Billions With Zero Knowledge

Last summer my friend Patrick Lauzon and I spoke about the need to create a new type of networking event that would bring together founders of technology firms, angel investors and venture capitalists.

We held the first Founders & Founders dinner last November with a private group of 75 people.   With the help of our sponsors, iNovia Capital, Neotech Capital and Montreal Startup the event raised $1,000 for the Montreal Barcamp community.

The event was a great success, and was quickly replicated in Toronto by our friends David Crow and Jevon MacDonald.

2nd Founders & Funders Montreal Announced

We are pleased to announce that we are going to be holding the second Montreal Founders and Funders dinner this coming May 14th in Montreal.

To help expand the community of people we invite to the event, we are opening up a registration form for invites allowing anyone who is a founder, angel investor or VC investor to request an invite. 

We are limited to 100 seats for the dinner.   The fee for the dinner will be $100 which will include drinks and dinner.

Given the interest we received after the first event and the fact that we won’t be able to invite everyone who has expressed interest to the dinner.  As a result we are also going to be hosting an after dinner open cocktail networking (A nice roof top terrace party).  The networking event will cost $20 and include two drink tickets.

Attendees to the dinner will be able to attend the networking event.  The networking party afterwards is open to anyone interested in the technology community in Montreal (not just Founders & Funders).

All profits from the event will go to support Barcamp events in Montreal.

How to Get An Invite

If you would like to attend the dinner, or the networking event after the dinner please fill out the following form and let us know who you are.

We will be contacting everyone with details on the location & registration for the dinner in the coming weeks.  We will also be announcing the great sponsors who are supporting us throw the event.

You can keep track of the event on the Founders and Funders blog.

If you would like to sponsor the event please feel free to contact me.

On Fri 18 Apr 2008. 1 Comment

I’m incredibly proud to be part of the new Montreal Startup fund that launched this week.

Montreal Startup is a new $3 million dollar angel-backed seed fund, that is run by John Stokes & Daniel Drouet.  Both John and Daniel are very active in the local startup community and did an incredible job in securing the support & involvement of many of the cities angels and structuring a fund that is focused on a gap in the funding market.

Alongside my friends Alan Macintosh, Jean-Sebastien Cournoyer - I am involved a both as an investor & board member of the fund.  The rest of the investors include a who’s who of the cities seasoned & successful entrepreneurs with generous investment support from Investissement Quebec

Montreal Startup will be focused on seed stage investments where we will be assisting entrepreneurs in building venture ready companies by providing critical funding and mentorship.

You can read more about the funds focus in this announcement.

Kristina Tomaz-Young at VC-TV has a two posts about the launch up.

She also has some video from this weeks press conference up which I’m including here.

As Jevon points out on StartupNorth, a $3 million dollar fund isn’t a large fund for Canada but with our focus on seed style investments and the combination of the advisory capital with capital investments for early stage projects we are confident that this will help meet a needed gap in Montreal.  I also know of similar projects being initiated in Toronto & Vancouver and we hope this fund can serve as a model for replication across Canada.

In addition to the launch of the fund, Montreal Startup announced their investment in Standout Jobs.   As Ben points out, Montreal Startup joined iNovia Capital, my own funding and participation by some other angels in the previously announced funding of Standout Jobs.  Now that the fund has launched we are able to announce this investment which is a great example of how Montreal Startup is going to be also investing alongside angels & VCs for the best new startups in Montreal.

For some more comments on the fund here are some links I found interesting,

• Marc MacLeod, CFO at MobiVox (who writes a great blog on CFO life at a Startup)
• Boris Mann writes about the fund at Bootup Labs.
• Heri at Montreal Tech Watch covers the announcement and the investment in Standout Jobs.

If you are an entrepreneur in Montreal, looking for funding then MSU is open for business.

As always, Ben has a great post on what you need to know about Startup Funding.  Ben is a great writer and shares his experiences building Standout Jobs regularly on his blog which is a must read for those with an inkling for startup life.

On Sat 15 Mar 2008. [3] Comments