any questions or comments regarding the episode, feel free to get in touch with me at brett@growvc.com. Thanks for listening!        

  “I started a company in a country I’ve never been to, in an industry I’ve never worked in, making technology that’s never been built before in the biggest financial crisis for 100 years.” – Nick Christy We talked with Nick Christy, the founder and CEO of Cintep. Cintep has gone all the way from setting up with many challenges, to joining Grow VC and successfully raising nearly $100 000 via crowdfunding, to winning nearly $700 000 in the Green Challenge this year. Nick joins us in our podcast to talk about how he got here and what the path has been like so far. Listen to the episode for Nick’s story, for how he utilized crowdfunding and raised a seed round, how he manages his relationship with the crowd investors and what that relationship is like. You’ll also hear about the hustle behind the entrepreneur, and the smarts of making it all a reality. Listen to the episode on iTunes or directly here (“save as” for mp3 version) Here is the link to the Green Challenge 2011 award ceremony, where Nick and his team are awarded the grand prize.

Stock exchanges are not often coupled with the early stages of entrepreneurship and may be quite foreign to many entrepreneurs. In this podcast episode, we talked with Bogy Skowronski about New Connect, an early stage stock exchange for growth companies in Poland. Similar to AIM in the London Stock Exchange, New Connect has a drive to become a larger solution for a recognized problem in Europe, the access to growth capital. We also discussed the growth plans, development across Europe and how entrepreneurship in central and eastern Europe has developed. We touched on how the New Connect platform has developed since it’s inception in 2007 and what trends are emerging in investments, but also what is needed for going forward. Listen to the episode here.

Image by bascha via Flickr In this podcast episode we talked with Chris Turner, Managing Director of Springwise. Springwise is a global community of new business ideas, spotted by the community. Chris has been following trends and innovation for some time and with a global perspective he shares his insights with us. For entrepreneurs trends are a powerful force and there are obvious benefits from being able to spot new markets emerging. However with trends there may also be other more important factors to take into account, than focusing solely on trends themselves. We talked about trends in general and the use of predicting future trends. Also we touched on what’s going on right now, how entrepreneurship is evolving and startups and the startup space. Listen to the episode here.

Image via Wikipedia Grow VC has recently launched the update of the service, but what’s in store next? In this episode of the Everyone Funding Startups podcast we talk with Tony and Jouko about what’s coming up in the short term, specifically the “networks” that we have cooking. If you are an active part of any actor in the startup ecosystem, then odds are you could benefit from running your own funding network. Signed up to our pilot program already, we have many incubators, accelerators, startup communities, business communities, angel networks and other investor networks, but going forward we hope to develop the networks with a variety of other actors as well. Listen to the episode here. And if you want to stay in the loop and join our pilot program, sign up here.

In this episode of the Everyone Funding Startups podcast, we spoke with Ali Ahmed, the founder of Lutebox, an entertainment hub. Lutebox is an online hangout where users can instantly stream, play, discover, manage and enjoy premium entertainment content (movies, shows, music videos, songs and games), while at the same time being able to socialize around, interact with, and share this experience with friends in real time through video chats and simulcasts. We talked about the experience of running Lutebox, of getting the vastly positive reception and winning awards in the early days of the startup, as well as the challenges of being an entrepreneur in a highly competitive landscape. Lutebox has also already closed one funding round and is in the process of closing another, listen to the episode for learning points from the fundraising process! Listen to the episode here.

Image by jakeandlindsay via Flickr In this episode of the Grow VC Everyone Funding Startups Podcast we talked with Marc Duke, who’s been involved with many startups and guiding them in terms of marketing ins and outs. With Marc, we discussed startups and marketing, what challenges arise by the inherent nature of startup companies and what the startups should be focused on. We also talked about some of the common mistakes and how to avoid these. Listen to the episode here. Read up on Marks thoughts on marketing on his blog and listen to the episode for more insights.    

Investing and what goes on behind the curtains may be confusing at times, especially for first time entrepreneurs dealing with investors. In this episode of the Everyone Funding Startups podcast, we talked with Claire Munck, Managing Director of EBAN, European Business Angel Network to get a glimpse into the angel scene in Europe and how it has evolved during the years, but also to talk about some practical topics like what opportunities and challenges angel networks face. We also talked about the EBAN organization itself, and discussed differences between the European and US trends in angel investing. It seems that a lot has happened in this field in the recent years, and that there is a lot coming in the next few years. How do angel networks view crowd funding and micro investing, listen to the episode to find out. Listen to the episode here.

In this episode of the Everyone Funding Startups podcast, we talked with Mario Healy, the founder and marketing director of InfoScroll. InfoScroll plans to grow faster than Groupon, by offering free gift certificates to targeted audiences. Listen to the episode for their plans and an overview of Mario’s experience in integration marketing. You can follow up with Infoscroll on their websites or then follow them in our community. If Groupon grew so fast by selling discounted gift certificates, how fast could InfoScroll grow by giving them away for free? Asks Mario. Listen to the episode here.

