David Crow - Latest Comments in Founders & Funders – It’s a wrap

Re: Founders & Funders – It’s a wrap

Philippe Telio — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 13:22:41 -0000

David, great to have seen you at Startup Camp Montreal. 
 
I really like your ambassador concept. We all know how hard and uncomfortable it is to mingle in a crowd we are not familiar with. Add to this that it is virtually impossible to know ahead of time who would be the best connections, and just as difficult to find them even if you could identify them. 
 
Classic trade shows and events have understood this problem, and they have developed sophisticated match-making engines and even devices that help attendees book face-to-face meetings. 
 
You are spot on with your idea of ambassadors, which should be a component of any future events like Startup Camp. I will look into technology solutions that would facilitate the whole process, and let you know what I find. 
 
See you again soon.

Re: Founders & Funders – It’s a wrap

Boris Mann — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 04:26:48 -0000

Thanks for putting this together, David (and Jevon!). Was definitely worthwhile to fly out from Vancouver for. I'd like to do a 'west coast' version, perhaps in March.

Re: Founders & Funders – It’s a wrap

Austin Hill — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 16:18:46 -0000

It was great to see you last night David. I always enjoying catching up. 
 
Congratulations to you, Jevon and the Toronto Founders & Funders group on what looks like a great event. 
 
When <a href="http://01entrepreneur.ca/" target="_blank">Patrick Lauzon</a> and I organized the Montreal Founders & Funders event our goal was very similar which was to bring together Founders and Funders (Angels & VCs) in a social setting. 
 
In Montreal we had the added goal of uniting and encouraging networking among both the French and English entrepreneurs & CEOs who along with the Montreal angel community often do not network. 
 
After the work we had done in Montreal to get Barcamp and Democamp's going we noticed that while it was popular with the technology, Web startup and engineering; design & social media crowd we weren't getting the involvement of key members of our community who could act as mentors to the new emerging community of startups. 
 
By keeping our invite list hand selected for the first event we hoped to reach out to many of our 2nd & 3rd time entrepreneurs and angel investors who weren't coming out to other community events. 
 
It was a great success for us, but with a different twist. We had more VCs and Angels then we did 'Founders' in the sense we were looking for. We had a turn out of approx 75 (out of 110 invites) which was at capacity. The breakdown was about 40% Founders and 60% VC's and Angel investors. 
 
We are planning the next event soon and look forward to sharing our experience and continuing this trend. 
 
David & <a href="http://www.socialwrite.com/" target="_blank">Jevon</a>, you've already given me some great ideas to incorporate into our next event. 
 
Congrats again.

Re: Founders & Funders – It’s a wrap

Omar — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 04:57:14 -0000

The whole ambassador thing is so friggin' true. We were at The Crunchies last week and there was definitely a struggle to meet people. Having someone to take me under their wing and make the necessary introductions to the RIGHT people would be invaluable. And really, it benefits both me, and the person I'm being introduced to. 
 
Having a more organized system of ambassadors/connectors would really help out in these networking sessions.