Image via Wikipedia In this episode of the Everyone Funding Startups podcast, we revisit what’s going on in Europe. With Tony Dhillon, we talked about what’s going on in London, on a general level, but also in terms of our operations at Grow VC. We also touched on some great things that are coming up. Listen to the episode here. Two great events coming up! Crowd Convention in Berlin on June the 15th. Jouko will be talking in a panel discussion at the event. Read more at: http://crowdconvention.com/ Practical Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding event on June 20th, at the Innovation Warehouse in the UK. You can also meet more of our team at the event. We also have some bigger updates coming up, in terms of our own development. One of these is what we are calling the “networks”. The idea is for partners to run their own startup funding network, using the tools and functionality we’ve created. We’re already talking with various partners who will start to develop these with us, but if you are a pioneer in your field, an incubator, accelerator, bootcamp, angel network, student group and so on, do get in touch with us for setting up your own network! There are always opportunities to get involve with our European operations too, so if you’re interested in how startup funding is evolving, get in touch with tony at tony@growvc.com.

Crowdfunding is emerging as a new financial model, but are all the methods used compatible with one another? With standardization, better collaborations and partnerships can be built with other financial institutions and the field can emerge and expand easier. This is a recording from an event where Grow VC co-founder Jouko Ahvenainen was speaking of innovative financial models and their importance for a greater impact. The event itself was held in Brussels on the 19th of May and it was organized by Loft Finance. You can find more information on the event itself here. Listen to the episode here. The topic of the event was “Crowdfunding & Finance : Discover new business models” Here is a little more information on the event itself: In the series of events held in Paris, Open Minds welcomes you this time in Brussels to discover the latest trends and new business models in online finance & crowdfunding. Leading European speakers will be detailing their startup constraints and opportunities. Explosive growth, regulation, customer acquisition and innovation will be the keywords of this event.

Adil Mohammed, founder of the Inspire Conference and experienced entrepreneur, joined us in this podcast episode to talk about the ecosystem in London for entrepreneurs and why the Inspire Conference came about. Adil’s also co-founded Launch48 among other successful ventures. Listen to this episode for insight in the the conference, but also trends and being an entrepreneur in London and how the environment is developing. It bears a resemblance to New York in a certain way, not just for entrepreneurs, but also for the developments and infrastructure for entrepreneurship. Listen to the episode here. Here’s a blurb on the Inspire Conference: Over two days (7th-8th June 2011), The Inspire Conference is bringing together some of the most brilliant minds in Technology, Creativity and Entrepreneurship from across the world to the heart of Europe’s exploding tech and creative scene in London to create The Inspire Conference featuring 30+ inspirational speakers incl. The Times, Mozilla Labs, MediaSift, Ogilvy, YouGov, Mendeley, Ushahidi, Soundcloud, Spotify and more…  Early bird tickets available if you book by 31st May 2011 and if you use promotional code ‘GROWVC10′ then you can save a further 10%! More information and conference schedule: http://theinspireconference.com

Africa is an amazing continent with a growing middle class like no other, growth in mobile adoption at amazing rates and many opportunities for long term business. Many multinationals have already realized this, with large investments in the continent of Africa for long term competitive advantages. One day Jouko asked me “What are we doing about Africa”. In this podcast episode, we talked with Munya Chiura about just that. Munya is managing our market entry to Africa and he shares with us thoughts about the continent, what we are looking forward to and what we are practically doing at the moment. Listen to the podcast here. What opportunities do you think lie in the continent of 1 Billion + people? Do you want to find out and get involved? Get in touch with munya@growvc.com to find out ways that we can work together or join our team!  

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” And woman, adds Teju Ravilochan from the Unreasonable Institute to this quote by George Bernard Shaw. These are the thoughts the Unreasonable Institute is built on, to enable and cater for the high-impact entrepreneurs solving society’s largest problems. Teju joined us in our podcast to discuss the accelerator, but also their experiences from running the program and dealing with some of the most brilliant, driven individuals. Also listen to some insights from the ecosystem in Boulder, Colorado. Listen to the episode here. Here are a couple quotes from the episode: In the interview, we really try to weed out those entrepreneurs who are motivated by ego, as opposed to by desire to serve. .. we challenge the entrepreneurs to each raise $8000 which is the cost of attending the program. But the catch is, they can’t pay it themselves.

Image via Wikipedia Entrepreneurs are largely influenced by their environments and believe it or not, there is a world of entrepreneurship outside of the strongest startup hubs in the world. In this episode of the Grow VC Everyone Funding Startups Podcast we discussed the context in Armenia, with Edgar Cross aka Edgar Khachatryan, experienced entrepreneur and advocate for developing Armenia and the surrounding region. In this episode we discussed the mentality of the people in a former USSR nation, how that has impacted the country and peoples thinking. The region used to be a center for innovation in the former USSR, also dubbed the Silicon Valley of the Soviet Union. Further we talked about challenges of operating in the region, opportunities for the future and for foreign individuals in the region. You can listen to the episode here. Follow Edgar at and read more on his activity and company at on his website.